In a settlement that experts say is a significant win for free speech, the West Point School Board in West Point, Va. agreed to pay more than $500,000 in damages and attorneys’ fees to former high school French teacher Peter Vlaming after the Virginia Supreme Court ruled in December that he was wrongfully terminated for refusing to use pronouns that were opposite of a transgender-identifying student’s biological sex.

The saga began in 2018, when a female student in Vlaming’s class who identified as transgender demanded to be called by a male name and pronouns. Vlaming, who had taught in the district for almost seven years and was popular with students, agreed to call the student by her chosen name but declined to refer to her with male pronouns. In an attempt at compromise, he invited the whole class to use new names for French class and also avoided using any pronouns in class.

But Vlaming’s attempts to accommodate the student were not enough for West Point High School officials. They ordered him to start using the trans-identifying student’s preferred pronouns or risk losing his job. After Vlaming declined to use male pronouns and attempted to explain his efforts to compromise, he was informed that he was being fired for “discrimination” on the basis of gender identity.

“I was wrongfully fired from my teaching job because my religious beliefs put me on a collision course with school administrators who mandated that teachers ascribe to only one perspective on gender identity — their preferred view,” Vlaming stated. “I loved teaching French and gracefully tried to accommodate every student in my class, but I couldn’t say something that directly violated my conscience.”

Vlaming filed a lawsuit against the school in 2019 with the King William Circuit Court, but his complaint was rejected. Vlaming’s legal team at Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) then appealed the case to the Virginia Supreme Court in 2021. In December 2023, the court ruled that it would reinstate Vlaming’s lawsuit, stating that the Virginia Constitution “seeks to protect diversity of thought, diversity of speech, diversity of religion, and diversity of opinion.”

As a result of the ruling, the West Point School Board agreed to settle the case by paying $575,000 in damages and attorneys’ fees. In addition, the school board cleared Vlaming’s firing from his record and agreed to abide by Governor Glenn Youngkin’s (R) new policies which protect free speech and defer to parents regarding decisions about a student’s gender identity.

Following the announcement of the settlement, ADF Senior Counsel Tyson Langhofer, who was part of the legal team that represented Vlaming in the case, expressed satisfaction with the outcome.

“Peter wasn’t fired for something he said; he was fired for something he couldn’t say,” Langhofer observed. “The school board violated his First Amendment rights under the Virginia Constitution and commonwealth law. … We’re pleased to favorably settle this case on behalf of Peter and hope other government and school officials will take note of the high cost involved in failing to respect an American’s constitutionally protected freedoms.”

“It has taken six years for Peter Vlaming and his family to bring this case to a close,” added Meg Kilgannon, senior fellow for Education Studies at Family Research Council, in comments to The Washington Stand. “At the time he made his stand, very few people in Virginia had any idea that this situation was becoming more and more common in our public schools. His stand was courageous and cost him his job. I wish the monetary settlement could have been more generous, but it is certainly high enough to make other school systems in Virginia take notice and respect the rights of teachers to not accept or participate in gender tyranny.”