A federal judge has ruled in favor of a kid in a dispute about speech in school.
The dispute began at Chamblee charter High School in Georgia, after a new principal named Rebecca Braaten was hired. Soon enough, there were numerous complaints that she ran the school through intimidation and bully tactics.
A student (initials K.B.) started attending the school. He was familiar with the reputation of Braaten, due to watching local news coverage of the issue. He became convinced that Braaten was unfit to lead the school, so he signed an online petition calling for her ouster. His family also signed it.
K.B. then designed some stickers which featured the professional resume photo of Braaten and the phrase “Fire Braaten.” He gave them out to some fellow students who put them on their backpacks and phone cases.
The school officials decided to discipline K.B. for allegedly violating rules against creating a disturbance and disrespectfulness. He was suspended for a week, which was later reduced to one day.
The family sued, and a federal judge ruled that the student’s First Amendment rights had been violated. For you see, the stickers were never put on any school property, there was no vulgar language involved, and there probably was no cognizable chance of any actual disruption just because a few students put stickers on their own property.
So the student’s lawsuit can proceed with no qualified immunity for the defendants.