Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, June 3, 1995 TAG: 9506050037
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JAN VERTEFEUILLE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Franklin County school officials asked a federal judge in Roanoke to resolve a teacher's lawsuit against them before it goes to trial. They argued that there is no dispute about the facts, only about whether the School Board violated the teacher's constitutional rights.
Lari Scruggs, a Franklin County High School math teacher forced to resign after making controversial statements about interracial dating, asked that a jury be allowed to hear the case.
U.S. District Judge Jackson Kiser did not make a ruling Friday.
The incident that prompted the lawsuit occurred in February 1993, when two students approached Scruggs while she was monitoring study hall and asked her about an upcoming Black History Month program.
Another teacher complained to the principal that Scruggs, who is white, referred to it as a "nigger" program and lectured the two white students against interracial dating. The two girls gave statements to the principal about the incident. He then suspended Scruggs for three days with pay.
Details that came out at Friday's hearing show that school officials - while publicly saying at the time that the student body remained calm after the incident - had heard rumors of an impending riot. Both Scruggs and the teacher who brought the matter to light, Nadine Keen, later were put on paid leave for 10 days while tensions cooled. A mediator from the U.S. Justice Department came to Franklin County to talk about racial tensions with residents.
Scruggs denied "using the n-word," her attorney said. One of the teens told Scruggs she preferred dating blacks to whites and asked her opinion of interracial dating. Scruggs has said she told the students it was a personal choice, but that she believed it caused a lot of problems at the high school.
The students claimed that Scruggs said dating black boys lowered white girls' status. But her attorney, Keister Greer, said that, when one of the girls told her interracial dating was a status symbol, Scruggs responded that they should set high standards for themselves and not worry about being "cool" or "in."
Scruggs seeks her former job or similar employment, and $2 million in damages.
Besides the School Board, her suit names as defendants Superintendent Leonard Gereau, Principal William Gibson, the two students, the head of the Franklin County NAACP and Keen.
Scruggs agreed Friday to dismiss the students, Kelly Steele and Elizabeth Abshire, from the suit.
Kiser asked the school officials' attorney, David Paxton, what a teacher should do when students come to her for advice. "Is she supposed to stonewall them?''
Paxton said in cases of sensitive issues "that could be misconstrued," teachers should say they are personal matters and not get into a discussion. When people are speaking in their role as teachers, it "gives the School Board an interest in what they say" and their speech is not protected by the First Amendment, he said.
"When they talk as teachers, they're restricted; that's what the law says," Paxton said.
"I thought academia was supposed to be a place of free exchange of ideas," the judge responded.
Gibson said he believed Scruggs' speech to be "potentially disruptive," prompting him to suspend her for three days with pay. The superintendent told her he would recommend the School Board not renew her contract, both sides agreed. Scruggs resigned rather than be dismissed.
A second-year teacher without tenure, Scruggs maintains the School Board denied her due process. Greer said she has been unable to find a teaching job since her resignation and that she has been "essentially blacklisted" in Virginia education.
Greer argued that the teacher was not speaking during a class lecture, but was responding to a request for her opinion during study hall. She had "a First Amendment right to answer in the manner she did, no matter how politically incorrect" the school thought her response was, he said.
"Are teachers required to favor black and white romance?'' Greer asked.
Paxton argued that Scruggs' statement indicated that she might treat black and white students differently.
And, he told the judge, "the court can't look at whether [her treatment] was fair or not, but whether it violated her constitutional rights."
by CNB