South Panola High is facing a discrimination lawsuit from longtime assistant coach Mark Weaver (not pictured).
Former high school football coach Mark Weaver is suing the South Panola School District, and others, claiming he was fired for protesting the elimination of two class periods allocated for football. Coach Weaver, who is also the school’s science teacher, was hired as an assistant coach in 1995 to discipline and turn the failing Mississippi program around. He accomplished this monumental task by increasing the graduation rate while substantially improving the football team. When it was all said and done, the varsity team won 89 games in a row, eight state titles, and won a national championship. He was also responsible for a number of South Panola High School graduates in receiving college scholarships.
Despite his paramount success, the district’s superintendent wanted to change the climate around the football program by eliminating two class periods designed to help the players. Weaver argued that eliminating the two class periods would “diminish the time the football player could spend with academic tutors, and would hinder the team’s on-the-field performance.” As a result of this disagreement, Weaver was ultimately terminated.
Weaver claimed his termination violated his First Amendment rights of free speech. The school responded by saying the termination had to do with Weaver improperly disciplining a student earlier in the year. Weaver, who is white, further alleges that his termination was racially motivated in that his replacement, a black teacher, actually struck a student but was not terminated. Additionally, his replacement coach, who is also black, had been subject “of national media coverage of his practice of disciplining students by striking them with a leather strap.”
Based on the complaint and being it was filed in Federal Court, this case is more about racial discrimination than a simple free speech matter. Weaver filed his six page complaint in the US District Court for the Northern District of Mississippi, Delta Division (2:12-cv-00152-MPM-JMV).
