Affirmed

I should have heeded my husband's apprehension and our friends'
advice, but I wanted that house. Because Ron and I were public school
teachers and supported public education, we ignored our friends'
warnings and enrolled our daughters in Marion's school system. A year
later I transferred to the Marion system from Florence where I had
developed two educational programs: the itinerant learning disabilities
program and a self-contained middle school class for emotionally
disturbed juvenile delinquents. In Marion, I was assigned to two schools
as a learning disabilities clinician. Within weeks of my transfer, my first
encounter with the establishment made me acutely aware that the
warnings of our friends were accurate.
Almost four decades since the landmark decision in Pickering v. Board
of Education, 1968, many teachers still cannot criticize their school
system without fear of retaliation. When author Maggi Hall, a veteran
public school teacher, wrote a letter to the newspaper in Marion County,
South Carolina, criticizing her school district, she didn't realize that one
day she would be called upon to defend the cornerstone of democracy
itself-the First Amendment. AFFIRMED: Teachers as Citizens is her amazing story of determination.