Teacher seeks over $970K in discrimination lawsuit v. Muscogee school district
A fired teacher has sued the Muscogee County School District, alleging employment discrimination based on the Americans with Disabilities Act.
The teacher, Chenita Sanks, filed her lawsuit Aug. 12 in the Columbus Division of the U.S. District Court Middle District of Georgia.
Sanks accuses MCSD of failing to accommodate her disability, specified in the lawsuit as “Major Depressive Moderate and Adjustment Disorder (Anxiety),” and wrongfully terminating her employment.
She seeks from MCSD a total of $970,054.74, comprising two years of back pay, three years of front pay, restoration of retirement funds, punitive damages and emotional distress damage.
Sanks filed her discrimination charge with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission two years ago. The EEOC issued her Notice of Right to Sue letter May 13.
The Ledger-Enquirer asked MCSD’s lawyer and communications director Friday for the school district’s response to this lawsuit. No reply was received before publication.
COVID, anxiety contribute to teacher’s desires to work remote in MCSD
In her lawsuit, Sanks says she taught in MCSD for about 20 years, most recently teaching fifth grade at Double Churches Elementary School. She was fired March 17, 2023, “because I had used all my Board leave and my physician had not cleared me to return to work, and they did not communicate the status of my sick leave,” she wrote in the lawsuit.
While MCSD conducted classes remotely during the 2020-21 school year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Sanks was allowed to work from her church office to teach her students online.
“There were no issues with my ability to perform my duties effectively from this location,” she wrote in the lawsuit.
But the pandemic “greatly exacerbated” her anxiety, Sanks said, so she went on medical leave from Oct. 14, 2020, through Jan. 28, 2021.
When she returned to work, MCSD was operating in a hybrid learning model, meaning some students were in the classroom while others remained online.
MCSD granted Sanks “reasonable accommodation” to keep teaching remotely from her church office while a long-term substitute teacher was assigned to her classroom, she said in her lawsuit.
“Again, I taught effectively from the church office with no issues,” Sanks wrote in the lawsuit.
Her doctor sent the MCSD Human Resources Department a letter July 22, 2021, stating, “Due to her current mental health issues, I recommend that Chenita teach remotely, if this is a continued option. … I am deeply concerned with her current presentation in counseling and the focus of her anxiety around contracting COVID,” according to the lawsuit.
MCSD’s administration decided to start the 2021-22 school year with completely in-person classes.
“Since MCSD was unwilling to allow me to continue teaching remotely,” Sanks wrote in her lawsuit, “I was forced to take unpaid Board leave.”
On Sept. 22, 2021, according to the lawsuit, Sanks emailed the MCSD HR department a request, “as a reasonable accommodation for my disabilities,” to be considered for “any remote position that may become available … because I would rather be working than to be on leave.”
Sanks remained on unpaid leave from August 2021 until she was fired March 17, 2023. MCSD didn’t notify her about any available remote positions or provide updates on her job status during that period, she said.
The school district’s unpaid leave is supposed to last 12 months, but Sanks was on unpaid leave for 19 months, according to the lawsuit.
“MCSD sent me a letter informing me that since I had exhausted my Board leave and my physician had not released me to return to work, MCSD terminated my employment March 17, 2023, even though I was told on a voicemail that my last day was March 31, 2023,” she wrote in the lawsuit.
Ted Theus, the lawyer for Sanks at the time, sent MCSD superintendent David Lewis a letter March 20, 2023, reiterating her September 2021 request to teach remotely and noting MCSD was advertising job openings for two remote teaching positions in the district’s Lighthouse Virtual Academy, according to the lawsuit.
In his reply two days later, Lewis wrote that MCSD was staffing Lighthouse Virtual Academy through its third-party vendor, Proximity Learning, the lawsuit says.
Lewis added, due to an “ongoing teacher shortage,” he couldn’t commit to offering any remote position at that time, according to the lawsuit.
“But should conditions become more favorable,” Lewis wrote, according to the lawsuit, “we will advertise and Dr. Shanks (sic) can certainly apply.”
On March 24, 2023, MCSD chief human resources officer Tonya Carter also responded to Theus by providing a link for Sanks to apply to virtual teaching position openings through a different provider, Essential Staffing Solutions, the lawsuit says.
“However,” Sanks wrote in the lawsuit, “when I clicked on that link, there were no positions for educators listed.”
Dr. Lezli Braswell, the physician for Sanks, sent MCSD’s HR department a letter March 29, 2023, explaining her mental health conditions and requesting, “as a reasonable accommodation,” that she teach remotely, the lawsuit says.
Sanks had the right appeal her firing because her employment was terminated before her contract expired in May. The MCSD Board conducted her appeal hearing Oct. 3, 2023. After the nearly three-hour hearing, the board unanimously voted to uphold her firing.
On May 28, 2024, the Georgia Board of Education affirmed the local board’s decision, then Sanks and MCSD failed to reach an agreement during an Aug. 12, 2024, session with EEOC mediator Ward Richards, according to the lawsuit.
