Court of Petty Appeals: Students for Honorably Administered Tests (“SHAT”) v. Jason Dugas
Students for Honorably Administered Tests (“SHAT”)
v.
Jason Dugas
78 U.Va 13 (2025)
Berklich, J., delivers the opinion of the Court, in which Demitry, C.J., Wu, Vanger, and Becker, J.J. join. Moore, J. concurs in part and dissents in part.
Berklich, J., delivers the opinion of the Court.
Facts
A group of law students consolidated via joinder, now known as the Students for Honorably Administered Tests (“SHAT”) brings suit against Dean Jason “The Dūg” Dugas ’01, the Office of Student Records and Academic Services, and the provider of Exam4 software, Exegrity, Inc. (Exam4). Plaintiffs allege harm in the form of an intentional—or in the alternative, negligent—infliction of emotional distress, and breach of contract via a violation of the Honor Code. Plaintiffs seek an injunction to stop the rollout of Exam4 software prior to the beginning of exams on Friday, December 5.
Consolidated with this litigation are separate lawsuits and crossclaims brought by plaintiffs against each other after discovery and other investigations ensued. These claims, too trivial to fully indulge here, allege breach of Honor Code violations for needless disability accommodations, Microsoft Word “hacks,” ChatGPT-ing, and general finals-oriented chicanery.
Discussion
Infliction of Emotional Distress
Students for Honorably Administered Tests (“SHAT”) first alleges that Dugas et al. inflicted emotional distress via the last-minute adoption of the Exam4 software for the Fall 2025 finals season. They claim that Dugas, motivated by a deep desire to torture the many students who have ruthlessly lampooned him for years, intentionally imposed upon them inferior test-taking conditions. In the alternative, they argue that the Office of Student Records and Academic Services (“OoSRaAS”) was grossly negligent in the vetting of the suitability of Exam4 software before its rollout. They maintain the existence of a vicious chicken-and-egg cycle. The mockery of Dugas is motivated by the alleged incompetence of the OoSRaAS (an acronym ideally sung to the tune of the Five Stairsteps’ “O-o-h Child”), which in turn lowers OoSRaAS morale, causing worsened service, leading to more ungrateful students and heightened contempt of The Dūg. Plaintiffs argue this causality loop makes it impossible to determine if the actions of OoSRaAS (♪ things are gonna get easier) are intentional or negligent.
To support their claims, SHAT presents evidence of the concerted effort of Dugas and OoSRaAS to avoid sending communications about class registration, and evidence of the plainly unsuitable condition of the Exam4 software. Exam4 imposes the following constraints on users: a professor-optional lockdown computer and/or browser mode, the elimination of inter-software copy/paste functionality, the absence of Cmd/Ctrl+F searching, a 1991 WordPerfect 5.1-style display and spellcheck engine, and Courier as the unchangeable default font, despite the law student’s natural preference for Times New Roman. Most distressing to SHAT is the inability to minimize or half-screen the Exam4 software, eliminating the traditional side-by-side exam document-outline model, to which so many students are accustomed. The side-by-side model famously allows for minimal cognitive load when transcribing an outline near-verbatim into the exam document, and removes the need to swipe from one window to the next. SHAT alleges the wasted time associated with that action is so large, that in the aggregate, it functionally prevents them from attaining good enough grades to be the S.D.N.Y. U.S. Attorney, a senator, or probably even the President.
But they wouldn’t want that job anyway, because it’s so grueling. If they wanted to be the President, SHAT contends, they could be, by working really hard and being as smart or smarter than everyone else. SHAT maintains that the emotional distress they anticipate suffering at the hands of defendants would be the sole reason that they might have worse grades than the guy next to them. And of course, all those cheating disabled students. But, SHAT reiterates, they could become the President if the world was fair, and if they really wanted to (which they don’t).
In their defense Dugas, OoSRaAS (♪ things’ll be brighter), and Exam4 respond to SHAT’s claims by maintaining that law students are, generally speaking, high-strung big babies. The defense says law students’ understanding of “outrageous” conduct is generally so far outside the socially accepted norm that their allegations cease to mean anything at all. Defendants believe that their own behavior, which consists of sort-of-lazily doing one’s job, not really thinking about how hard it will be to administer a brand-new wonky test software, and failing to inform highly impacted parties of relevant policies, are nothing but par for the course in the real non-law world.
Regretfully, we must agree. This sort of careless behavior, though clearly understood to be negligent by defendants—at an institutional nay socially-acceptable cultural level—is not offensive enough to warrant emotional distress in a reasonable person. Arguments that defendants knew or should have known that the average law student is also an eggshell plaintiff (see that girl from Professor Abraham’s Torts class) also fall on deaf ears. Additionally, it’s unclear if that would even matter. The Court would need to crack open their 1L Torts outlines to find out, and we are simply unwilling to do so right now.
