Jackson State VP Fends Off Bid to End Sex Bias Claims on Appeal

A Jackson State University senior administrator can pursue allegations the state board tasked with hiring the school’s president bypassed her because she’s a woman, a federal appeals court said Wednesday.

Debra Mays-Jackson, vice president and chief of staff at the historically Black university based in Mississippi’s capital city, adequately alleged she was qualified to lead JSU but passed over in favor of a man with less relevant experience, the US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit said. She properly pleaded sex bias in violation of the US Constitution’s equal protection guarantee, so the lower court correctly declined to ...