GW owes a former professor more than $75,000 in damages for improperly denying him tenure but is not obligated to grant him the highest professorial level, the D.C. Court of Appeals ruled Thursday. The decision upholds an earlier ruling.

Former Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science professor Apostolos Kakaes was hired as an assistant professor in 1987 on tenure track until 1993, when he was denied tenure, according to court records.

Proceedings in 1996 established that GW breached the Faculty Code
by failing to give Kakaes timely notice that he would not receive tenure.

Kakaes appealed the ruling, claiming that the awarded damages are inadequate. Kakaes also argued GW should grant him tenure.

Judges found that the Faculty Code was breached but there is no
remedy suggested in the code. According to GW rules, faculty must be
notified of tenure by June 30 of the year before the appointment expires or
they automatically receive it.

Kakaes received an initial letter from former Vice President for Academic Affairs Roderick French on June 28, 1993 denying tenure, but the court found it was not sufficient. A committee of electronic engineering faculty members voted three times to give Kakaes tenure, but then-Dean Gideon Frieder refused, according to court documents.