Employment Practices Decisions Archive: 1937 - 1995, EMPLOYMENT-PRACTICES 27 EPD ¶32,373, Debra Beck, Plaintiff v. Quiktrip Corporation, Defendant., (Nov. 06, 1981), (Nov. 6, 1981)

Debra Beck, Plaintiff v. Quiktrip Corporation, Defendant.

United States District Court, District of Kansas.Civil Action No. 79-1434, November 6, 1981

Title VII--Civil Rights Act of 1964

Failure to Promote--Sex Discrimination--Pregnancy Consideration.

--A female claimant’s removal from her employer’s management training program right after her supervisors had optimistically expressed their view that she would make a good manager was discriminatorily motivated by her pregnancy. Evidence that she was removed shortly after advising the employer of her condition, of the employer’s general reaction to the news, and demonstrating the employer’s underutilization of females in management positions indicated that the employer’s newly found misgivings about claimant’s ability were a mere pretext to cloak a discriminatory attitude.

Back reference.-- ¶546.16 .

Discharge--Sex Discrimination--Pregnancy Consideration.

--The discharge of a pregnant female employee constituted discrimination on the basis of sex where it was motivated by her condition and her vocal suspicions that she had previously been removed from a management line of progression because of the pregnancy. The employer’s assertions that its action was prompted by absences and abusive behavior could not be credibly supported by the facts.

Back reference.-- ¶618.674 .

Remedies--Back Pay and Reinstatement--Pregnancy Leave Provision.

--Relief in the form of a reinstatement offer with back pay is afforded a discharged employee denied employment opportunity due to her pregnancy. Pay will be based on a reconstruction of claimant’s probable employment history absent the discrimination less six weeks of pay for time claimant would have been forced to spend on pregnancy leave.

Back reference.-- ¶2605.43 .

Jim Lawing, Wichita, Kansas, for Plaintiff.

Martin W. Bauer (Martin, Pringle, Fair, Davis & Oliver), Wichita, Kansas, and Thomas Robertson (Kothe, Nichols and Wolfe), Tulsa, Oklahoma, for Defendant.

Kelly, J.: This is a civil rights action brought pursuant to Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. §2000e et. seq., for lost wages and other damages suffered by the plaintiff, Debra Beck, when she was removed from defendant Quiktrip Corporation’s Manager Training Program and ultimately discharged by the defendant. Plaintiff contends both of these actions were motivated by the plaintiff’s pregnancy. Quiktrip Corporation’s defense is that it has never discriminated in any manner against the plaintiff because of her sex or her pregnancy. The trial of this matter began on October 15, 1981, and after a break it was concluded on October 22, 1981. In a disparate treatment case such as this, the plaintiff is required to prove a prima facie case of sex discrimination, and once proven, the defendant is required to articulate a nondiscriminatory reason for its actions. In the case at bar, this Court determined that both the prima facie case and a satisfactory nondiscriminatory reason for the defendant’s actions were established. However, at the close of the parties’ evidence and oral arguments, the Court found that it was persuaded by a preponderance of the evidence that the defendant’s rebuttal of the plaintiff’s prima facie case was merely a pretext for sexual discrimination due to pregnancy, and consequently judgment shall be entered in the plaintiff’s favor.

Findings of Fact

1. The plaintiff is a white female who commenced her employment with the defendant on May 5, 1978, as a store clerk.

2. Her principal general supervisor from her first day of work until March 13, 1979, was George Brumback. The plaintiff was promoted and eventually rose to the position of first assistant manager.

3. The defendant corporation has its corporate headquarters in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and as of 1978 operated over 50 convenience stores in its Wichita division. Each store has its own store manager. The Wichita division is divided into areas with seven to eight stores in each area, and these stores are administered by an area supervisor.

4. Before 1979, the defendant had established a management training program to facilitate the selection and training of new store managers. The practice in the defendant’s Wichita division was that the area supervisors would meet when a new trainee was needed and each would nominate the most qualified first assistant manager from each area. After discussion of the various nominees, the supervisors would vote to select the best candidate.

[Training]

5. In approximately February 1979, George Brumback, the plaintiff’s area supervisor, informed her that he had nominated her for the management training program and that the supervisors had approved her for the program. After discussing this opportunity with her spouse, she elected to enter the program.

