Hour after laptop request, Success Academy fired autistic teacher, suit alleges

He explained that his autism makes handwriting difficult and asked to use a laptop, the filing states. A lead supervisor turned him down, according to the complaint, telling him it “would be distracting to the other employees.” The complaint says she opened no interactive dialogue, referred him to no one who evaluates accommodations, and offered no stopgap – she sent him back to the room to keep taking notes by hand.

About an hour later, just after lunch, two people who introduced themselves as HR took him aside, the filing states. He says he assumed they were there to start his formal accommodation request. Instead, they told him he was fired. The reasons, according to the complaint, were “not being an organizational fit” and “not adjusting your behavior following feedback you had been given during the lectures.”

The timing felt “strange,” the worker says in the filing, landing about an hour after he disclosed his disability and asked for help. When he asked for a document confirming he had requested an accommodation, HR refused, the complaint says. Security then walked him out of the building in front of his new colleagues, according to the filing.

The suit brings disability discrimination and retaliation claims under the Americans with Disabilities Act and New York’s state and city human rights laws. It also names the lead supervisor, a school manager and the HR business partner individually, arguing each aided and abetted the firing. Before suing, the worker filed a charge with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and received a right-to-sue notice, the complaint states.

The alleged sequence lands squarely on the HR playbook: a note-taking accommodation waved off as a distraction, no interactive process, a dismissal about an hour after a protected request, and HR staff driving the decision rather than slowing it down. The complaint also sets the network’s public diversity commitments against how it says the worker was treated.