District settles sex discrimination lawsuit with former Highland High School principal

With just 17 days left until her official retirement date, the Highland School District settled a two-year-long legal case with Highland High School principal Karen Gauen, who had sued the district claiming she had been intentionally paid less than her predecessor due to her gender.

"I regret it reached this place," Gauen said in a phone interview Thursday.

During a special meeting on Wednesday, the school board unanimously approved a $200,000 settlement with Gauen and her attorneys. Gauen will receive $106,145, and her lawyers will get $93,855.

"It was really difficult to sue the district, because I love the town and I love the district," Gauen said.

Gauen's suit had sought $1.5 million in damages.

"There is no award. This was simply a settlement between the two parties," Highland School District Superintendent Mike Sutton said.

The district admitted no wrongdoing.

"The Board vigorously defended this lawsuit, and denies any and all liability with respect to Dr. Gauen’s claims," a statement issued by the district said. "Motions were filed in an attempt to dispose of this litigation before trial, and we were disappointed with the ruling of the U.S. District Court in allowing these claims to continue to trial. The Board has always denied, and continues to deny, that it discriminated against Dr. Gauen in any way."

"When we settled with the board, the board really didn't want to say they were wrong," Gauen said. "But if I thought they were right, I would never have sued them. I'm not a litigious person."

Gauen, the Highland High principal since the 2013-14 school year, filed a federal lawsuit against the district in February 2016, accusing the district of sex discrimination and unfairly paying her a lower salary than less-qualified men who had served as the high school’s principal and assistant principal.

In her lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in East St. Louis, Gauen alleged that the Highland School Board paid her predecessor, Derek Hacke, a base salary of at least $25,000 per year more than it paid her to do the same job, even though he had 17 fewer years of experience as an educator and lacked Gauen’s qualifications.

Gauen holds bachelor's and master's degrees from Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, a master's degree jointly from National University and the University of California-Irvine and a doctorate in educational administration from Lindenwood University in St. Charles, Missouri. She is a also a National Board Certified Teacher.

In addition, the district paid Gauen less as principal than it paid men who held lower-level and less-responsible jobs, including as assistant principal, the suit said.

"I just needed to take a stand was what I thought was right," Gauen said.

In its response to the lawsuit, the district said Gauen's pay had nothing to do with her gender but was based on her previous experience in administration.

Gauen had no administrative experience before being hired as assistant principal, a job she had for just one year before being promoted to principal. Chris Becker, who was hired as the Highland High assistant principal when Gauen was promoted, had eight prior years of administration experience at the time.

Pay based on administrative experience is still how the district conducts business, Sutton said.

"All of our administrator salaries we calculate based on administrative experience the candidate has, solely," Sutton said.

A press release issued by Gauen after the settlement seemed to dispute that. "Since Gauen filed suit, the board has increased the salaries for several other female employees," the press release said.

Sutton disagreed with the premise.

"We've also raised the pay of male administrators, too, as well as male teachers and female teachers," Sutton said.

In her press release, Gauen also said she "resorted to a lawsuit only after Mr. Sutton refused my repeated requests to negotiate a more equitable salary."

"It was true she requested an adjustment in salary, and I did not feel like the request had merit," Sutton said. "We always felt our administrative compensation — to all our administrators — was fair and consistent."

Gauen's press release also said "one of her conditions for the settlement was that its terms not be confidential."

"I don't know that that was an issue for either side," Sutton said. "The board did not want it confidential, either."

The case was set to go to trial in March. However, just before jury selection was to begin, the two parties told the judge they had come to an agreement.

"The settlement was pretty much verbal, and after that time, it had to be reduced to writing," Sutton said.

Twice after the verbal agreement was reached, the board had placed settling the suit on a meeting agenda, but votes were postponed both times as the exact language could not be agreed upon by the parties. The judge had given both sides until June 18 to reach an agreement or proceed to trial. There was another date looming as well, the end of the school district's fiscal year, June 30, and Gauen's official retirement date.

In addition to the monetary settlement, the board also agreed to have the state Teachers' Retirement System recognize Gauen's recalculated pay over the past six years, which will result in about a 20 percent increase in her pension. In Illinois, educators' retirement benefits are paid mainly by the state, based on salaries set by local school districts. Gauen also received 10 vacation days back.

The amount of money Gauen will receive is just shy of her last year's pay. Gauen's base salary this past year, before the settlement, was $110,215, not including benefits.

The district's insurance will pay $50,000 of the settlement, as well as pick up the school's legal bills, Sutton said. The remainder of the settlement will by paid out of the district's tort fund, which is funded through property taxes and can be levied to whatever the district's needs are.

"In order to mitigate the potential monetary exposure of putting this matter in the hands of a jury and to continue to provide children with the best possible education, a settlement was reached," the statement from the district said. "Ultimately, the decision was a business decision made with the well-being of the District and the taxpayers in mind."

"I'm glad it's over," Gauen said.

Gauen, who was born in Granite City and raised mainly in Collinsville, taught in suburban St. Louis and in Orange County, California, before moving to Highland in 1993. She taught middle school music and high school English and then went into administration.

Gauen, 67, said she plans to continue working part-time in a national teacher development program. She and her husband, Pat, a retired columnist and editor at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, will also likely move from the area to be closer to their children and grandchildren, she said. Their son and his family live in Minnesota, and their daughter and her family live in Wisconsin.

"So I think we are going to move north," Gauen said.

However, she's proud of her time at Highland High School.

"The high school has done so well," she said, pointing to the school's test scores and rankings the last two years by U.S. News & World Report as one of the top 100 public high schools in Illinois.

"I'm really proud of the kids and the community," Gauen said.

This story was originally published June 14, 2018 at 11:05 AM with the headline "District settles sex discrimination lawsuit with former Highland High School principal."