6. The plaintiff’s training was to proceed according to written guidelines over a 2-week, i.e., 10 working day, period. (Pl. Ex. 1). After the formal 2-week training program, the trainee was then to be observed in the actual management of the store. Ideally, after an additional two weeks of practical experience in managing a store, the trainee would then be qualified to operate a store on his or her own. However, during the course of this case it was shown that after the first month of training, manager-trainees could spend an additional six weeks to six months in the training store before being placed in their own store.

7. The plaintiff’s training period commenced March 13, 1979, at a “training store” located at the intersection of Harry Street and Rock Road, in Wichita, Kansas. Her initial manager-trainer was Randy Wright.

8. It was the manager-trainer’s responsibility to summarize the trainee’s status after each day of the initial 2-week training period. Mr. Wright summarized the progress of plaintiff’s training daily, and his final conclusion was contained in his report after day 9:

Debbie has enough talent to make manager. She should be ready to be manager in 2 or 3 weeks. At this time she needs help. My area of concern is her extending of tickets and writing orders. However, both can be corrected with time. Debbie has talent and I’m sure in time she will make a qualified manager.

Before working with the plaintiff, Mr. Wright testified he had trained five or six managers over a one and one-half year period. He was not able to complete an additional two weeks of observing the plaintiff actually managing the training store, however, since he was promoted to a new position after the plaintiff’s initial two weeks in the training program.

9. Mr. Wright was replaced by a completely inexperienced manager-trainer, Bruce Lang, on April 2, 1979. When Mr. Lang took over in his new role, he was instructed by his area supervisor, Richard Slivocka, to observe the plaintiff in her management of the store. Lang was instructed not to make daily reports on the plaintiff. Mr. Lang’s only written report regarding the plaintiff’s training, which although undated was typed on approximately April 15, 1979, contains the following commentary:

Debbie has now been working with me for two weeks. While this is not enough time to make a final decision, it is enough time to note problems that have surfaced. Before I begin I would like to emphasize that Debbie does have the potential to become a good manager.

First, Debbie needs help in writing orders in the store. I have checked her orders and they are very weak. What really bothered me was that there was some merchandise omitted that we were out of on the shelf. To me this indicated that she is not willing to put in the time and effort that it takes to write a good order.

Also, at the end of the week several tickets were omitted from the report. The tickets were not all extended on the invoices. What disturbed me about this is that I emphasized the importance of extending all tickets earlier in the week. She needs to listen to people when they have something that affects operation of the store.

In summary, Debbie will be a good manager with work. However, she still remains three or four weeks away. At this time she has not developed her management skills to maximum potential. She needs to learn what is important to become a good manager, working tickets, entering them on time, and the other duties of a manager. I find myself having to tell her what needs to be done. She is not self-sufficient at this time and would not be able to independently run her own store. Given time she can develop these skills. She needs work on basic management skills.

(Pl. Ex. 3).

10. Both the evaluation by Randy Wright and Bruce Lang indicate an optimistic view of the plaintiff’s future as a manager. In essence, Mr. Wright stated that plaintiff had all the talents and qualifications to make manager except in the area of ordering merchandise and extending tickets, i.e., reconciling merchandise orders with the merchandise when delivered by suppliers. Mr. Wright stated that he was sure that with two weeks or so additional experience, she would have no problem with ordering or extending tickets. From Mr. Lang’s written report, it appears that plaintiff still had some problems in these two areas, but it likewise appears that he did not take an active role in helping the plaintiff correct this problem. In the Court’s view, the collective reports suggest the plaintiff was indeed in line for a management position and only needed the benefit of a limited amount of additional experience and supervision in the two problem areas. The plaintiff established through an examination of the reports of other manager-trainees that these two areas were also problems after the first two weeks of formal training and that these trainees eventually became managers. By any standard, plaintiff’s evaluations exceeded or at least equaled the concluding reports of other successful trainees.

[Pregnancy]

11. Shortly before April 24, 1979, plaintiff became aware that she was pregnant. On her next scheduled work day, which was Wednesday, April 24, she told Mr. Lang about her pregnancy. The plaintiff testified that Mr. Lang seemed troubled by this information and that his response was that she should not tell anyone about her condition. Another employee of the defendant working at the store then, Susan Dunagan, testified that this was indeed Mr. Lang’s response.

12. The next day, April 25, Lang told Richard Slivocka, plaintiff’s area supervisor, that the plaintiff was pregnant, and the plaintiff stated his response was that her pregnancy would cause problems regarding her management training and that he would have to speak with John Cly, the operations manager, about it. Although Mr. Slivocka denied making this statement, the plaintiff’s version was again corroborated by the testimony of Susan Dunagan.

