The West Point School Board in Virginia has agreed to settle a wrongful termination lawsuit and pay $575,000 in damages and legal fees to high school French teacher Peter Vlaming, who was fired for refusing to refer to a female student by male pronouns citing his religious convictions.

Vlaming was fired in 2018 for refusing to comply with the school district superintendent’s demand that he refer to a gender-confused student by pronouns inconsistent with the student’s biological sex. He argued his sincerely held religious beliefs hold that gender is biologically determined and cannot be changed, which prohibit him from “intentionally lying” by using “pronouns that express an objectively untrue ideological message.” While Vlaming agreed to call the student by her chosen name, he attempted an even further compromise by inviting the whole class to use new names to avoid using any pronouns. These efforts did not satisfy school officials and he was fired for “discrimination” on the basis of gender identity. He argued his dismissal violated his First Amendment free speech rights and religious expression.

In December 2023, the Virginia Supreme Court allowed Vlaming’s lawsuit to move forward after it had been dismissed by a lower court. Virginia’s High Court ruled the state’s constitution “seeks to protect diversity of thought, diversity of speech, diversity of religion, and diversity of opinion,” and so Vlaming’s freedom of religion and expression had been violated. The ruling then paved the way for a settlement.

Under the terms of the settlement, the school board has cleared Vlaming’s firing from his record which allows him to pursue a new teaching position with a clean employment history. In addition, separately from the settlement agreement, the school board has abandoned its pronoun policy to conform to Virginia’s new education policies, which directs school personnel to refer to students only by the pronouns appropriate to the sex listed in the student’s official record. Virginia’s new policies make no allowance for schools to compel expression by stating that the First Amendment “guarantees religious freedom and prohibits the government from compelling speech in some contexts.”

At least 1,131 U.S. school districts across the nation have adopted policies to support a child’s preferred pronouns and some school districts have enacted secrecy policies to hide any child’s gender confusion from parents. 

Liberty Counsel Founder and Chairman Mat Staver said, “The First Amendment guarantees the right to speak and the right to not speak. Government schools cannot force teachers to endorse or engage in ideological viewpoints that violate their religious beliefs or freedom of speech. People have a right to live according to their conscience and religious beliefs.”