RUTKOSKI v. NEW YORK UNIVERSITY (2025)

Order, Supreme Court, New York County (Mary V. Rosado, J.), entered on or about January 8, 2024, which, to the extent appealed from as limited by the briefs, granted defendants' motion to dismiss the amended complaint, unanimously affirmed, without costs.

The motion court correctly found that plaintiff's causes of action, while pled as discrimination and contract claims, essentially seek to challenge defendants' academic decisions and testing procedures, and should have, therefore, been brought in an article 78 proceeding (see Kickertz v. New York Univ., 110 A.D.3d 268, 272, 277–278, 971 N.Y.S.2d 271 [1st Dept. 2013];  see also Gary v. New York Univ., 48 A.D.3d 235, 236, 850 N.Y.S.2d 433 [1st Dept. 2008]).  It is undisputed that plaintiff was granted testing accommodations for her disabilities, and defendants' decision to deny her requests for additional accommodations and opportunities to re-take exams constitutes an academic decision, as granting her request would require relaxing defendants' academic standards and policies (see Kickertz at 278, 971 N.Y.S.2d 271).

Since plaintiff failed to bring her action within the four-month statute of limitations, her claims are time-barred (Sandler v. Benden, 202 A.D.3d 579, 159 N.Y.S.3d 677 [1st Dept. 2022];  see also Matter of Mamatkulov v. CUNY, the City Univ. of N.Y., 220 A.D.3d 622, 197 N.Y.S.3d 218 [1st Dept. 2023]).  For that reason, the motion court correctly declined to convert plaintiff's plenary action into an article 78 proceeding (see Mitchell v. New York Univ. [“NYU”], 129 A.D.3d 542, 543, 12 N.Y.S.3d 30 [1st Dept. 2015], lv denied 26 N.Y.3d 908, 2015 WL 6143488 [2015]).