13. On the following Friday, April 27, at 7:00 A.M., the plaintiff completed working a double shift (16 hours). Since it was payday, she came back to the store in the afternoon for her check and was met there by Mr. Slivocka. Slivocka told her that he and Mr. Cly had conferred and had agreed to remove her from the management program.

14. At trial, plaintiff placed into evidence the defendant’s EEOC reports for the years 1976 through 1978, for the Wichita division. The 1976 report (Pl. Ex. 15) indicates when the report was filed the defendant had 46 store managers, of which five were women. The 1977 EEOC report (Pl. Ex. 13) indicated that when this report was filed the defendant’s Wichita division had 46 store managers, of which four were women. The EEOC report for 1978 for the Wichita division (Pl. Ex. 14) indicates that at the time the report was filed there were 55 managers, of which one was a woman. All of these three reports reveal an absence of women supervisory employees above the store manager level in the defendant’s Wichita division.

15. After the plaintiff had been removed from the training program and placed in another store, No. 370, an acquaintance of the plaintiff and her husband, Michael Flower, was the recipient of a casual remark by the store manager, Roy Brockmeier. At that time, in early May 1979, Mr. Flower was an officier of the Wichita Police Department. While taking a break from his patrol, he stopped at Store No. 370 to inquire regarding employment with the defendant. During the conversation Flower discussed advancement, and Flower mentioned plaintiff’s placement in the manager training program. To his surprise, Brockmeier responded that plaintiff was no longer in the program, and Brockmeier also stated with a smile that the plaintiff “would have been a manager if she hadn’t gotten pregnant.” While it appeared to Flower that Brockmeier was smiling while making this remark, it also appeared that he was not joking.

16. Since the plaintiff had all the qualifications to become a manager by April 27, 1979, except for a lack of experience in ordering and reconciling tickets, and given the evidence that other trainees were given much more time than received by the plaintiff to correct such deficiencies in the training store, this Court is persuaded that the plaintiff was removed from the defendant’s management training program because of her pregnancy. The Court also finds significant the scant numbers of women store managers in the defendant’s Wichita division and their complete absence in the upper management echelons.

17. After removal from the management training program, the plaintiff was immediately transferred to Store No. 370 at the intersection of Oliver Street and Lincoln Street, in Wichita, Kansas, where her area supervisor was Mr. George Brumback. Her manager at the new store was Roy Brockmeier.

18. In early May the plaintiff developed the suspicion that her removal from the management program was caused by her pregnancy, and she questioned Mr. Brumback regarding this. Mr. Brumback responded that he had no knowledge regarding the reasons for her removal but that he would talk to Mr. Cly regarding her inquiries. Shortly thereafter, Slivocka and Brumback met with the plaintiff and presented her with Bruce Lang’s report regarding her and the explanation that she was removed from the management program because of problems with ordering and extending tickets.

[Discharge]

19. The plaintiff continued working in Store No. 370 as a first assistant manager until the middle of May 1979. On May 14 her son was seriously ill, and at approximately 8:00 A.M. she tried to call her supervisor, Mr. Brumback, at his office. When she was informed that he was unavailable, she explained to the telephone receptionist that she was in a hurry to get her son to a doctor, and the receptionist assured the plaintiff that she would be able to relay the message to Mr. Brumback that the plaintiff would not be able to begin work at 2:00 P.M. that afternoon.

20. The receptionist located Mr. Brumback shortly thereafter and he arranged for a replacement before 11:00 A.M. that morning. At approximately 11:00 A.M., Mr. Brumback made his regular call on Store No. 370 and informed Roy Brockmeier that the plaintiff had called and left a message that she would not be in at 2:00 P.M. He then instructed Brockmeier to call the plaintiff to find out if she could come in later in the day and also to find out why she did not call Mr. Brockmeier with this information.

21. When the plaintiff answered Brockmeier’s telephone call, he asked her why she did not call him first. Plaintiff responded that she had called Brumback with such information before and had never been reprimanded for doing so. Tempers on both sides of the conversation escalated and plaintiff exclaimed: “Who do you think you are, God?” At that time, Mr. Brockmeier immediately terminated the conversation.

