## Facts

- After a national student walkout was planned for April 20, 2018 to protest gun violence, administrators in a Kansas public school district learned students intended to participate.
- The district informed parents students could participate without discipline, emphasized participation was optional, and stated the walkout was not district-sponsored.
- Plaintiffs alleged district-level administrators directed building administrators to prohibit student discussion of “guns, gun control, or school shootings” during the walkout, while encouraging speech framed as “school safety.”
- At a middle school walkout, plaintiffs alleged an assistant principal interrupted or halted student remarks addressing gun violence and school shootings, warned students they would be removed for discussing “shootings or deaths,” and directed a student organizer to stop speaking when she began discussing gun violence.
- Plaintiffs alleged the event was ended early, remaining students were ordered to disperse, and some students were physically pushed toward doors.
- Plaintiffs alleged students were threatened with or given discipline (e.g., detention or suspension) because of the content of their walkout-related speech.
- Student plaintiffs, through their parents, sued the district and the interim superintendent under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 (First Amendment) and Kansas law.

## Issues

1. Whether the complaint plausibly stated a First Amendment claim under § 1983 based on alleged content- and viewpoint-based restrictions on student political speech during a school walkout.
2. Whether the complaint plausibly stated state-law claims, including a claim under the Kansas Student Publications Act.
3. Whether the interim superintendent could be held individually liable under § 1983 based on the pleaded facts.

## Decision

- The court granted the motion to dismiss the § 1983 claim to the extent it sought individual-capacity liability against the interim superintendent.
- The court denied the motion to dismiss the claims against the school district under the Kansas Student Publications Act and related state-law theories, allowing those claims to proceed.
- The court treated official-capacity allegations against the superintendent as redundant of the claims against the district.

## Legal Principles

- On a Rule 12(b)(6) motion, the court accepts well-pleaded factual allegations as true and asks whether they plausibly state a claim for relief.
- Student speech is protected in public schools, but may be regulated in limited circumstances; allegations of content- or viewpoint-based suppression of student political speech can state a First Amendment claim at the pleading stage.
- A school district’s characterization of an event as “not sponsored” does not, by itself, preclude constitutional scrutiny when school officials allegedly control the event and restrict speech.
- Supervisory liability under § 1983 cannot rest on respondeat superior; a plaintiff must plausibly allege the supervisor’s personal participation, direction, or deliberate indifference connected to the constitutional violation.

## Conclusion

The court held that allegations the district barred student discussion of guns and school shootings while permitting “school safety” messaging plausibly alleged content- and viewpoint-based censorship sufficient to proceed on district-level state-law claims, but dismissed the interim superintendent from individual-capacity § 1983 liability for lack of specific allegations of personal involvement.


M.C. Through Chudley v. Shawnee Mission Unified Sch. Dist. No. 512, 363 F. Supp. 3d 1182 (D. Kan. 2019)