Yesterday, the U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals rejected claims brought by a part-time instructor of cosmetology at a public community college that the school's failure to re-hire her violated her constitutional rights, including her right to discuss her religious beliefs. In Piggee v. Carl Sandburg College, (7th Cir., Sept. 19, 2006), instructor Martha Piggee, upon discovering that one of her cosmetology students was gay, placed two pamphlets in the student's smock during clinical instruction time. She pressed the student to discuss the pamphlets with her. The materials that Piggee had given to student Jason Ruel were virulent religious denunciations of homosexuality in comic book format. When Ruel complained to college officials, they investigated and concluded that Piggee's conduct constituted sexual harassment. They found that "Piggee has been proselytizing in the hopes of changing Mr. Ruel's sexual orientation and religious beliefs." It appears that Piggee had given religious pamphlets to other of her students as well.
The court concluded that: " the college had an interest in ensuring that its instructors stay on message while they were supervising the beauty clinic, just as it had an interest in ensuring that the instructors do the same while in the classroom.... [W]e see no reason why a college or university cannot direct its instructors to keep personal discussions about sexual orientation or religion out of a cosmetology class or clinic." [Thanks to How Appealing for the lead.]