22. On the morning of May 17, Mr. Brockmeier called the plaintiff and asked that she meet with him and Brumback that afternoon. She arrived at Store No. 370 at 2:00 P.M. When she arrived Brumback told her that he was disgusted with her and advised that she should apologize to Mr. Brockmeier, and the plaintiff complied with his request. While doing so, the plaintiff stated that she did not appreciate Mr. Brockmeier’s behavior during the telephone conversation. At the end of this conference, Brumback told plaintiff that she was fired, and he requested that she sign a discharge notice, which she refused to do. (Pl. Ex. 7). The reasons stated on this notice for the plaintiff’s discharge were: (a) absenteeism, i.e., “absenteeism and taking off early;” (b) misconduct, i.e., “being abusive with manager;” (c) lack of cooperation, i.e., “failing to call manager when missing work;” and (d) attitude, i.e., “verbal disrepect to manager.”

23. The defendant corporation in 1979 had a policy and procedure handbook (Def. Ex. B). According to this book, disciplinary actions within the defendant corporation varied from consultations with the erring employee to written warning notices, and depending upon the severity of the breach, discharge. The plaintiff introduced in evidence a sufficient number of examples from the defendant’s records to establish that as a practice, a wayward employee received written notices of unsatisfactory conduct before he or she was ultimately discharged. In the plaintiff’s case, she never received any written warnings from the defendant.

24. The plaintiff’s only instance of absenteeism, other than May 14, occurred one late evening while working at Store No. 370 after she became prenant. With one-half hour remaining on her shift, she became ill and called and requested that her replacement come in one-half hour early to relieve her. On that evening Mr. Brockmeier was not working and she was in charge of the store. Since it was late, she arranged for her replacement without consulting Brockmeier and Brumback. The only instance involving the plaintiff leaving work early involved a day during her management training program when she left the store to deliver its grocery order. On both occasions she made sure the store would be attended to by another employee.

25. The only example of the plaintiff’s misconduct presented by the defendant was her comment to Mr. Brockmeier on May 14. The defendant’s policy book states that misconduct includes such acts as insubordination, theft, deliberate and willful violation of corporate rules, or other gross misconduct. The plaintiff presented numerous examples from the defendant’s records of employees who were only discharged after written warnings for such things as chronic tardiness, inventory shortages, and mishandling of cash.

26. The only example of the plaintiff’s lack of cooperation was on May 14 when she did not call Mr. Brockmeier, her manager, when she intended to miss work that day. However, the defendant’s policy and procedure book, although extensive, does not state a rule regarding whom should be called in such a situation. Although Mr. Slivocka and Mr. Brockmeier stated that the store manager should always be called, the plaintiff testified that she had called her supervisor on such occasions before without reprimand. Mr. Wright stated that he thought an employee who intended to miss work should call both the store manager and the supervisor. Since the plaintiff had an emergency at home, this Court finds that the plaintiff was not uncooperative when she attempted to call her supervisor and left the message that she would miss work.

27. The only instance of a bad attitude exhibited by the plaintiff was her sarcastic remark to Brockmeier on May 14 in their telephone conversation.

28. After being discharged by the defendant, plaintiff applied for unemployment compensation benefits, which the defendant contested. The plaintiff appealed her initial denial of benefits and after a hearing the unemployment compensation referee awarded her full benefits. The referee found that although plaintiff perhaps acted rashly when she spoke with Mr. Brockmeier on May 14, this amounted to only an isolated instance of unsatisfactory conduct and did not constitute such a breach of duty that would warrant denying her unemployment compensation benefits.

29. Given the wholly unsubstantial cause for discharging the plaintiff, as presented by the defendant, the Court concludes that the actual motive for firing the plaintiff was that she had become a troublesome employee only because she complained and told other employees she was removed from the management program because of her pregnancy. Consequently, the Court finds that her discharge was not motivated by any significant breach of duty owed as an employee, but rather, was caused by the defendant’s adverse reaction to her pregnancy.

Legal Discussion

In a “disparate treatment” case such as the one at bar, the plaintiff is required to prove by a preponderance of the evidence a discriminatory intent. Grano v. Dept. of Development of City of Columbus, [24 EPD ¶31,424 ] 637 F.2d 1073, 1081 (6th Cir. 1980). Although it is difficult to achieve this through direct evidence, it is usually accomplished through presenting circumstantial evidence of differences in treatment. Id., 637 F.2d at 1081, n. 7; see International Brotherhood of Teamsters v. United States, [14 EPD ¶7579 ] 431 U.S. 324 (1977).

