By: dmc-admin//July 8, 2002//
“In defining the proper labor market, the expert must identify not only those individuals who are qualified for the position but also those who are potentially interested in it.
“In this case, Ms. Bennett’s expert conducted three statistical analyses that he contends indicate the School District has engaged in discriminatory hiring practices. Specifically, he first compared the racial composition of the School District’s workforce with that of the general teacher pool in the State of Illinois during the 1994-1995 school year. The expert also compared the racial composition of the teachers hired in the School District between 1990-1997 with that of teachers employed in the Chicago Primary Metropolitan Statistical Area (‘Chicago PMSA’) during the same period. Finally, he conducted an analysis comparing the racial composition of the School District’s applicant flow data to the approximate number of teachers employed in the Chicago PMSA. After reviewing this study as well as the expert’s deposition testimony, we conclude that the district court did not err when it characterized this statistical analysis as unreliable. The study contains several inherent flaws. First, in conducting his analysis, the expert did not consider the degree to which potential applicants from a place such as the Chicago PMSA would be interested in working in Naperville. During deposition testimony, he conceded that he was unfamiliar with the geographic relationship between Naperville and the Chicago PMSA; the study, in fact, did not account for commuting patterns within the Chicago metropolitan area-a nondiscriminatory factor that may impact significantly the validity of the results. Moreover, as the Board emphasizes, Illinois was selected as a benchmark because, in the expert’s estimation, it seemed reasonable to expect that the School District would hire applicants from within the state. The expert acknowledged that he did not attempt to verify this theory. Because of these infirmities, this analysis was properly deemed unreliable. Because Ms. Bennett has failed to present evidence in support of her disparate treatment claims, we conclude that the district court properly entered summary judgment on this portion of her case.”
Affirmed.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Darrah, J., Ripple, J.