Connecticut Media Specialist Sues District Over Transfer

Staff -- School Library Journal, 10/1/1998

After nine years as a school librarian, Cheryl Ward was back teaching in the classroom this fall. School administrators in Windsor Locks, CT, ordered her transfer, saying they needed her skills in a fifth-grade class. Ward, however, sees the move as punishment for speaking out against censorship, and now she is suing the district claiming the transfer violated her First Amendment rights.

District officials deny the charge, saying they routinely carry out involuntary transfers to put staff people where they're most needed. Ward was one of seven certified staffers transferred this year, six of whom were moved involuntarily.

The controversy began over a library book, Iceman by Chris Lynch (HarperCollins, 1994), which a parent found too vulgar and morbid to be on a summer reading list for sixth to eighth graders. The parent's complaints led Superintendent June Hartford-Alley to propose a policy segregating "controversial" library books and requiring that students have parental permission to read them. Ward was outspoken in her opposing the idea.

After suing the district in July, Ward asked the court to stop her transfer, pending resolution of the case. But shortly before school started this month, a federal judge dened her injunction request, saying Ward would not suffer "irreparable harm" to her First Amendment rights while the case goes to trial.