The following may inspire tears of pride and/or rage, depending on your disposition. They are Change.org quotes from two petitions: one on each side of a debate over the use of Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye and other texts in Adams County, Colorado. Bailey Cross, a student at Legacy High School, is combatting censorship in her district in Colorado [...]
Spooky... scary... KRRP responds to some of the most frequently heard myths when it comes to challenged and banned books in this downloadable pulpy one-sheet inspired by Tales from the Crypt.
Steven Pico in 1981 Steven Pico may not be a household name. But for those who champion the freedom to read, he’s a big deal. Back in 1976, Pico and four other teens sued their school district in Long Island, NY, for banning 11 books from their classrooms and school libraries. The six-year battle to defend the constitutional rights [...]
Thirty-one years ago today, the Supreme Court upheld students rights to read in the Island Trees School district in Long Island. The 5-4 decision of Board of Education vs. Pico found that the school board violated the First Amendment when they removed certain books from junior high and high school libraries after parents complained they were “objectionable.” Check out some [...]
If you love libraries, you might know that today marks the anniversary of an important decision upholding the First Amendment in schools. In Board of Ed. v. Pico (1982), the plurality opinion stated that school libraries have “special characteristics” as providers of free access to information, and should be especially vigilant of upholding students’ First Amendment rights. Pico began when [...]
Following a second letter from the Kids' Right to Read Project and a little help from Judy Blume, the school board of Glen Ellyn School District 41 in Illinios voted to restore access to The Perks of Being a Wallflower in middle school classroom libraries.
The Kids’ Right to Read Project (KRRP) celebrated the return of Stephen Chbosky’s The Perks of Being a Wallflower (Simon & Schuster) to middle school classroom libraries in Glen Ellyn, Illinois. District 41 school board members voted 6-1 to reverse a ban on the book at their meeting yesterday. Perks was effectively banned on April 29 by the outgoing Glen [...]
--UPDATE-- Last night the board voted 6-1 to keep the book. They will be instating new policies that will hopefully balance parental concerns with students rights and the professional judgments of teachers. --------------------------------------------- The students, teachers, parents and citizens on the ground in Glen Ellyn have been working hard to spread the word about tonight's board vote there to (hopefully) [...]
NCAC's Kids’ Right to Read Project (KRRP) and its allies sent a letter to Glen Ellyn District 41 school board members today, urging them to reverse the district’s ban on Stephen Chbosky’s The Perks of Being a Wallflower (Simon & Schuster) in middle school classroom libraries. The board is set to reconsider the ban at a June 10 meeting. [...]
Over a month ago now, the Glen Ellyn school board voted 4-2 to ban the book The Perks of Being a Wallflower from middle schools in District 41. The district's ad hoc committee of teachers, parents and administrators read and assessed the book, after the parents of a student filed a formal complaint about the its content. They advised the [...]
Students in middle schools in Northville, MI will continue to have the opportunity to read and study the definitive edition of Anne Frank's A Diary of a Young Girl. A district reconsideration committee voted to retain the book, which was challenged by a parent because of anatomical descriptions in the book.
For the last few months, the West Palm Beach Library Foundation in Florida has been hosting the travelling exhibition Banned and Burned: Literary Censorship and the Loss of Freedom from the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. In addition, the Library asked students in the area to make their voices heard in their first-ever essay contest. The theme? Literary censorship. The Library Foundation recently [...]
Timeline On March 14, 2013 Christopher Dignam, Principal of Lane Tech High School, sent an e-mail to his staff repeating a mandate reportedly handed down by one of Chicago public schools Network Instructional Support Leaders. That mandate required schools to remove the graphic novel Persepolis from libraries and classrooms and stop teaching the book, effective March 15. When the e-mail [...]
Khury Petersen-Smith of SocialistWorker.org caught up with Persepolis author Marjane Satrapi to talk about the shady restrictions being placed on the teaching of her book in Chicago. Again, Satrapi showed her insight and savvy and aptly expressed the utter confusion and dismay we are all feeling: What is so horrible in my book that you need guidance? Am I inviting people to [...]
Last week, the best-selling graphic novel "Persepolis" was removed from Chicago's middle and high school reading lists. This week, a spokeswoman for the school system has claimed that the word "censorship" was inappropriate, as teachers could still assign the book so long as they were willing to sit through a class on how to teach such "sensitive material". These extra classes appear designed [...]
In an interview with PBS station WTTW Chicago last night, Barbara Jones, Executive Director of ALA's Office for Intellectual Freedom, of the Chicago Teachers Union and two Lane Tech Seniors spoke about the removal of Persepolis from classrooms in Chicago Public Schools. You can watch the interview here, but this particular moment stood out as a perfect response to anyone who might [...]
A reconsideration committee voted unanimously to keep Phyllis Reynolds Naylor's Intensely Alice in school libraries in Buffalo, Missouri after NCAC joined its letter in defense of the book with those from the ALA and ACLU.
Earlier this month, the Washington Post reported on a mother's attempt to have Toni Morrison's Beloved banned from AP English classes in Fairfax County. When we heard about the challenge, we immediately contacted board members to take the temperature of the situation. In Fairfax County -- a huge public school system with beefed up district operations serving 180,000 studentss -- there's a [...]
...and this was a problem for the mother of a student in Pennsylvania, who recently lodged a challenge against Adele Geras' Troy (Scholastic). The book was housed in the Northwestern Lehigh Middle School library and will stay there: the school board voted 5-4 to keep the book, in spite of the challenge. Two things caught my attention about this story. First of [...]
