Michelle Mickens
The Oglethorpe County School System’s insurance policy will pay for a settlement resulting from a lawsuit filed by former teacher Michelle Mickens regarding a social media post she made after the death of conservative activist Charlie Kirk last fall.
“I think there’s a lot of misconceptions out there that the district paid for this out of taxpayer funds, and that’s not the case,” new Superintendent Phillip Powell said Tuesday.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported the settlement on July 3. The settlement includes $270,420 for emotional distress and $17,080 to cover legal fees, according to The AJC.
The agreement was signed in June, and the lawsuit was dismissed July 1, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center.
In the suit, Mickens, who taught English at Oglethorpe County High School, said the school system violated her First Amendment rights by removing her from the classroom last September after her comments about Kirk’s death on Sept. 10.
The Echo reported Mickens shared a quote from Kirk on her private Facebook account, which sparked a political discussion in the comment section. Screenshots of her remarks regarding Kirk’s quote, political views and death were later circulated online, leading to a complaint filed with the school system.
On Sept. 29, Mickens was informed through her Georgia Association of Educators (GAE) representative that “the District did not want her to return to teaching and that she would be terminated if she did not voluntarily resign,” the lawsuit stated, The Echo reported last October.
The Southern Poverty Law Center and GAE filed the lawsuit on Mickens’ behalf.
“We are pleased to reach a mutually amicable settlement of this matter,” SPLC senior supervising attorney Sam Boyd said in a release on July 3. “As courts across the country have recognized in other cases involving firings over comments about Charlie Kirk, and many other topics, ‘public school employees, including teachers, have a constitutionally protected right to free speech.’ ”
Former Superintendent Beverley Levine, who retired in June, referred questions to Powell. The school system was represented by Harben, Hartley & Hawkins, Powell said.
“(I’m) looking forward to having a clean slate and moving past it,” he said. “I’ve only been dealing with the fallout from it. We are, as a district, making sure that we are following all guidelines with human resources, and as the superintendent, my plan would be to always contact our lawyers for any type of decision that would involve something of this magnitude. Making good common sense decisions moving forward would be my goal.”