The ousted marching band director at The Ohio State University (OSU) has lost his Title IX suit accusing the school of gender bias.
U.S. District Judge James Graham said OSU presented a legitimate, nondiscriminatory reason to fire Jonathan Waters after a comprehensive internal investigation into the band’s “sexualized culture.”
Waters started with the band as a student in 1995 and worked his way up as a graduate assistant, assistant director and eventually as the full-time director in 2013. He reported to the director of the School of Music.
In 2014, OSU’s Office of Compliance and Integrity investigated two Title IX complaints against Waters. He was cleared of the allegation that he’d retaliated against a female band member after she reported being raped by a male band member. However, the inquiry found a sexually hostile environment and extensive sexual harassment in the band that Waters had failed to adequately address.
The president terminated Waters in July 2014 rather than placing him on a performance improvement plan. His eventual permanent replacement was male.
In dismissing the suit, Graham said Waters failed to show that an allegedly similarly situated female employee had been treated more favorably or to show that OSU’s grounds for termination were a pretext for gender bias.
Specifically, Graham found insufficient similarities between Waters’ situation and that of the former head coach of the Spirit Program. The ex-coach had been placed on a performance improvement plan and later terminated for inadequately responding to sexual harassment complaints against two of her assistant coaches.
