A Shawnee Mission School District teacher who made a splash a year and a half ago with an op-ed critical of the district’s diversity, equity and inclusion training, has now sued the district, saying it violated her freedom of speech and religion.
Jennifer Caedran Sullivan has filed suit in U.S. District Court of Kansas alleging administrators’ response to her outspoken opposition to “gender ideology” and “anti-white ideology” was an infringement of those rights.
The suit seeks unspecified damages and several injunctions claiming she’s suffered emotional distress and mental anguish and that her career has been “irreparably damaged” by the district’s response.
Administrators violated her rights by requiring her to use words “endorsing and supporting the fiction that boys can become girls and girls can become boys, or that one can disavow his or her sex because one feels like it,” according to the 102-page suit.
In addition to filing the lawsuit in late October, Sullivan also published an op-ed column on Fox News’ website detailing her reasons for bringing the suit.
The district declined to comment on the ongoing litigation, according to spokesperson David Smith.
Find a copy of the lawsuit here.
Sullivan, a teacher in the district since 2007, was an Advanced Placement and Honors English teacher at Shawnee Mission North High School.
She is still employed as an English teacher there but without the AP classes.
In the lawsuit, she outlines a dispute with the district that began in 2021, when she spoke out against the district’s DEI training sessions she said teachers were required to attend.
She contended the training was anti-white and racist, and that she opposed Black Lives Matter workshops with “propaganda videos.” Such training presented a “leftist” ideology and a progressive liberal point of view, the suit says.
After her objections, Sullivan contends the district retaliated by disciplining her for allegedly using the wrong pronouns with a student. Sullivan said the administration gave her a written reprimand, monitored her team meetings, made her workplace “hostile” and stripped her of her AP classes.
Sullivan tries not to use pronouns for any students, preferring to call them by their chosen names because names don’t necessarily express sex the way pronouns do, according to the suit.
In a section outlining Sullivan’s personal beliefs, the suit says she is not hostile to students who struggle with “gender dysphoria,” which she believes can be considered a “serious emotional disorder” and a “disability.”
But, “Ms. Sullivan refuses to deceive students and she endeavors not to tell them things that are false or harmful,” the suit contends.
She also faulted the district for requiring teachers to use alternative pronouns without notifying the students’ parents.
She also cites her psychology degree to bolster her beliefs that “the idea that one can change genders or sexes or ‘transition’ from one to the other is false and harmful to children.”
What is the district’s guidance on transgender students?
While district officials provided no comment on the suit, spokesperson David Smith provided some clarifying documents on issues related to transgender students.
The district has no board policy specific to transgender students, but instead relies on its broader non-discrimination, non-harassment policy and compliance with the federal Title IX law prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sex, he wrote in an email to the Post.
“The district is strongly committed to maintaining an educational environment and workplace that is free from discrimination and harassment against students and employees on any statutorily protected basis, including gender identity,” the email said.
The district also has a document detailing its practices when working with transgender students. The administration evaluates requests for accommodations and develops individual plans for students on a case-by-case basis, according to a district document.
Here is a copy of the school district’s guidance, titled “Transgender Practices & FAQ.”
On the subject of preferred names and pronouns, the district’s FAQ notes that a signed and approved form by the student’s family is required to change a student’s preferred name in Skyward, the online access portal for families.
However, the student’s legal name is still preserved in certain educational records. For the preferred name request to be formalized in the Skyward Student Management System, the student’s family would also need to complete a request form.
As for pronouns, “All students have the right to be addressed by the name and pronouns that correspond to the gender identity they assert at school,” the document states, adding the building administrator is responsible for seeing that the request is honored, “while working to engage and include the family.”
Students pushed back last year
Sullivan caught media attention when she wrote an op-ed about her dispute with the district in 2023 in The Lion, an online right-wing publication. The op-ed became a talking point on some national media and among conservatives.
There was some fallout for Sullivan. More than 50 students at Shawnee Mission North High School, Sullivan’s home school, walked out in protest.
Students at the time said they wanted to push back against Sullivan’s narrative. Several said they support diversity training and that Sullivan’s views are not representative of the school.
Also on that day, 10 Republicans staged a counter protest to support Sullivan.
Last February, Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach called out some Kansas school districts, including Shawnee Mission, in letters critical of how they handled transgender issues, including pronouns and parental communication. The letter to Shawnee Mission schools referenced Sullivan.
Then-Superintendent Michelle Hubbard said she was “disappointed” by Kobach’s tone and the use of partisan words like “woke.”
Much of Sullivan’s lawsuit was devoted to the district’s investigation and discipline process, which she said was intimidating and expensive. She also said the district has not produced a written copy of the complaint against her.
She asked for several injunctions that would stop the district from requiring her to use alternative pronouns, allow her to report name changes to parents, and to purge her personnel file of any reference to her discipline. The suit also asks for unspecified damages and attorney fees.
This story was originally published by the Johnson County Post.
