Federal Appeals Court Revives Lawsuit by Prof Who Defended Math Standards
“We ultimately conclude that the administrators did violate clearly established law”
Shouldn’t colleges want professors who defend standards?
Inside Higher Ed reports:
Court Revives Suit by Professor Who Defended Math Standards
A federal appeals court has revived a tenured math professor’s First Amendment lawsuit that was dismissed in 2023.
In 2021, Truckee Meadows Community College in Nevada moved to fire Lars Jensen, citing two consecutive unsatisfactory performance reviews that accused him of “insubordination,” among other things. One of the insubordination allegations concerned Jensen handing out fliers at a state math summit that criticized the college’s math standards. Jensen said the college was watering down its curriculum while rolling out a corequisite support program for students.
In November of that year, college president Karin Hilgerson said she’d accepted a special faculty hearing committee’s recommendation to retain Jensen. But Jensen still sued college officials the following January, alleging, among other things, retaliation for First Amendment–protected speech on matters of public concern. Among his demands was that the college remove the negative information from his personnel file.
A U.S. District Court judge for Nevada dismissed the case in September 2023, but Jensen appealed to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. On Monday, a three-judge panel ruled that the lawsuit could progress. They concluded that the legal concepts of qualified and sovereign immunity don’t protect the Truckee Meadows officials from Jensen’s First Amendment claims.
“We ultimately conclude that the administrators did violate clearly established law,” Judge Marsha S. Berzon wrote on the panel’s behalf. “The state’s interest in punishing a disobedient employee for speaking in violation of their supervisor’s orders cannot automatically trump the employee’s interest in speaking.” She also wrote that the administrators hadn’t shown that Jensen caused an “actual, material and substantial disruption.”
A Truckee Meadows spokesperson said in an email that because the case continues, the college “will not make any further comments on this or any personnel matters as we continue focusing on student success and meeting our community’s needs.”
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Comments
Is this one of those “Conform and Embrace Diversity!” things that the left is so fond of spewing?
It’s astounding how many government actions like this cite “disruption” as the justification for government actors to try to silence speech they just don’t like.
How many students have been punished or threatened with punishment because they wore a T-shirt with a graphic or saying on it that some teacher or administrator just plain didn’t like or agree with, claiming “disruption to the learning environment” as justification? The only disruption came as a result of their hysterical and sometimes tyrannical reaction to free speech.
The same thing happens at school board and city council meetings and others, and I will note that it is usually, not always, but usually, petty tyrants on the left that try to silence expression they don’t like.
I will guess that the only disruption, if any, at the math summit was that attendees wanted to talk about the watering down of the standards instead of whatever drivel was on the schedule.
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