A Virginia school teacher who was fired for refusing to use his student’s “preferred pronouns” has won a more than half-million dollar settlement, according to Fox News.
The West Point Board of Education has agreed to pay former high school teacher, Peter Vlaming, $575,000 in damages and attorney’s fees after he refused to call a transgender student by their preferred pronouns and agreed to clear the firing from his record.
Separate from the settlement, the board additionally changed its policies to conform to the new Virginia education policies established by Republican Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin
The settlement stems from a lawsuit filed by the Alliance Defending Freedom against the board in Sept. 2019. Vlaming was a French teacher at West Point High School for about seven years.
According to ADF, Vlaming tried to accommodate the student’s wishes by using the student’s new preferred name and “by avoiding the use of pronouns altogether.”
However, school officials were insistent that Vlaming use the pronouns even when the student wasn’t present.
According to a release from ADF, the settlement follows last December’s landmark Virginia Supreme Court opinion in Vlaming’s favor affirming that the Virginia Constitution contains robust free speech and free exercise protections for public employees.
“Peter wasn’t fired for something he said; he was fired for something he couldn’t say. The school board violated his First Amendment rights under the Virginia Constitution and commonwealth law,” ADF Senior Counsel Tyson Langhofer, director of the ADF Center for Academic Freedom, said in the release. “As a teacher, Peter was passionate about the subject he taught, was well-liked by his students, and did his best to accommodate their needs and requests. But he couldn’t in good conscience speak messages that he knew were untrue, and no school board or government official can punish someone for that reason. We’re pleased to favorably settle this case on behalf of Peter and hope other government and school officials will take note of the high cost involved in failing to respect an American’s constitutionally protected freedoms.”
ADF attorneys filed the lawsuit against the school board in September 2019.
Kansas has seen a similar pronoun case
This is far from the first case of its kind nationwide.
Indeed, in 2022, in Kansas, a long-time Fort Riley teacher sued her district after being reprimanded and suspended for refusing to use a student’s “preferred pronouns.”
According to the federal lawsuit filed by Pamela Ricard, during the spring semester of 2021, USD 475 in Geary County middle school administrators issued “diversity and equity” training materials directing instructors to use “preferred names” instead of the student’s legal name or name of record.
On April 9, 2021, Ricard was suspended, and on April 15, a formal reprimand — citing the school’s “bullying” policies — was placed in her file after she referred to a biologically female student by the student’s legal last name.
“Prior to addressing the student by the student’s last name, Ricard had been informed by email by the school counselor (that) the student preferred to be called by an alternate first name different from the student’s legal and enrolled first name,” the lawsuit reads. “Although the school counselor, when notifying Ms. Ricard of the student’s new preferred first name in his email to Ricard, had referred to the student as ‘she’ (consistent with the student’s biological sex), Ms. Ricard was later told by the student’s classmate that the student’s preferred pronouns were ‘he/him.’”
This is in spite of the fact, the lawsuit contends, that the student in question never directly asked Ricard to use a different name or pronoun — nor did the school have a formal written policy on pronouns or names at the time.
Requests for a religious exemption by Ricard were also apparently summarily dismissed.
In August of 2022, Ricard reached a settlement agreement with Geary County Schools, USD 475, which saw her good name restored and awarded $95,000 in damages.
As part of the agreement, school officials had to issue a statement that Ricard was in good standing without any disciplinary actions against her at the time of her retirement in May of 2022.
“No school district should ever force teachers to willfully deceive parents or engage in any speech that violates their deeply held religious beliefs,” ADF Senior Counsel Tyson Langhofer, director of the ADF Center for Academic Freedom, said in a release at the time. “We’re pleased to settle this case favorably on behalf of Pam, and we hope that it will encourage school districts across the country to support the constitutionally protected freedom of teachers to teach and communicate honestly with both children and parents.”
