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U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals
Justices Uphold Dismissal of Teacher’s Lawsuit
That Claimed U.S. Constitutional Violations
Ruling: A teacher’s claim that her ISD violated her constitutional rights is dismissed because she sued the district itself and not the parties that she claimed had violated her rights. Elsa Rodriguez v. Houston ISD, No. 16-20720. Issued Jan. 23. Ordered not to be used for precedent purposes.

Starting in 2008, elementary teacher Rodriguez (with the help of the Houston Federation of Teachers [HFT]) filed a number of grievances with the district. One of the grievances led to a principal having to publicly and privately apologize to Rodriguez over negative remarks the principal made about Rodriguez at a staff meeting.

Another time, HISD’s board approved nonrenewing Rodriguez’ contract (based on a recommendation by another one of Rodriguez’ principals and then-Superintendent Terry Grier).

A challenge to the nonrenewal by Rodriguez and HFT resulted in the board agreeing to rescind its nonrenewal decision in exchange for Rodriguez entering into an agreement with Grier and HISD that allowed her to keep her job and be transferred, with a one year demotion, if she agreed to not sue Grier, HISD or any of its “officer employees” and lawyers.

Rodriguez also complained in her suit that after coming back to work from an extensive medical leave after being seriously injured, she was only able — by contacting HISD’s equal employment office — to override a principal’s directive for custodians not to help her move her classroom materials to another classroom in the same building to which she had been assigned.

Rodriguez was also among a group of teachers at her elementary that HISD administrators suspected of having engaged in STAAR cheating. Rodriguez was suspended from her teaching duties and spent the remainder of that school year working at an HISD field house.

It took more than a year for Rodriguez to have her name cleared of the STAAR cheating allegations despite HISD’s knowledge that she had been on medical leave for several weeks before (and many months after) the alleged cheating occurred.

Dismissed
Rodriguez sued HISD in November 2015 alleging violations of her First and Fourteenth Amendment rights, and appealed to the Fifth Circuit after the federal judge dismissed her suit. Among other things, Rodriguez alleged that Grier “espoused and publically [sic] implemented an anti-teacher union policy” throughout his HISD tenure.

A three-member Fifth Circuit panel concluded that by suing HISD only, Rodriguez was required to — but did not — show that the alleged constitutional rights violations resulted from intentional decisions by the district’s one-and-only official policy maker (the school board) or had resulted from an official HISD policy or custom. The justices rejected Rodriguez’ claim that disputes she had with Grier and other administrators could be identified as actions attributable to HISD.