BREVARD COUNTY, Fla. — A former Brevard County high school AP English teacher who lost her job after she called a student by a long-term nickname without their parent’s permission will be allowed back into a classroom, a panel of educators and parents decided Wednesday.
Melissa Calhoun was one of the first educators swept up in the controversy surrounding Florida’s new nickname law this past winter and became the face of the outcry from community members who decried the law as government overreach.
The law forbids a teacher from using anything other than a student’s legal name without written permission from their parent. Republicans in Tallahassee passed the law amid a crackdown on transgender expression in the state, particularly among minors.
Lawmakers billed the requirement as a win for parental rights, saying parents deserved to have a say when their child was undergoing a major identity transition.
Calhoun used a male nickname for the born-female student, who had asked to be known by that nickname for years before the new law took effect. The parent filed a complaint, and Calhoun’s contract was not renewed at the end of the school year, with the Brevard County School Board citing the fact her certificate was at risk of being pulled.
Calhoun reached a settlement with the Florida Department of Education to avoid that outcome. She will be formally reprimanded, pay a $750 fine, take an ethics class and serve a year of probation. It was virtually the same punishment given to a different teacher who admitted to calling a student the n-word.
“I just question why we’re here to this degree – I think it’s too much,” Florida Education Practices Commission member Charlotte Wintz, who represented teachers on the commission, said.
Wintz was the most visibly uncomfortable with Calhoun’s case and the state’s claims Calhoun was “grooming” the teen. She called the law a slippery slope, asking if a teacher could grade a paper that a student signed with an unapproved nickname.
A representative of the Department of Education [DoE] assured Wintz that the law would be “ironed out” in the coming year.
“What we need to recognize is teacher’s tremendous influence over students,” the representative said. “Honestly, I think this would be a violation without the new law because of the harm that’s done.”
The DoE attempted to back out of the settlement it reached with Calhoun, saying new Commissioner of Education Anastasios Kamoutsas did not agree to the terms his predecessor, Manny Díaz, signed off on.
The panel batted the attempt down after Calhoun’s attorney accused the DoE of infringing on the panel’s independence.
“You heard, short and sweet, ‘We changed our mind. We don’t want to do this,’” Mark Wilensky accused.
Calhoun was too emotional to offer an immediate reaction or detail what her future plans were now that her certificate was safe.
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