This court is hip deep in issues. Together the parties in this sexual harassment case have appealed the district court’s rulings on nearly thirty grounds. Because the plaintiff failed to exhaust her administrative remedies on her retaliation-in-employment claim, we reverse and remand for a new trial. At that trial, the plaintiff shall have the right to have her state law claims tried to a jury.
I. Facts and Prior Proceedings
In 1994, Julie McElroy enrolled as a graduate student in the doctoral program at the Iowa State Univеrsity College of Education. Lynn Glass, a male professor in the College, was McElroy’s academic advisor. ISU also hired McElroy to work as a research assistant for Glass. Glass taught at least one of McElroy’s classes.
Glass repeatedly subjected McElroy to unwelcome touching and grossly inappropriate comments. The harassment reached its zenith (or nadir) in April 1995 when ISU sent McElroy to Russia to help Glass run a month-long cultural and educational exchange program for high school students.
Upon arrival at their hotel in Russia, McElroy discovered Glass had arranged for them to share a two-room suite — with both beds in one room. McElroy told Glass she was uncomfortable with the sleeping arrangements and insisted one of the beds be moved to the other room. Glass became furious but eventually relented.
Glass later publicly berated McElroy for not letting him “take care” of her on their first night at the hotel. He told her she *388 could “kiss her Ph.D. good-bye.” Whilе the two were riding the Moscow Metro, he threatened to leave her alone and let her find her way home. This was particularly troublesome because Glass had taken McElroy’s passport and money “for safekeeping” after they had deplaned.
At other times on the trip, Glass gave McElroy a massage after she told him not to do so; rubbed lotion on her feet against her will in a manner that evoked images of sexual intercourse; told her intimate details about his sex life, including a disgustingly detailed description of his semen; kissed her after she told him not to touch her; and ran suddenly into her room and told her he had just “messed himself.” We need not repeat all the salacious facts here; nonetheless we remain fully cognizant of them.
Shortly after returning home from Russia, McElroy made a sexual harassment complaint to Ann Thompson, a department chair in the College. Thompson notified Noreen Daly, Dean of the College. For the most part, Glass fessed up to his actions. Thompson removed Glass from his position as McElroy’s academic advisor and instructor. Thompson also reassigned McElroy to work as a graduate assistant for another professor. Thompson and Daly told Glass to have no contact with McElroy.
Glass continued to pester McElroy. In June 1995, McElroy filed a formal complaint with the ISU Affirmative Action Office. McElroy was frustrated that ISU was not taking adequate steps to stop Glass from harassing her. She also voiced concern that ISU would retaliate against her. ISU appointed an attorney, Jeanne Johnson, to investigate.
Johnson concluded Glass had violated ISU’s sexual harassment policy, created a hostile work environment, and interfered with McElroy’s academic progress. Johnson recommended ISU eliminate interaction between Glass and McElroy, conduct sexual harassment training, and suspend Glass without pay for one semester. Deаn Daly adopted Johnson’s recommendations but increased the term of the suspension to one year. ISU’s president tried to fire Glass, but dropped the formal proceedings necessary to dismiss a tenured faculty member after Glass was diagnosed with terminal colon cancer. Glass died in May 1997.
In November 1997, McElroy sued the State of Iowa and ISU (the defendants) for sexual harassment in employment and education, in violation of various federal and state statutes. McElroy maintained the defendants did not adequately address Glass’s behavior. Instead of protecting her from Glass when she complained, McElroy alleged the defendants retaliated by changing the terms of her employment. McElroy claimed she suffered psychologically and physically as a result. She dropped out of the graduate program on December 31, 1997.
McElroy initially lost at trial, but we reversed on account of a confusing jury instruction.
See generally McElroy v. State,
Additional facts will be set forth below. We first consider the appeal issues, then the cross-appeal issuеs.
II. The Merits: The Appeal
The defendants ostensibly raise nine issues for our review on appeal, but some of *389 these have as many as eleven sub-issues. We examine these arguments in turn, to the extent necessary.
A. Scope of Retrial
The defendants contend the district court erred when it granted a retrial of all the issues in the case. The defendants posit McElroy I only required retrial of McElroy’s employment discrimination claim because the erroneous jury instruction involved solely that claim. They argue employment discrimination is distinct from retaliation and education discriminatiоn. The parties agree our review is for errors at law.
The general rule is that when a new trial is granted, all issues must be retried.
See, e.g., Hawkeye Bank v. State,
[T]he granting of partial new trials is a practice not to be commended.As a condition to the granting of a partial new trial, it should appear that the issue to be tried is distinct and separable from the other issues, and that the new trial can be had without danger of complications with other matters.... Nor may [only] certain issues be retried unless it appears that the other issues have been rightly settled and injustice will not be occasioned.
Larimer,
We did not limit the scope of the retrial in
McElroy I.
The record before us shows McElroy requested retrial of all claims in that appeal. Finding reversible error with respect to one of those claims, we ordered a new trial.
