# Grammens v. Dollar > Supreme Court of Georgia · July 5, 2010 · 287 Ga. 618 URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9765961 ## Case - **Full name:** Grammens v. Dollar - **Court:** Supreme Court of Georgia - **Decided:** July 5, 2010 - **Citations:** 287 Ga. 618; 2010 Fulton County D. Rep. 2181; 697 S.E.2d 775; 2010 Ga. LEXIS 516 - **Precedential status:** Published - **Opinion:** Dissent by Hunstein - **Judges:** Benham, Hunstein, Carley, Thompson - **Cited by:** 73 later opinions in the Frix Law Library ## Citator (automated) - No negative treatment found by the automated citator. That is not the same as a confirmation that the case is good law; read the citing cases. - Full citator and citing cases: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9765961 ## How later opinions describe it (automated extraction) - holding that a science teacher did not violate a ministerial duty to a student who received an eye injury during a science experiment when the teacher failed to provide eye protection to the student prior to the experiment because the policy at issue required “the instructor t… - stating that official is entitled to immunity unless plaintiff can show that officer acted with actual malice or an intent to injure in undertaking his discretionary acts of hiring and retaining em- ployees - holding teacher shielded by official immunity because school policy did not define key term, therefore requiring teacher to exercise discretion in implementation of the policy - finding that because a written policy did not define a term, it required a teacher to engage in a discretionary act ## Opinion text HUNSTEIN, Chief Justice, dissenting. The majority holds that because the term “explosive materials” is not defined in the written eye-protection policy, Grammens was required to use discretion in deciding whether the policy applied to the “bottle rocket” experiment and was thus entitled to official immunity from personal liability for the injury at issue. Because I disagree with the foundation for this analysis, i.e., the determination that the term “explosive materials” is somehow ambiguous, I must respectfully dissent. As noted by the Court of Appeals, the instructions for the experiment warned of “the possibility of the bottle exploding.” Dollar v. Grammens, 294 Ga. App. 888, 892 ( 670 SE2d 555 ) (2008). Although Grammens presented the affidavit of a mechanical engineer concluding that the experiment “did not involve explosive materials or an explosion but rather was a controlled venting of pressure,” id., the eye-protection policy is not a technical document drafted for use by members of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers. Its terms should be evaluated in accordance with the manner in which they would be reviewed by Forsyth County school teachers, and the common understanding of terms such as “explosive,” “exploding” and “explosion” encompasses the launching of a projectile using air pressure. See Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary (1973), p. 404 (defining “explode” as, inter alia, “to burst forth with sudden violence or noise”). Because application of the eye-protection policy in this situation required no discretion on the part of Grammens, she is not entitled to official immunity, and I would affirm the Court of Appeals’s reversal of the trial court’s grant of *622 summary judgment to her. Decided July 5, 2010 Reconsideration denied July 26, 2010. Gray, Rust, St. Amand, Moffett & Brieske, Matthew G. Moffett, Wayne S. Melnick, Harben & Hartley, Phillip L. Hartley, Martha M. Pearson, for appellant. Holland, Schaefer, Roddenbery & Blitch, James D. Blitch TV, for appellees. Womack, Gottlieb & Rodham, Ronald R. Womack, Steven M. Rodham, amici curiae. I am authorized to state that Presiding Justice Carley and Justice Thompson join in this dissent. --- Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9765961. Public record. Not legal advice.