Lauren Dressback is adored by parents and students, but the school board won't say why they placed her on leave

May 01, 2024

For about two months now, Principal Lauren Dressback hasn’t been seen at Vestavia Hills Elementary Cahaba Heights, a public school in Alabama, even though there’s no reason she’d be out of commission. She graduated from the district, lives in the community, worked as a history teacher in the local high school since 2005, became the elementary school’s principal in 2022, and, according to CBS 42, just had her contract extended through 2026.

(Follow above article link to view photos/PDFs/video that accompanies this article.)

Since letting the school community know she was on leave, the only other message to them came in mid-March with this brief email:

“Good afternoon, CH Parents,” Dressback wrote in one email to school parents on March 13. “I have been out of the building, and will be for a little while longer. Please know that if you have any immediate needs, contact (assistant principal) Kim Polson, and she will be happy to assist you.” 

When concerned parents asked the school board on Monday where the hell she was, board members were cryptic and evasive.

“If I ask questions, are you obligated to answer them,” asked Jim Whisenhunt, who had two children graduate from the school system.

“We generally do not respond to public comments,” board vice president Scott Brown said.

…

Patrick Mills, a graduate of Vestavia Hills High School, said the board’s decision to be silent about Dressback was a disservice to the community.

“I would like to remind the board that its mission is to create an educational system distinguished by a safe and nurturing environment, the courage to be creative, unparalleled community support and an appreciation for diversity,” Mills said. “The action of putting Lauren Dressback on administrative leave undermines this mission.”

…

“On the advice of my counsel and the board, we will not comment on matters related to personnel,” [Superintendent Todd] Freeman said.

The only official information we have is that Dressback was placed on “administrative leave,” even though there’s no public record of the board taking that step. But the employment contract she signed made clear that it could be cancelled at any time for reasons that include insubordination, failure to perform duties in a satisfactory way, and “immorality.”

Since there’s no evidence she wasn’t doing her job well, the public perception is that Dressback was placed on leave for supposed immorality… but since the school board is silent, there’s a lot of speculation over what horrible thing she may have done to be removed from her school. After all, if students’ safety were at risk, you’d hope they’d be pretty forthcoming with information.

As it turns out, there are people who seem to know what happened. And they’re finally talking about it.

They both say they know Dressback personally and were granted permission from her to tell the real story. (The local news was unable to verify their claims.)

YouTuber Karl Julian says his wife attended high school with Dressback and she “cleared it ahead of time”—implying that Dressback gave him permission to share the details.

In his telling of the story, Dressback was married to a man but, last year, came out as lesbian. She and her husband separated but “he remains very supportive.” In February, now dating a woman, Dressback allegedly shared a picture with a friendly secretary at her school of her new girlfriend kissing her on the cheek. Another staffer, perhaps a custodian, may have seen that. Not long after, she was placed on leave.

Julian says district administrators want to fire her… but they have no good (legal) reason to do so. So for now, she’s just on leave until they can find something to blame on her. (Maybe she filled out a time sheet incorrectly?!)

He adds that Dressback has secured a lawyer.

Separately, on TikTok, a woman named Lauren Pill, who says she went to high school with Dressback, tells a similar story. She also says she got approval from Dressback to talk about this. (It’s not clear if she has any connection to Karl Julian. Pill did not respond to my request for comment.)

The details are virtually identical. Pill adds that Dressback was escorted out of the school when her superiors learned about her new girlfriend. In fact, someone may have filmed her showing that picture to her colleague. The situation is so bad that Dressback literally had to ask permission to step on district property in order to watch her son’s track meet.

The bottom line is that Dressback was a “Teacher of the Year” when she was married to a man, but she was placed on leave soon after she began dating a woman.

Alabama, of course, has one of those “Don’t Say Gay” bills with a more restrictive one currently working its way through the legislature. If district officials think that will protect their alleged actions here, though, they may want to think twice. There’s no indication that Dressback discussed or shared her orientation with any children. (Not that any of that should matter even if she did, since other teachers talk about their spouses all the time, but the point is she didn’t do that.)

Pill says in a separate video that Dressback has been contacted by a federal investigator with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC). So this whole situation could become a much bigger problem for the district.

If the allegations of what happened to Dressback are true, the administrators are sending a disturbing message to everyone in the community: that a staffer’s harmless personal revelation overrides her actual abilities and work history.

They would rather see a shitty straight principal than a stellar lesbian one.