A Virginia superintendent is suing the schools board that fired him claiming he was drummed out of his job for promoting Christianity in his spare time.
Mark Taylor was hired by Spotsylvania County in September 2022 despite having no background in education and fury over social media posts attacked as racist and homophobic.
The board referenced the posts when it fired him in January this year, but Taylor claims the real reason was his backing of child star turned evangelical activist Kirk Cameron and his campaign against ‘woke’ books in schools.
The Growing Pains actor was the star attraction at a book fair Taylor sponsored on school property to promote Christian books for children that ‘reinforce biblically-based, foundational values’.
‘This is primarily a First Amendment retaliation case,’ Taylor’s attorney Thomas Strelka told the Independent. ‘American public school employees can fall victim to unconstitutional retaliation due to the overcharged politicized environment.’
Mark Taylor claims the Spotsylvania County School Board fired him for embarrassing them with his promotion of Christian books for children in his spare time
Actor turned evangelist and writer Kirk Cameron was the star attraction at a Christian book fair paid for by Taylor at a school under his jurisdiction
Taylor promised to create an environment of ‘inclusion and high achievement’ when he was hired by the board for the $245,000 job in the teeth of opposition from opponents, including his own estranged daughter.
‘I never in a million years really thought that they would actually consider my dad to be superintendent,’ said Jael Taylor who was homeschooled by her father.
‘For many, many years there was very little to do with any kind of textbook learning. And still to this day, I still feel like there are a lot of holes in my education.’
Taylor, a former county administrator, blamed hackers for posts that attacked white people for supporting Coca Cola and mercilessly mocked LGBTQ people, before the board appointed him on a 4-3 vote.
The new superintendent pulled 14 ‘sexually explicit’ books from shelves including two by revered black author Toni Morrison, as concerns over the content of school libraries were pushed to the front line of the nation’s culture wars.
Helping lead that campaign was Cameron who accused Scholastic – the world’s biggest publisher of children’s books – of flooding schools with ‘pornographic’ and ‘sexually explicit’ material.
‘We all grew up with Scholastic, everyone, as the publisher of these great books, and Clifford the Big Red Dog and Stuart Little and James and The Giant Peach and all the fun little crossword puzzles,’ Cameron told the Christian Broadcasting Network in April.
‘Well, their book fairs are now filled with the kind of progressive, socialist Marxist material that is undermining God, family, and the country.’
Taylor promised to create an environment of ‘inclusion and high achievement’ when he was hired by the board for the $245,000 job in September 2022
But his critics were infuriated by his less than kind social media posts
Cameron , pictured with Dudley Moore, was a child star of the 1980s earning two Golden Globe nominations for his work playing Mike Seaver on the ABC sitcom Growing Pains
He has since become one of the leading campaigners against ‘obscene’ books in schools
Weeks before he was sacked Taylor hired out space at one of the county’s schools to host an exhibition by Brave Books, which claims to ’empower your children against woke culture’.
The event was organized by SkyTree Book Fairs, which promotes a ‘school-choice alternative to the sexually explicit content distributed in Scholastic’s book fairs’.
But Taylor claims the board was infuriated by the publicity attracted by Cameron who was there to promote ‘the need to disseminate Christian literature’, according to the lawsuit.
‘The theme of the book fair was to showcase literature that had been endorsed by conservative Christian authors and critics,’ it claims.
‘The books available at the book fair were marketed by Mr Taylor as an alternative to literature that Mr Taylor and other conservative Christian-minded individuals considered obscene pursuant to their religious beliefs.’
The following month Taylor found himself placed on administrative leave ‘without warning’.
‘This letter is to inform you that Spotsylvania County School Board believes it has sufficient cause to terminate your employment with Spotsylvania County Public Schools with cause,’ the board told him.
In March this year his dismissal was confirmed with the board citing his hiring of ‘several unlicensed and unqualified employees in violation of state law and school division policy, and improperly disposing of school property’.
It also warned potential employers that ‘numerous documented offensive and inappropriate social media posts on various social media platforms may bring into question his ability to serve as a School Superintendent in any school system in the Commonwealth of Virginia’.
Taylor’s LinkedIn profile suggests he has yet to find another job, and he claims the ‘fabricated’ explanation for his dismissal was concocted to disguise the board’s ‘retaliation’ for his high-profile work with Cameron.
The board ‘permits members of the public to reserve and use school property for events such as book fairs,’ he claims, and he was acting ‘as a private citizen and never used his position as Superintendent to organize the book fair’.
Reports at the time suggested that Taylor’s contract included a provision that guaranteed more than three years of pay even if he was fired.
But he is suing for lost pay, compensatory and punitive damages claiming he has ‘suffered and will continue to suffer emotional distress, and other significant financial and personal harm, due to the retaliation committed by the Board’.
Children’s book publisher Scholastic, the worlds largest, has come under fire from campaigners for its ‘woke’ titles and ‘pornographic’ content
The enmity at the heart of the school board saw member Lisa Phelps, left, accuse fellow member Nicole Cole of assault and battery earlier this year
The board, which has not commented on the claim, unanimously voted to fire Taylor, and has hired a replacement
But it remains riven by personal animosity which saw one member charged with assault and battery against another in July of this year.
Nicole Cole found herself in court accused of slamming a door into fellow board member Lisa Phelps during a May 20 meeting and tripping her up.
Taylor was in court to support Phelps, and board member Carol Medawar supported Cole claiming she had decided to start recording the meeting when Phelps began ‘yelling and screaming and calling me evil’.
Judge Gene Woolard dismissed the case at Spotsylvania General District Court as he admonished the board for its conduct.
‘Chaos is a good word,’ he noted.
