Student cheating was widespread at a Cass County private school that closed this year, according to a defamation lawsuit that the Minnesota Court of Appeals revived on Monday.
In the lawsuit, a former student at Foothills Christian Academy in Backus admitted she used teachers’ credentials to log in and change grades in an online grading system. However, the student said Principal Blair Ecker tried to focus the blame on her while ignoring a yearslong pattern of academic dishonesty.
The plaintiff alleged that during a meeting of 17 students and staff that she did not attend, Ecker made false and defamatory statements about her, describing her as having a “poor IQ,” needing special-education services and implying she was expelled from the school.
A former school board member and athletic director said in a court affidavit that cheating was a longstanding problem at Foothills, with “students having passwords to see all of the online test answers,” according to Monday’s appeals court order.
The order said that a teacher’s aide discovered in April 2022 that several high school students were using a former teacher’s account to change their grades. Soon after that, the plaintiff student withdrew from the school, and the principal met with some of the remaining accused students to discuss the scheme.
A district court judge found that Ecker made statements during that meeting that he knew were false and which could have harmed the plaintiff’s reputation among her peers. But the judge ruled in the school and principal’s favor, closing the case after finding that Ecker’s statements were protected by qualified privilege.
The former student appealed the decision, arguing that the principal’s statements were not made in good faith, and an appeals court panel reversed the decision, sending it back to the district court.
Foothills Christian Academy closed this year, citing low enrollment and staff vacancies, after operating for nine years, reported the Pine and Lakes Echo Journal.
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