The Uphill Battle For Just Cause And The Consequences That Flow

Is it just cause if an employee admits to falsifying data? The answer is - maybe. The ongoing debate about when employee misconduct is severe enough to constitute just cause just became more complex as a result of a recent Court decision.
 
In Fernandes v. Peel Educational & Tutorial Services Limited c.o.b. Mississauga Private School 2014 ONSC 6506, the Court ruled that a private school did not have just cause to terminate a teacher who admitted to falsifying student’s grades. In this case, Fernandes submitted student midterm marks in 2009 that were obviously inaccurate because he allotted grades for student presentations that had not yet been completed. Fernandes was asked to resubmit the grades twice. Both times, Fernandes resubmitted the same grades and initially denied that the grades were inaccurate. The school administrators met with Fernandes on three separate occasions to review the grades. In the third meeting, Fernandes admitted to falsifying the grades after