EXCLUSIVE — An Ohio middle school teacher sued her school district Monday, accusing the district of violating her First Amendment rights after she was abruptly fired for refusing to affirm students’ stated gender identity or use their preferred pronouns.
In a lawsuit filed Monday in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio, Vivian Geraghty, a former teacher at Jackson Memorial Middle School in Massillon, Ohio, accused administrators at the school and Jackson Local Schools of violating her right to freedom of speech and free exercise of religion when they fired her earlier this year for refusing to address two students who had claimed to have new gender identities by their preferred pronouns and names.
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The lawsuit says Geraghty, who is represented by the conservative legal group the Alliance Defending Freedom, was informed on Aug. 16 that two of her students wished to be addressed by new names and pronouns that did not correspond to their sex. Six days later, on Aug. 22, the school counselor directed Geraghty and other teachers to “participate in the social transition of the two students.”
On Aug. 26, the lawsuit says, Geraghty met with Kacy Carter, the principal of the middle school, “in the hope of reaching a solution that would allow her to continue teaching without violating her religious beliefs and constitutional rights.”
Carter allegedly informed Geraghty at that meeting that he avoided using pronouns whenever a student sought to be addressed by pronouns that did not correspond to their biological sex. But half an hour later, Geraghty was again summoned to Carter’s office, where she was asked by Carter and Monica Myers, the director of curriculum, instruction, and assessment for Jackson Local School District, to explain her Christian religious beliefs and why she could not cooperate with the social transition of the two students.
“After Ms. Geraghty explained her beliefs … Defendants Carter and Myers told Ms. Geraghty that ‘she would be required to put her beliefs aside as a public servant,'” the lawsuit says. “Ms. Geraghty explained that she could not put her beliefs aside, and she did not believe she could be compelled to do so as a condition of public service.”
According to the suit, Myers then informed Geraghty that refusing to use a student’s preferred pronouns and name “amounted to insubordination” and that she could no longer teach for the school district. The teacher again refused and was sent back to her classroom.
But shortly thereafter, Geraghty was again called to Carter’s office and was given an ultimatum, acquiesce or resign, the lawsuit alleges. After she again reiterated her inability to cooperate with the social transition, the lawsuit says Carter “immediately handed Ms. Geraghty a laptop and ordered her to draft her letter of resignation in the adjoining room for immediate submission.” She was promptly escorted off the school grounds
In a statement to the Washington Examiner, Alliance Defending Freedom legal counsel Logan Spena said the school’s actions were “unconstitutional” and showed that the school was “out to implement a woke ideology and compel Vivian to confess her conformity to it.”
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“Schools can’t force teachers to set their religious beliefs aside just to keep a job and they also can’t force teachers to say things that are untrue and harmful to students,” Spena said. “Vivian loves her students and only wants what’s best for them, but the school doesn’t care about that — otherwise, they would have worked with Vivian instead of immediately forcing her to resign.”
The Washington Examiner has reached out to Jackson Local School District for comment.