In order to be successful in a Title VII case, a plaintiff must establish a prima facie case of sexual discrimination as required by McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, [5 EPD ¶8607 ] 411 U.S. 792 (1973). In the case at bar, the plaintiff established a prima facie case regarding her claims of improper removal from the management training program and eventual discharge by establishing that: (1) she is a member of a minority group; (2) she was qualified to remain in the management training program and was qualified to remain as an employee of the defendant; (3) she was removed from the training program and eventually discharged by the defendant, regardless of her qualifications; and (4) after her removal and eventual discharge, the defendant sought other trainees and employees with qualifications equivalent to the plaintiff’s.

After the plaintiff established a prima facie case, the defendant was required to then articulate a nondiscriminatory reason for both removing her from the management training program and discharging her. Texas Dept. of Community Affairs v. Burdine, [25 EPD 31,544 ] 67 L.Ed.2d 207 (1981). The defendant articulated such a nondiscriminatory reason by presenting evidence that the plaintiff was removed from the training program due to unsatisfactory performance and was subsequently discharged due to an abusive remark made to her superior.

Once a defendant has articulated some nondiscriminatory reason for its treatment of the plaintiff, the plaintiff, to succeed, must show by a preponderance of the evidence that the defendant’s reasons were a mere pretext for intentional sexual discrimination. In order to do this, plaintiff can show that “a discriminatory reason more likely motivated the employer or indirectly by showing that the employer’s proffered explanation is unworthy of credence.” Id., 67 L.Ed.2d at 217.

In order to determine whether the defendant’s motivation in its treatment of the plaintiff was sexual discrimination, a court may consider the defendant’s policy and practice regarding other management trainees and employees. In addition, where there are very few minorities in a defendant’s employ, the defendant employer’s claim that the plaintiff was unqualified must be closely scrutinized. Kinsey v. First Regional Securities, Inc., [13 EPD ¶11,614 ] 557 F.2d 830, 838 (D.C. Cir. 1977); United States v. N. L. Industries, Inc., [5 EPD ¶8529 ] 479 F.2d 354, 370-71 (8th Cir. 1973); Williams v. Hoffmeister, 520 F.Supp. 521, 535 (E.D. Tenn. 1981). Although subjective criteria are the major considerations in determining whether to promote an employee or discharge one, they must be closely scrutinized, and proffered subjective justifications for deciding not to promote or for discharging an employee must be examined for reasonableness in order to determine whether they are mere pretexts. Loeb v. Textron, Inc., [20 EPD ¶30,028 ] 600 F.2d 1003, 1012, n. 6 (1st Cir. 1979).

[Reasoning]

The plaintiff, Debra Beck, established by a preponderance of the evidence that the defendant’s reasons for removing her from the management training program were a pretext for their actual discriminatory motive. Both of her manager-trainers estimated that she would be a good manager for the defendant with a reasonable amount of additional experience regarding her ministerial duties. The plaintiff established that other nonpregnant trainees received much more practical experience as trainees before being placed in a store. Although Mr. Lang testified that when he wrote his undated report he had already concluded that the plaintiff should be removed from the program, he failed to state this conclusion but rather reiterated her earlier trainer’s conclusion that the plaintiff would make a good manager.

The plaintiff also established to the Court’s satisfaction that her discharge was solely due to her pregnancy. Essentially her only substantial breach of duty was her sarcastic remark to Mr. Brockmeier on May 14, 1979. However, both Brumback and Brockmeier testified that they appreciated that the plaintiff’s attitude was temporarily bad because of her removal from the training program, and the plaintiff explained her valid reasons for not making further attempts to contact Mr. Brumback personally or Mr. Brockmeier. Given the unreasonableness of the defendant’s stated reasons for discharging the plaintiff, the Court can only conclude that the actual motivating factor for firing plaintiff was her pregnancy and her statements to other employees regarding her suspicions about being removed from the training program because of her pregnancy.

