A Florida high school teacher's decision to use a student's preferred name, in a state with strict anti-LGBTQ+ laws applying to K-12 classrooms, has led to her contract not being renewed and a state review of her professional certificate — putting into jeopardy her future employment with the school district.
The teacher's reprimand is the first widely known incident of such a nature resulting from Florida's 2023 law restricting name and pronoun use in public schools that does not align with a student or employee's biological sex.
Brevard Public Schools said the decision to not renew the Satellite High School teacher's 10-month contract, which expires next month, came after a parent inquired about the teacher's decision to use a student's preferred name. The district issued a letter of reprimand after it "conducted a detailed investigation" and after the AP literature teacher, Melissa Calhoun, admitted that she did not comply with the state statute.
The district said Calhoun violated multiple policies, including a state statute that says "a person’s sex is an immutable biological trait and that it is false to ascribe to a person a pronoun that does not correspond to such person’s sex." Another policy cited is the state board of education's professional conduct code that prevents harassment and discriminatory conduct that "unreasonably interferes" with education or "creates a hostile, intimidating, abusive, offensive, or oppressive environment."
The Brevard district "supports parents’ rights to be the primary decision-makers in their children’s lives, and Florida law affirms their right to be informed," said BPS spokesperson Janet Murnaghan in an email to K-12 Dive. "Teachers, like all employees, are expected to follow the law."
The Brevard Federation of Teachers spoke out against the district's decision and in solidarity with Calhoun, saying that the soon-to-be graduating student was called by their preferred name for most of their time in high school.
"Educators simply want to do what they love and what they are highly trained to do: teach to the best of their ability, support the best outcomes for their students, and help students thrive," said Anthony Colucci, the union’s president, in a statement to K-12 Dive. "Every educator deserves the ability to do their job without fear of whatever political battle they will be thrown into."
Colucci called the district's decision "heavy-handed" to "essentially terminate" Calhoun, who has been teaching at the district for over a dozen years.
While the incident is the first such widely publicized ramification of Florida's strict anti-LGBTQ+ policies, related incidents and lawsuits have unfurled in Florida and elsewhere over the past few years.
In 2023, multiple Florida teachers sued the Florida Department of Education as well as state and district education boards over a law restricting teachers from using their own preferred title or pronouns if they “do not correspond to his or her sex." The plaintiffs said the statute violated the anti-sex discrimination statute of Title IX, employment discrimination protections, and the Constitution's First and 14th amendments. That lawsuit led to a preliminary injunction stopping its implementation in the case of one teacher.
In other states, teachers have been fired over refusing to use students' preferred pronouns or names as a result of personal or religious beliefs.
California’s Jurupa Unified School District, for example, paid $360,000 last year to settle a wrongful termination lawsuit after a public school teacher, who was Christian, claimed the district violated her First Amendment rights. Specifically, she said, Jurupa USD did not accommodate her religious beliefs when it required her to adhere to transgender students' use of facilities and pronouns.
