Akron Public Schools’ own spokesperson is suing the district in federal court. Stacey Hodoh, the district’s director of strategic communication, media, community relations and outreach since 2024, filed a lawsuit Nov. 12 in U.S. District Court alleging discrimination and retaliation, and she is also suing Superintendent Mary Outley for retaliation and defamation, according to the lawsuit as reported by the Akron Beacon Journal.
The lawsuit, which requests a jury trial, follows an Aug. 13 letter from the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission that gave Hodoh the right to sue within 90 days. Hodoh has been on paid administrative leave since May and declined to comment Nov. 12, the Beacon Journal reported. The case has been assigned to Judge Sara Lioi of the Northern District of Ohio.
Hodoh is asking the court to end her administrative leave, return her to her district job, award back pay and money for attorney fees and other damages, bar the district and Outley from retaliating against her going forward, and remove references to her leave and related decisions from her district files, according to the Beacon Journal’s account of the filing.
In the 30-page lawsuit, Hodoh, a 60-year-old Black woman, accuses the district of discriminating against her based on her age, race and sex when it did not pay her for additional duties she performed as interim director of information technology between February 2025 and December 2025. The lawsuit cites two white male supervisors who received stipends for extra duties outside their primary jobs, including former facility services director Steve Keenan, who was paid $9,227 for 11 weeks as interim director of facility services, the Beacon Journal reported.
Keenan himself sued the district in federal court on July 10 over claims including sex discrimination and retaliation, and his case remains ongoing, according to the Beacon Journal.
Hodoh also alleges the district handled her complaints differently from complaints filed by white male employees. According to the lawsuit, when Keenan and others complained about then-Superintendent C. Michael Robinson, the school board hired an outside law firm whose April 2025 report substantiated those complaints, while Hodoh says her own complaints were ignored or rejected. She filed her first internal complaint within a week of being hired in December 2024, and that month filed a discrimination charge with the Ohio Civil Rights Commission that was dual-filed with the EEOC, the Beacon Journal reported.
Hodoh was placed on administrative leave on May 8. Outley’s letter cited concerns about Hodoh’s “statements, communications and other escalating conduct,” according to the lawsuit. Hodoh’s filing emphasizes the timing — 42 days after she testified at another employee’s termination hearing, less than two weeks after she updated her federal complaint, and five days after she wrote the school board about Outley. Joanne Isaac, the district’s assistant director of marketing and communications, told the Beacon Journal the district generally does not publicly comment on pending or prospective litigation.
The district has not yet filed a response in court. What happens next is a court schedule from Judge Lioi and, eventually, the district’s formal answer to allegations it has so far declined to address in public.