Stacy Bailey - Art Teacher, Mansfield, TX
My Story…Ms. Bailey
How one school district’s discrimination became fuel for a group of allies to start a fire and create change.
There are two words you don’t often hear together: gay teacher. It’s uncomfortable to straight and gay people alike to think about discussing sexual orientation in front of children. I’d like for you to think about all the times a teacher mentioned her husband or kids during class. When doing this, is she putting her sexual orientation on display? For some reason, the oversexualization of gay people has created a toxic and unsafe environment for gay educators. When a gay teacher mentions a spouse, people tremble at the audacity that sexual orientation is being discussed in front of children. The truth is, sexual orientation has always been discussed in front of children. Straight teachers have been doing it for generations.
My question to you is: Is there anything sexually explicit about mentioning a family? Gay people, not only in education, but in workplaces everywhere have felt the oversexualization of our families for decades. I have a question to all the allies listening: how many times have you casually mentioned your spouse or children at work? Have you ever had to question your safety or job security when doing so? It’s time we have that uncomfortable discussion about the double standard, recognize privilege, and make our workplaces safe for all families.
The Supreme Court of the United States made a ruling on June 15, 2020 that extended workplace protections to the LGBTQ population. We have never been a “protected class” of people, nationally, until now. Before this ruling, in 2017, I experienced workplace discrimination that changed my life. I’d like to share my story with you. Maybe we can think of it now as a story that never needs to happen again and celebrate the end of stories like mine.
Teachers have the power to change lives. We have all had teachers who have made an impact on our life. For me, the people I loved the most in my life were teachers. My granny was a teacher’s aide at the elementary school I went to. She was loved not only by her school, but by generations of families in our community. Her name meant something to a lot of people. I was proud to say that “Ms. Bailey” was MY granny. When I got my first job as an elementary art teacher in 2008, I could not wait to take my granny’s name and become someone’s ‘Ms. Bailey’ for myself.
Teaching and connecting with kids came naturally to me, and I was voted Teacher of the Year twice. The first time, in 2011, happened to be the year I came out of the closet AND made my first appearance in the Dallas Voice newspaper. My face and story were literally in a gay newspaper the same year I accepted my first teacher of the year award. Just as a fun fact. The second time I received this award in 2017, my wife, Julie, attended the event with me and sat right next to my principal. My job was such a big part of who I was, that I started living my truth in front of my students in 2012. I was never any good at lying, I’ve been that way my whole life.
My ability to be honest and authentic with students was a big reason they connected with me so easily. I started out each year by showing a silly slideshow of my family that included baby pictures of myself, my parents, my siblings, my hobbies, and vacations. It’s fun to start the year laughing with your students.
Connections and lasting impressions on the very first day are the teacher hack for all teachers who hope to make an impact. In 2017, I was still riding the high of winning Teacher of the Year only three months prior. Year ten of my teaching career was a go!
But only two weeks into the school year, on September 8, 2017, I was removed from my classroom and never allowed to return. Human Resources informed me that I was being suspended and put under investigation due to a parent complaint. One parent had written the school board saying I had shown a gay-lifestyle slide show, I was pushing a homosexual agenda, indoctrinating the children, and explicitly describing my intimate relationship with a woman. My eyes, my heart, and my brain went blank.
My family had been oversexualized in a disgusting way and I was sitting in a gay teacher’s worst nightmare. How could a parent email place me in this chair right now? I cried. I offered to email and show the pictures that I used. I had only shown my wife and I in our Finding Dory and Nemo Halloween costumes making silly fish faces. The students had all laughed.
I was told my computer was being taken from my classroom as I sat there, and they would gather the evidence they needed. It was clear that the harassment from this one parent was backed by the prejudice of my superintendent and school board. I was told that the investigation could take up to 2 weeks. In the meantime, I was not allowed be in contact with my students, their parents, my coworkers, or even step foot onto district property. My badge, and the key to my classroom that I had kept for 10 years were taken from me, and I was sent home.
I thought when marriage equality passed 2015, it came with sweeping protections for us. This was not true at all. The following Monday my phone was flooded with texts and calls from my work family. I had suddenly disappeared without leaving sub notes or telling anyone. They were immediately concerned. I was told that if I responded to their messages or checked my email, it would be seen as breaking a directive from my suspension and the district would have valid reason to fire me.
I expected a phone call within the week to clarify any misunderstanding. This investigation should only take a few days, they will find nothing, and I’ll be back to work soon; that is what I thought.
On my 57th day of waiting, silenced and isolated, the district lawyer asked for my resignation. There was no evidence or reason provided. Most people don’t understand the process of removing a teacher from a job. So, I have a quick teachable moment, if you will, that will help you better understand how school districts work. They are tiny government entities.