Despite receiving accolades ranging from the National Book Award to the Pulitzer, these five notorious novels have been banned by schools across the United States. Their Eyes Were Watching God —Zora Neal Hurston, 1937 "Their Eyes Were Watching God" is a bildungsroman about a young Black woman growing up in the Deep South. In 1997 parents in Brentsville, Virgina attempted to [...]
Photo: Rob Casey Sherman Alexie tells the Write Stuff about how it feels to be challenged, why he’s determined to keep writing controversial books for teens, and the upcoming sequel to his oft-banned, award-winning novel, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (Little, Brown). I'm sure you hear about the impact True Diary has on kids all [...]
The school board in Prosser, WA may again hear comments from a high school social studies teacher who has made it his mission to ban two library books. A reconsideration committee in the district already voted to keep A Child Called "It" or The Popularity Papers in school libraries.
Matthew Dunbar's short film is one of our 2012 Youth Free Expression Project Film Contest semifinalists. Like what you see? "Like" this video on YouTube and it could become our 2012 People's Choice Award Winner!
Once more The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian has faced censorship in author and YFEP Film Contest Judge Sherman Alexie's home state. A panel of educators, administrators, parents and media specialists voted to retain the book in Yakima, WA, where it is being read by 10th grade students.
In Our Mothers' House, a book about an adoptive family with two moms will no longer be hidden behind a counter at school libraries in Davis County, Utah. Following a lawsuit by the ACLU, the district reconsidered its restrictions on the book. KRRP wrote a letter defending the book in June of 2012.
Despite recommendations by a library committee that the book be retained, Alan Moore's Neonomicon was pulled from library shelves in Greenville, South Carolina. The library services director who ultimately made the decision called the book "disgusting" in an interview with The Greenville Times.
NCAC reached out quickly and effectively on a challenge to Jeannette Walls' The Glass Castle, a summer reading assignment for 9th graders in the Traverse City school district. A school board reconsideration committee had already supported removing the book, but the school board ultimately voted 4-3 to retain the book.
Several works being taught in AP English classes in Katy, TX were removed or replacafter complaints. Fight Club by Chuck Palaniuk, A Thousand Acres by Jane Smiley and Ernest Hemingway's short story "Hills Like White Elephants" were among the objectionable titles.
NCAC and partner organizations sent a letter voicing our concerns over a push to remove books from classrooms in the Springfield School District in Massachusetts. Among those objected to are Sherman Alexie's Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian and The Other Wes Moore.
NCAC and nine partner organizations came together on a Kids' Right to Read Project letter to the Guilford School District in Greensboro, NC. The letter advised the district to stay strong and continue to follow its policies in the face of recent complaints over "The Handmaid's Tale", "Cat's Cradle" and other texts used in AP English classes. Parents in the district have complained that the texts "denigrate Christianity."
New York City may have been on pause for a bit after superstorm Sandy, but censorship attempts were certainly not taking a break. The mother of an 8th grader at Bromley East Charter School in Brighton, Colorado evidently lodged a complaint to the school's administration and to the media about one of the most frequently taught short stories of all [...]
The Rocklin School District in California reversed an earlier decision to remove Stephen King's "Different Seasons", a short story collection which contains "Shawshank Redemption" and "Apt Pupil" among others. NCAC sent a letter to the district urging them to keep the book.
Great news! Bastard out of Carolina and Angels in America will be taught in Fremont to all those who wish to learn, notwithstanding the Fremont Unified School District's decision to ban the books from its English curriculum. Thanks to the efforts of Rev. Jeremy Nickel of the Mission Peak Unitarian Universalist Congregation, the class will begin tonight and continue throughout the school year. [...]
The American Library Association teamed up with us this week on a letter to the Rocklin Unified School District, where they are currently considering pulling Different Seasons by Stephen King out of school libraries. After her ninth grade son brought the book home from the library, a parent complained about sexual content in the book, specifically in the story "Apt Pupil." [...]
In King County, WA, the public library system responded to a complaint over a manga novel, Hero Heel 2, in the best possible way: by reaffirming the freedom of access of its patrons and responsibility of parents. Yay, librarians! Like graphic novels and comics, manga is sometimes misunderstood by readers and parents who (wrongly) presume that because the books contain a large [...]
Kids' Right to Read was joined by the American Library Association in defense of Stephen King's Different Seasons which has been challenged in a school library in Rocklin, CA. A parent objected to a rape scene in the novella "Apt Pupil" and wants the book removed.
Kids' Right to Read responded to the removal of Laura Esquivel's Like Water for Chocolate from classrooms in Nampa School District in Idaho. Informal complaints led the school to ban the book, despite the fact alternative assignments were offered and no formal process had been followed.
In evaluating and reviewing a recent challenge to Stephen King's Different Seasons (Signet, 1982) in a high school library in Rocklin, California, we were amused to read the following passage in King's the story "Apt Pupil". In the passage, the main character, 13-year-old Todd, is discussing his interest in and research into the Nazi death camps during World War II: "At first the [...]
NCAC joined with the American Booksellers Foundation For Free Expression and the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund in writing a letter of support to the King County Library System for their response to a recent challenge of Hero Heel 2, a manga title intended for mature audiences.
Score one for the robots freedom to read supporters! A seven-person committee in the Hardin Valley Academy, in Knox County, TN has decided that Daniel H. Wilson's "Robopocalypse" should stay in the school's curriculum. The best-selling science fiction book about a hostile robot takeover was selected as the STEM Academy's summer read to keep students engaged in a light but [...]
