Wilbur Wright College Settles Age-Discrimination Suit

The City Colleges of Chicago’s Wilbur Wright College will give $40,000 and a full-time job to Rosemarie Crane, an adjunct English instructor who claims she was denied a tenure-track position because of her age, the Chicago Sun-Times reports:

Rosemarie Crane was 68 when she was denied the opportunity to interview for two full-time English Department openings in 2004 and 2005, according to U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission lawyers who filed suit on her behalf.

A 29-year-old and 30-year-old were hired instead, marking the third and fourth time in her 11 years with Wright that Crane was passed over for a job that would have put her on the tenure track, the attorneys said.

When Crane asked the former Wright English Department chair why she wasn’t hired for a full-time job, she was told, “You would have been hired, but it was your age. We are not supposed to discriminate because of age, but, let’s face it, we do,” said EEOC trial attorney Jeanne Szromba.

Wright, one of the City Colleges of Chicago, admitted no wrongdoing in the federal court deal announced Monday. Under it, Wright also will give its entire English Department age discrimination training and will post the resolution of the case and the EEOC phone number on the department bulletin board for two years.