McElroy I,
B. Exhaustion of Administrative Remedies
In the district court, the defendants objected to the trial of McElroy’s retaliation claims because she had not exhausted her administrative remedies. Specifically, the defendants claimed McElroy had only notified the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and Iowa Civil Rights Commission (ICRC) about her federal and state sex discrimination claims, not her retaliation claims. We consider the federal and state claims separately.
1. Title VII
Title VII explicitly prohibits both sex discrimination and retaliation. See 42 U.S.C. § 2000e et seq.
However, Title VII establishes an administrative procedure which a complaining employee must follow.... Exhaustion of administrative remedies is central to Title VII’s statutory scheme because it provides the [administrative agency] the first opportunity to investigate discriminatory practices and enables it to perform its roles of obtaining voluntary compliance and promoting conciliatory efforts.
Williams v. Little Rock Mun. Water Works,
McElroy filed her complaint with the ICRC on March 14, 1997. (The same complaint was cross-filed with the EEOC). She used the standard form, which requires complainants to identify the bases of their harassment claims by checking the applicable boxes. McElroy checked the box labeled “sex” but not the “retaliation” box.
1
When the ICRC asked McElroy to state in narrative fashiоn why she felt she was discriminated against, McElroy described Glass’s continuing harassment. Although she indicated the defendants were not adequately addressing this ongoing harassment, she did not describe any acts of retaliation. Indeed, the reviewing officer specifically noted that “the only issue is whether [the defendants] took reasonable measures to stop the harassment and keep [McElroy] from working in a hostile environment.” Because McElroy did not allege retaliation, she therefore failed to exhaust her Title VII remedies with respect to alleged retaliation-in-employment.
See Williams,
It is true the administrative complaint must be construed liberally to further the remedial purpose of the civil rights laws.
Nichols v. Am. Nat’l Ins. Co.,
Although аt first glance one might think sex discrimination and attendant retaliation are “reasonably related,” “it is well established that retaliation claims are not reasonably related to underlying discrimination claims.”
Wallin v. Minn. Dep’t of Corrections,
*391
At trial, the thrust of McElroy’s retaliation claim centered around the fact that after she complained to the ISU Affirmative Action Office, in 1996 she was demoted from a temporary instructor to a graduate assistant. (The former position paid significantly more and did not require McElroy to take classes.) She also alleged her letters-of-intent were delayed. Because McElroy did not file her complaint with the ICRC until March 1997 and did not allege retaliation in it even though the alleged retaliation had begun the year before, the district court should not have allowed a Title YII retaliation claim based on the prior allegations.
See Williams,
2. ICRA
Although the authorities cited in the foregoing analysis only apply to McEl-roy’s Title VII claim, we think — at least on the arguments presented in this case — that the same analysis should be applied to McElroy’s retaliation claim brought under the ICRA. Because the ICRA is in part modeled after Title VII, we have traditionally looked to federal law for guidance in interpreting it.
Pecenka v. Fareway Stores, Inc.,
*392 3. Disposition
Because the district court erroneously allowed a Title VII retaliation-in-employment claim, we are obliged to reverse and remand for a new trial on all issues. Although the jury also found the defendants had violated Title VII for discrimination-in-employment, the special verdict form did not distinguish damages for retaliation; instead it lumped all damages together. We are unable therefore to divine which damages should be attributed to which acts. 4
C. Remaining Appeal Issues
The defendants also argue the district court erred in a number of other respects, including eleven allegedly faulty jury instructions. Because we have already decided a new trial is necessary, we do not reach these other issues. We pause briefly to consider one of the jury instruсtions because it is likely to arise again on retrial.
See McElroy I,
Instruction No. 40
Instruction No. 40 stated that “[a]ny damages awarded to the plaintiff are treated as taxable income.” It is uncertain how the jury was to use this instruction. In
Stover v. Lakeland Square Owners Ass’n,
[T]he drawbacks of such an instruction seem to outweigh its benefits. Especially here, where the parties offered no evidence concerning taxation at trial, the possibility for confusion, speculation, and conjecture would be great.
Stover,
Should we up our award to McElroy because her awаrd is taxable? How much in taxes would McElroy have to pay? What tax bracket does she fall in? Don’t her lawyers get a cut? What do we do?
This is precisely what we were concerned about in
Stover,
when we declined to open a “Pandora’s Box” of cautionary instructions to the jury.
Id.
The risk of confusion, speculation, and conjecture is simply too great.
See id.
Not only do such instructions invite speculation, but they also unduly draw attention to a collateral consequence of a jury award and thereby constitute an unfair comment.
See
id,
5
;
*393
see also Anderson v. Webster City Cmty. Sch. Dist.,
III. The Merits: The Cross-Appeal
McElroy raises a number of issues on cross-appeal, but we choose to address only one because it alone will undoubtedly reoccur on remand and involves an issue of substantial public importance.
Cf. McElroy I,
A. Smith
In
Smith,
a sharply divided court held there was no right to. a jury trial under the ICRA. The case at bar apparently presents the first opportunity to reexamine
Smith.
Two plaintiffs have asked the court of appeals to “overrule”
Smith,
but understandably that court has declined to tinker with our precedents.
