Atlanta teacher fights dismissal in court

The Associated Press

A third-grade school teacher is claiming in a federal lawsuit that she is the target of an "ill-disguised witch hunt" by the superintendent of the Atlanta Public Schools amid a state investigation into cheating on standardized tests.

Sheila Evans, a teacher at Benteen Elementary School, said she was notified by Superintendent Beverly Hall in December she was to be fired. She said Hall claimed that Evans gave her students answers to questions on the 2009 Criterion-Referenced Competency Tests.

A lawsuit she filed last week in federal court seeks $20 million in damages and a temporary restraining order that would halt her termination. The school district did not immediately respond to the lawsuit.