Breach of Contract
SHAT also alleges a breach of the Honor Code by defendants. They maintain that the pledge to never “lie, cheat, or steal” is one half of a 183-year-old contract between the students and faculty at the University of Virginia. If this arrangement is ever broken, SHAT contends, the students can and will resume striking down University professors—like they did in 1840 when Law School Professor John A. G. Davis was shot and killed by a masked student. After this murder, a tenuous peace was brokered between students and faculty, which resulted in the Honor Code.
SHAT maintains that the Honor Code is a contract, either implied or explicit, where students contribute valuable consideration by declining to exercise their rights to “lie, cheat, or steal,” and in exchange, the University promises never to check. This harmonious mutual understanding, SHAT contends, has been the lifeblood of the University of Virginia for nearly 200 years, until it was brought down last Thursday by Dean Dugas and two gentlemen from LawIT, with the deployment of Exam4 upon the Law School at large.
In response, defendants provide evidence of large-scale cheating occurring at the Law School. Specifically and unconvincingly, they point to the use of AI software such as ChatGPT on exams. The Court finds this laughable. As any law school professor will tell you (and many of them have), AI on a law school exam is like using a Ouija Board to fill out your tax returns—it doesn’t work, you’ll make a mess, and it would have been simpler to just use your brain. Plus, it will save everyone a whole lot of trouble. But that hasn’t stopped some truly incorrigible dumbasses from going and getting themselves caught using AI on tests. See that guy from Section A, ’27, who was, I presume, expelled. Nevertheless, this incident—along with other incidents of pre-writing, time fraud, and good-old-fashioned-plagiarism—force us to admit that the Dirty Dūg and OoSRaAS (♪ things are gonna get easier) have a point. Students policing their own conduct cannot be expected to have the success rate of a computer software.
As with any self-governing, guild-like organization (*cough, cough*) rules are meaningless without the expectation that violators will invariably be caught and punished. However, the Honor Code afforded students a level of self-determination and freedom. It promoted the illusion—if it was only that—of honor, civility, and a fundamentally good and orderly human nature. This innocence was beneficial to our souls and the profession in ways that transcend the traditional law school purpose of limiting the supply of elite lawyers so we can continue to raise fees and salaries and perpetuate the great pyramid scheme of BigLaw. If we are to be subjected to joining a cartel of lawyers for the privilege of becoming lawyers for the cartel, knowledge of this fate should be put off as long as possible. The Honor Code has a higher purpose than catching crooks. It should, for a time, capture also our hearts and minds. Failure to acknowledge this reality can only serve to further corrupt law students, defeating defendants’ purpose of a reduction in cheating.
However, we’re saddled with a sort of Marbury-esque situation where OoSRaAS may not respect our authority (shocker). We want to preserve the immense integrity of the Court of Petty Appeals, but are unable to rule in ways that might continue to perpetuate the Honor Code. Just know that if the Court thought it could get away with it, it would order a return to the fully traditional pen-and-paper Bluebook setup.
This bodes well…
Intra-Plaintiff Honor Code Crossclaims
In the midst of SHAT’s suit against Dugas et al., discovery yielded evidence which then turned the students on each other. Over 150 separate crossclaims and counterclaims have been filed by students against other students. Plaintiffs allege an avalanche of claims, such as prior abuse of Microsoft Word shortcuts and hotkeys for expanding words and phrases, conspiracies to hoard outlines, and unjust enrichment from study-group conversations.
By far and away the most popular suit, enveloping over 20% of the student body as defendants, are allegations of time fraud—specifically extra-time fraud. Parties claim that their classmates obtained extra time under fraudulent conditions with scripts written by phony doctors, and that diagnoses for conditions such as Generalized Anxiety Disorder, Gastrointestinal Issues, and Autism/ADHD are so easy to obtain that they mean nothing for the purposes of test fairness. In response, the disability accommodated defendants point to the Americans with Disabilities Act and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, claiming discrimination will ensue if the suits are victorious in their attempt at injunction. They also counterclaim with defamation and libel suits.
In what has quickly turned into the biggest crap-flinging competition since monkey night at the coprophilia convention, the students appear to be seeking primarily to test the Court’s patience. We cannot condone this uncollegial behavior that risks us losing our status as the “chill” T14 (to Penn, or God forbid, Duke). If obtaining accommodations is truly as easy as is alleged, we find that this strategy—as with the others—remains open to all students, and cannot be a determinative factor between an A-, and an A. In the words of Ice-T, “Don’t hate the player, hate the game.” Students whose personal happiness is dependent upon a Circuit Court clerkship are encouraged to seek medical assistance to either A) obtain accommodations or B) to seriously re-examine their lives before they wake up one morning as Usha Vance.
Holding
Plaintiffs’ petition for an injunction of Exam4 rollout is denied, and all counter and crossclaims are dismissed without prejudice.
SO ORDERED.
Moore, J. concurs in part and dissents in part.
The return to traditional pen-and-paper examinations is wholeheartedly supported as a good start, but the instant brother is of the opinion that these tests should rather be returned to the format of stone tablets and chisels.