Teacher, Advocacy Group Sue GA School Leaders Over Coronavirus

DALLAS, GA — An unnamed teacher and her Georgia advocacy group are suing Paulding County school officials and state leaders to require consistent safety guidelines and transparency in the face of the coronavirus pandemic.

The 39-page lawsuit, filed Wednesday in Fulton County, names Gov. Brian Kemp, School Superintendent Richard Woods, the Paulding County Board of Education and Paulding Superintendent Brian Otott as defendants.

The plaintiffs are the Georgia Association of Educators and an unidentified longtime teacher from Paulding County. In the suit, she’s identified only as M.J. because she fears retaliation. Georgia is a right-to-work state where teachers are not unionized.

The lawsuit notes that schools are being given fewer standards than restaurants and other businesses.

GAE President Lisa Morgan told Patch that she believed this lawsuit was the first of its kind in the United States.

“We’re hearing similar concerns (about COVID-19 safety measures) from northwest Georgia to southeast,” Morgan said. “This is a concern across the state.”

Aside from consistent safety guidelines — some school districts require masks while others only encourage them, for example — Morgan said she hoped the lawsuit would force “honest and transparent reporting so parents can make decisions with the whole picture.”

Paulding County drew fire nationwide in August when a high-school student posted a picture of a crowded hallway to social media, showing most students without masks. Further public outcry forced the school to rescind its suspension of the student for taking the picture.

Morgan said that the “vast majority of feedback” had been positive, save for one Paulding County parent who emailed her to say that her school had no problem because her child wasn’t sick.

“Parents tend to use that view of what is specific to their child,” Morgan told Patch. “As educators, we view the students as a whole.

Morgan, a longtime kindergarten teacher in DeKalb County on leave to lead the GAE, said that educators’ first concern is always the students

“I call my kindergartners my babies, so anything that puts them at risk is of concern to us,” Morgan said.

The anonymous Paulding County has multiple concerns, according to the lawsuit: a child of her own who attends the schools, and an elderly mother she lives with whose lung disease leaves her especially vulnerable to COVID-19.

Plaintiffs to the lawsuit either declined comment or were unavailable to comment as of Thursday afternoon, according to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

According to statistics released Thursday by the state department of public health, more than 327,000 confirmed cases of COVID-19 have been reported in Georgia, and nearly 7,300 have died from it.

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