When a public schoolteacher is punished for controversial books

(RNS) — Last month, Karen Cahall, a longtime third-grade teacher in New Richmond, Ohio, was suspended without pay for violating the school district’s policy on “controversial subjects.” This month, she sued the district in federal court for violating her constitutional rights to due process, equal protection and religious free exercise. She deserves to win. 

Here’s the story.

On Oct. 30, Kayla Shaw, a parent at Cahall’s school, emailed the school’s principal and all the members of the board of education to complain that Cahall’s classroom had “several books in which the plot or the theme is around gender identity, transgender, censorship, etc.”

The books in question were “Ana on the Edge“, “The Fabulous Zed Watson!,” “Too Bright to See,” and “Hazel Bly and the Deep Blue Sea.” The protagonists of the first three are non-binary/trans children. The fourth tells the story of a girl traumatized by the death of one of her mothers. The books were included among over 100 books on various subjects that Cahall keeps in bins in her classroom.

Receiving a copy of the email, School Superintendent Tracey Miller summoned Cahall to a pre-disciplinary hearing on Nov. 4, after which Miller suspended Cahall without pay for three days. In her disciplinary notice, Miller asserted Cahall should have known the books were “controversial” and in violation of the “controversial subjects” policy because “of the values that many hold” in the New Richmond community.

“It is my sincere hope that you will internalize the discipline you are receiving and that you will reflect upon this in order to change,” wrote Miller. “However, if you continue to behave in this manner in the future, you will be subjected to more severe discipline up to and including termination of your employment.”

On its face, the “controversial subjects” policy does not seem unreasonable. It recognizes that “the consideration of controversial issues has a legitimate place in the instructional program of the District.” It identifies a controversial issue as “a topic on which opposing points of view have been promulgated by responsible opinion and/or is likely to arouse both support and opposition in the community.” And it permits the introduction of a controversial issue provided that it:

A. is related to the instructional goals of the course of study and level of maturity of the students;

B. does not tend to indoctrinate or persuade students to a particular point of view;

C. encourages open-mindedness and is conducted in a spirit of scholarly inquiry;

D. does not cause a substantial disruption in the school environment.

However, the relevance of a policy that addresses “a course of study” to the mere presence of books in a classroom is anything but clear. To be sure, the policy goes on to say:

The Board recognizes that a course of study or certain instructional materials may contain content and/or activities that some parents find objectionable. If after careful, personal review of the program lessons and/or materials, a parent indicates to the school that either content or activities conflicts with his/her religious beliefs or value system, the school will honor a written request for his/her child to be excused from particular classes for specified reasons.

Let’s say all the books in the classroom library are considered to be “instructional materials.” Under the policy, the most Kayla Shaw could have asked for was to have her child excused from the class — assuming, of course, that she actually has a child in Cahall’s class. 

Now, there’s no question Cahall strongly favors supporting students who do not conform to conventional gender roles. Indeed, her lawsuit specifically contends that, by disciplining her as she did, Superintendent Miller violated her “sincerely held moral and religious beliefs” in this regard. If, as the Supreme Court decided two years ago, a high school football coach has a free exercise right to pray with his players, why shouldn’t a grade-school teacher have the same right to place books about non-gender-conforming subjects in her classroom?

Bothsidesism for its own sake is lousy journalism, but sometimes both sides are comparably guilty. That means you, administrators of educational institutions.

On the left, I’ve seen administrators punish alleged discriminatory behavior in what a pretty woke former colleague of mine characterizes as “martial law.” A good public case in point is the 2022 firing of that adjunct lecturer in art history at Hamline University in Minnesota for showing her class a famous medieval Persian painting of the Prophet Muhammad receiving the words of Allah from the Angel Gabriel.

Maybe Superintendent Miller shares the conservative sentiments of Parent Shaw. Maybe she was just freaked out by the threat of community pressure. Either way, she and administrators on the other side deserve to be slapped down for their behavior.

As for Cahall, she’s put up a gofundme page to help pay her legal costs. More power to her.