A Mississippi school district that cancelled its prom rather than allow a lesbian student to attend has agreed to pay $35,000 in damages to the recent high-school graduate.

The American Civil Liberties Union sued the Itawamba County School District because the high school's prom was cancelled after Constance McMillen asked to be allowed to bring her girlfriend to the dance as her date.
    
After the school-sponsored event was cancelled, a parent-organized prom was held, but only 10 students showed up.

McMillen "suffered humiliation and harassment after parents, students and school officials executed a cruel plan to put on a decoy prom for her while the rest of her classmates were at a private prom 30 miles away," according to an ACLU statement.
    
The school has adopted a policy that will forbid discrimination based on sexual orientation.
    
The judge in the case refused to make school officials hold the prom, but he ruled the district violated McMillen's civil rights.