After a recess following the counsels’ closing arguments on October 22, 1981, the Court indicated on the record that it would find in the plaintiff’s favor but stay the effectiveness of such an order until the filing of a final memorandum opinion and the parties’ submission of an approved journal entry detailing the plaintiff’s damages. However, the Court is now in a position to order that plaintiff is entitled damages for lost income based upon a store manager’s prevailing salary from the plaintiff’s date of discharge on May 17, 1979, until October 22, 1981. This amount shall include all raises and bonuses normally accrued during this period of time, if applicable. The defendant corporation is forthwith ordered to pay the plaintiff $20,000.00 of this amount. Counsel for plaintiff and defendant are granted an additional seven (7) days from the filing date of this order to agree upon the total figure owed the plaintiff in lost income and to submit this to the Court in a journal entry. In addition, the Court finds the plaintiff is entitled to reimbursement by the defendant in the amount of $573.60 for medical expenses incurred because of her pregnancy, which would have been paid by her insurance through Quiktrip Corporation had she not been unlawfully discharged.

In determining the plaintiff’s lost income, a setoff shall be made for the average net income earned by the plaintiff in other jobs subsequent to her discharge to October 22, 1981, as well as salary which would have been earned during a 6-week maternity leave. The Court initially indicated from the bench on October 22 that the unemployment benefits received by the plaintiff subsequent to her discharge should be set off from her damages for lost income. Plaintiff’s counsel has submitted to the Court cases showing such a setoff is not mandated in Title VII cases. See, e.g., EEOC v. Ford Motor Co., [25 EPD ¶31,636 ] 645 F.2d 183, 195-96 (4th Cir. 1981); Pedreyra v. Cornell Prescription Pharmacies, [19 EPD ¶9009 ] 465 F.Supp. 936 (D. Colo. 1979); Tidwell v. American Oil Co., [4 EPD ¶7544 ] 332 F.Supp. 424, 437 (D. Utah 1971). This decision is a discretionary one, EEOC v. Sandia Corp., [24 EPD ¶31,304 ] 639 F.2d 600 (10th Cir. 1980), and since allowing the plaintiff to benefit from both lost income and unemployment benefits would amount to a windfall and make her more than whole, the Court finds that there shall be a setoff from the plaintiff’s lost wages for her unemployment benefits received after she was discharged.

The Court further orders that the plaintiff is entitled to prejudgment interest on her lost income. EEOC v. Sage Realty Corp., [25 EPD ¶31,529 ] 507 F.Supp. 599, 613 (S.D. N.Y. 1981); Chapman v. Pacific Telephone & Telegraph Co., 456 F.Supp. 77, 80 (N.C. Cal. 1978); Vant Hul v. City of Dell Rapids, 462 F.Supp. 828, 833 (D.S.D. 1978); Tidwell v. American Oil Co., 332 F.Supp. 424, 437 (D. Utah 1971). The rate of interest shall be at the current legal rate.

The plaintiff, as the prevailing party, shall be entitled to attorneys’ fees, and counsel for plaintiff and defendant are granted an additional seven (7) days from the filing date of this order to confer and submit a journal entry regarding attorneys’ fees and the other damages noted above. If this cannot be accomplished by agreement, the Court will set this matter for further hearing. However, while this matter is being determined, the Court’s order from the bench on October 22, 1981, that the defendant shall pay plaintiff’s attorney forthwith $8,500.00, remains in effect.

As a final matter, pursuant to the Court’s equitable powers and duties under Title VII, Albemarle Paper Co. v. Moody, [9 EPD ¶10,230 ] 422 U.S. 405, 418 (1975), the Court orders that at plaintiff’s option, which shall be exercised within 30 days from October 22, she shall be returned to full employment by defendant within 30 days from such notice as a first assistant manager with pay at the prevailing salary of a store manager. After two months’ time as a first assistant, if she so elects, she shall be returned to the manager training program for at least one month’s time. If she does not elect to go back into the manager training program, she shall remain as a first assistant at the prevailing pay of a first assistant manager. However, if she does choose to go into the manager training program, her managertrainer shall be someone separate and distinct from any of the personnel involved in this litigation. Upon completion of this training period, if the defendant’s management determines she is unqualified to be a store manager, this Court shall be notified within a week’s time and a conference with the Court shall be set with the parties’ counsel. In such an event that after one month in the manager training program, the plaintiff voluntarily chooses to return as a first assistant store manager, she shall be entitled to a job as a first assistant manager at the prevailing pay of a first assistant. In every event, this Court will be apprised as to the ultimate developments regarding the plaintiff’s decision and her program.

In conclusion, the Court finds that judgment shall be entered in favor of the plaintiff and against the defendant, Quiktrip Corporation, subject to the subsequent filing of a journal entry containing the plaintiff’s damages and attorneys’ fees.