There are 3 ways to remove a teacher from her job. The first and most common way is with a resignation. This is mostly voluntary. If there is a problem a district can ask you to resign. Most teachers comply immediately if they want the chance to ever teach again. The other two options are career ending.
Firing a teacher is extremely difficult. The district would need to provide evidence to a judge in Austin. The teacher would provide a defense, and a bipartisan judge would make the final call. This is expensive and is almost never used. Don’t worry though, school districts have a sneaky and easy equivalent to firing a teacher. It’s called a Non-Renewal. A non-renewal is basically the same as firing a teacher but without the due process and bipartisan judge. All that is needed for this to pass is a school board vote. A teacher is allowed to speak in a public forum BUT, it really doesn’t matter because by the time you make it to the nonrenewal hearing, the school board has already decided their votes.
If a teacher is ever threatened with a non-renewal, most resign immediately to save their career. I just want you to keep this in mind as my story continues.
First meeting
I knew the district didn’t have any evidence to fire me, so I refused their offer for me to resign; I was not going to just give up my classroom. Finally, on January 9, 2018, 123 days into my isolation and waiting, I finally had a meeting.
My union lawyer advised me to be mostly quiet and compliant if I wanted my job back. During this meeting I heard phrases like, “you just don’t meet community standards.”, “we are concerned that we had a gay activist in the classroom,” And “We just don’t know that we can trust what you will say if we allow you back into your classroom.” As you can imagine, I did not remain quiet and stood up to them with words like, “equal treatment,” “discrimination”, And “Do you expect me to lie to my students?”
I refused to admit that mentioning my family in class was wrong. I told them how much I missed my kids, and how that school had been my family for a decade. Honestly, I cried, and pleaded for my job.
The following week, the district notified me that if I didn’t turn in my resignation (with a non-disclosure agreement) by the end of the month, they would proceed with a non-renewal. So, my options were: leave quietly and never be allowed to discuss my suspension or receive a non-renewal and effectively end my career. Either way, my classroom was gone.
Dark Days
This is when the silence and darkness swept over my life. I grieved the loss of my job as if a person had died. So much of my identity was tied up in getting to be ‘Ms. Bailey’, I could not imagine my life any other way. I had called the ACLU and Lambda Legal, we met with local lawyers asking for advice, but no one would hear me because they didn’t see potential for…. money. I felt like no one was listening or cared. I felt helpless.
I wondered, if I was dead, would people finally hear me? Would the truth finally come out if I was gone? It was a very scary low for me and my wife both.
Thankfully, I sought help to deal with these thoughts. While I worked daily to help myself, my school family and a group of allies came to the rescue.
Open Records Request, Parent Response
I had been out of the classroom for five months without explanation. My coworkers and parents had grown tired of the silence. One parent did an open records request and found an email I sent to the school board requesting LGBTQ inclusive language in school policy. And I was removed from the classroom the very next day.
When my school family began to figure out what was going on, they showed up for me. This was not a group of queer people who rose up in my defense, it was a group of allies. They knew and loved me based on my connections with their kids, they knew I was gay, they knew what was happening was wrong, and THEY began to make noise. They attended school board meetings for three months to demand answers and my return back to the classroom. Parents, students, and coworkers lined up by the dozens to speak on my behalf when I did not have a voice for myself. This is the power of the ally.
As I said, by the time this started happening I was in a very low mental state. I watched these meetings virtually from home. For hours, one by one, I saw parents, and coworkers speak about what I meant to their families. They cried. Hearing the words of my school family was my first breath of air. I was in a dark place, and they provided light and hope that I wasn’t alone.
I told my therapist that I heard all these words from my school family about Ms. Bailey, but I felt like they were talking about someone I used to be. I had spent so many days alone and being degraded, I had lost all sense of myself. And she said to me, “Ok. You don’t have to be THAT Ms. Bailey right now, but IF THAT Ms. Bailey were sitting next to you, what would she do?”
I can’t exactly explain how the phrasing of that question allowed me to think differently. But one thing was undeniable: I knew that Ms. Bailey would stand up for truth.
Media, anxiety;
My email was released to the media in March of 2018, and things started to take on a life of their own. There are now hundreds of articles about my story all over the world.
While I did feel some sort of relief that the truth was coming out, I was still under the directives from my suspension. Any comment from me, and I would still be fired. While people started to build this perception of me as a strong teacher fighting for justice, I actually spent most of these days bent over a toilet dry heaving with anxiety.
I saw my story and my face literally flying around the world like a meteor, and I had no control or voice to speak for myself. My school family rode this wave hard and screamed loudly. This crazy amount of media came to fruition without one word from me. This is the power of the ally.