Reiss v. ICI Seeds, Inc.,
In its statutory analysis, the majority in
Smith
concluded the district court in an ICRA action “sits as the [ICRC] and is empowered only to grant that relief authorized” by the ICRA.
B. Examination of Smith
On further examination, we conclude the majority’s statutory analysis in Smith was fundamentally flawed and must be overruled. As four members of this court pointed out in Smith, the majority erred when it concluded the ICRA framework was administrative in nature:
*394 The district court does not sit as a civil rights commission; it does not screen cases as doеs the commission; it does not investigate cases like the commission; nor does a court hear cases under the commission’s rules. When the legislature sought to provide a partial answer to the backlog of undisposed claims before the civil rights commission, it did so by providing an alternative to the administrative proceeding in the form of an ordinary civil action.
Id. at 387-88 (Carter, J., dissenting) (emphasis in original). While it is true the ICRA generally requires plaintiffs to exhaust their administrative remedies, there is nothing еxtraordinary about the nature of a district court proceeding brought once those remedies are so exhausted. The ICRA is no different than any other statute providing a cause of action. The ICRA has always permitted a plaintiff to sue for monetary damages in the district court. For this reason, it is not surprising the legislature did not expressly indicate claimants were entitled to a jury trial under the ICRA- — -it was assumed.
Far from “substantially interferefing] with [the] statutory scheme,” interpreting the ICRA framеwork as written would alleviate the problems that have arisen since Smith was decided. In Smith, the dissent pointed out that denying the right to a jury trial on ICRA claims would not only run contrary to legislative intent, but would also prove infelicitous because plaintiffs bringing several different causes of action would have some of them tried by a jury, with others tried to the court. Id. at 388. Fifteen years later, the dissent’s prophesy has come true.
Further problems have arisen. Shortly after
Smith
was decided, Congress passed legislation that granted litigants the right to a jury trial under Title VII.
See
42 U.S.C. § 1981.
6
Subsequently, the Eighth Circuit ruled it was not bound to our pronouncement in
Smith. See Pickens v. Soo Line R.R.,
In truth, there is only one reason to uphold Smith
today
— stare
decisis.
“From the very beginnings of this court, we have guarded the venerable doctrine of stare decisis and required the highest possible showing that a precedent should be overruled before taking such a step.”
Kiesau v. Bantz,
“[S]tare decisis does not prevent the court from reconsidering, repairing, correcting or abandoning past judicial announcements when error is manifest, including error in the interpretation of statutory enactments.”
Miller,
[W]hen a rule, after it has been duly tested by experience, has been found to be inconsistent with the sense of justicе or with the social welfare, there should be less hesitation in frank avowal and full abandonment.
Benjamin N. Cardozo,
The Nature of the Judicial Process
150 (1921);
see, e.g., State v. Liddell,
For all the foregoing reasons, we overrule Smith and hold a plaintiff seeking money damages under the ICRA is entitled to a jury trial.
IV. Disposition
McElroy failed to exhaust her administrative remedies with respect to her federal and state retaliation-in-employment claims. Therefore these claims were not properly before the district court. Because the jury returned a generаl verdict, a new trial is required on all surviving claims. On remand, the plaintiff shall have the right to have her entire case tried to a jury.
REVERSED AND REMANDED.
Notes
. The form states the retaliation box applies if the complainant thinks the discrimination occurred "[b]ecause I filed a prior complaint or opposed a discriminatory practice."
. A recent United States Supreme Court decision buttresses our conclusion, and may even render the "reasonably related” exception оbsolete. In
National Railroad Passenger Corp. v. Morgan,
which the parties do not discuss, the Court concluded that each discrete retaliatory action constitutes its own unlawful employment practice for which administrative remedies must be exhausted.
. As an aside, we note that
Lynch v. City of Des Moines,
. The foregoing discussion of exhaustion of administrative remedies only applies to McEl-roy’s allegations of retaliation-in-employment in violation of Title VII and the ICRA. Title IX claimants are not required to exhaust the Title VII administrative scheme.
Cannon v. Univ. of Chicago,
. So far as we can tell, the Supreme Court has not ruled to the contrary with respect to Title VII claims. It is true that in
Norfolk W. Ry. v. Liepelt,
In Norfolk, the Supreme Court was concerned that juries likely presumed awards were taxable and might therefore overcompensate plaintiffs unless an instruction was given that an award would not be taxable. Here, however, McElroy apparently seeks a windfall by encouraging the jury to return an award that negates her tax obligations. There is no announced Congressional policy that a plaintiff should be compensated at such a level so as to relieve her of her tax burden; indeed, federal policy as currently reflected in federal tax law expressly points to the contrary. Not only does the instruction in this case imper-missibly cause the jury to speculate about рossible tax consequences, but it also unduly draws attention to a fact in order to prod the jury to make an award contrary to legislative intent.
. Any analogy in Smith to a pre-jury trial Title VII is not only outdated, but also mistaken. As the dissent pointed out, unlike the ICRA, Smith was decided at the time Title VII only granted equitable relief.
. This dichotomy is not unique to Iowa, however.
See DiCentes v. Michaud,