I had to ignore the media, and continue to walk as if I was the person the world was talking about; even though I had forgotten what she looked like. Each step felt like I was trying to remember who I used to be.
California Lawyer
A lawyer whom I had never met from California read my story, found my number and pleaded with me to find an employment discrimination lawyer. I told him I was tired of fighting, I was being advised to resign, and I didn’t think I could continue on.
He said with real conviction: “unfortunately really shitty things need to happen to good people for change to come. BUT those good people MUST file a lawsuit so we can set precedence.” He said that cases like mine could create small stepping-stones in the justice system that could one day lead to a big decision like a Supreme Court Ruling that could change life for everyone, not just teachers. This was a random straight guy. I could not believe he cared so adamantly about my rights. He coached me through writing a paragraph I could read to any lawyer I called. He said do not stop calling until you find one who listens. This is the power of the ally. I agreed to make phone calls for only one more day.
Finding Jason, Non-Renewal and Lawsuit
That same day someone texted me the name and number of an employment discrimination lawyer named Jason Smith. I called him expecting the rejection that I had already faced, but for the first time, he HEARD me and understood what I was fighting for: this cannot happen to another gay teacher; schools cannot take our jobs away and not be held accountable; this is not about money. He actually agreed and gave me the courage and guidance to continue on.
I felt the weight of all the gay teachers who came before me. There is no telling how many gay teachers have been bullied out of their profession. I knew that if I did not stand now, I would pass this burden on to someone else. When your passion is stripped away from you, and your dignity is under attack it becomes a matter of life and death. That’s when I knew it was my time to stand.
I did the opposite of what my district was expecting and told them to proceed with my non-renewal hearing. Yes, my career would be over, but at least I would have stood in my truth and held on to my integrity.
After the flurry of media coverage, my district was exposed and had no good explanation for why they did this. Suddenly, after all of the threats, my contract was renewed but, I was relocated to a high school. A place they felt my existence was more “age-appropriate.”
This discriminating action against me was the last straw, and on May 8, 2018, I filed a federal lawsuit against the district.
High School Teacher- 1 ½ years of waiting, Judge’s Ruling, Settlement
In August of 2018, I began teaching at Lake Ridge H.S. I decided to stay in the district that had done this to me. That school district had been my family for a decade, and I felt that it was important for me to stay visible and see this fight to the end. I kept my head down, I made connections, I learned how to be a high school teacher; it came with a lot of trauma and panic attacks, but like I said before I took each step trying to remember who I used to be hoping that one day, I’d take a step back into myself and remember how to be Ms. Bailey.
We waited one and a half years until finally there was movement in my case.
In November of 2019, a federal judge in Dallas, made a ruling that condemned the actions of my school district. This judge was a straight man who saw me as a human that deserved equal treatment under the law. This is the power of the ally.
The negotiated settlement of $100,000 was seen as a big win for gay teachers in Texas and across the country.
My hope for other Gay Teachers
The whole reason I filed a lawsuit was to declare that my family is equal to all families. I hoped to be a beacon to other gay teachers, and a warning to school districts.
Now, it feels like the Supreme Court ruling in June of 2020 echoed my hope on a much louder microphone for all to hear. I hope that with this ruling, gay employees across Texas and this nation walk with confidence into their workplace. I hope they begin to see their families as worthy to be mentioned, and I hope that the awful double standard can finally die.
Youth Programs to support now; do not forget younger generations
In June of 2020, my wife and I had the privilege to donate $10k of my settlement to a program at the Resource Center in Dallas called Youth First.
I’d like to encourage anyone reading my story to not forget the generation coming behind us. They are still facing the same rejection from their families that many of us have faced. Be visible, show up, volunteer, tell your story. Whether you are gay or straight your story of acceptance of yourself or others is powerful. Representation matters. The next generation deserves to hear and see that they are valued. So I challenge you to find organizations that help LGBTQ youth in your area and get involved.
12. Take Away: Show up
Ok, I’m almost done, but I wouldn’t be a good teacher if I didn’t ask you to learn something about yourself. I’d like to end with a little bit of self-reflection.
Answer this question: are you being your true self in all parts of your life? As a gay person, most of us learned early on to hide parts of ourselves. When is it safe to be myself, when do I need to go back into the closet? I will argue that many supportive straight people are closeted allies. Is there a place in your life where you are not showing up for a rejected gay friend or family member? Are you hiding your support for the queer community to maintain comfort? If my school family would have done that, I may have never had a voice. Remember the power of the ally.
Consider the new supreme court ruling, does that empower you in a new way? Gay and straight people alike: Find your new power. I challenge you to show up and live your truth out loud. It may be scary, and it will definitely be uncomfortable, but that’s how we grow. Sometimes the most courageous thing you can be is yourself.
With Love,
Ms. Bailey