"Young readers need challenging books to help them become empathetic, caring, knowledgeable, thoughtful, and mature adults," Bertin and Davis state. "They’ll tell you that themselves, if you just ask them."
NCAC's Executive Director and Millie Davis from NCTE explore why books are challenged in schools and libraries and the common responses to these challenges in a comparison between two surveys.
NCAC has written to a Florida school protesting a rule requiring parental permission prior to student protest on the grounds it infringes student free expression.
Kate Karstens, editor-in-chief of The Lasso, tells NCAC her school's vetting of her newspaper's articles violates district policy.
Renae Roscart, 15, considers parents who argued for the reading list removal to be "pretending that sexual assault and alcoholism isn’t something that youths encounter."
What are the legal and educational responsibilities of school librarians in stocking their book shelves?
Kate Messner speaking event at South Burlington's Chamberlin Elementary School after the school discovered her latest book was about heroin addiction.
NCAC has released the following statement on the climate change controversy brewing in Portland: On May 17, the Public School Board of Portland, Oregon unanimously adopted a resolution to “Develop an Implementation Plan for Climate Literacy,” which concluded with this recommendation: “The implementation plan should include a review of current textbooks for accuracy around the severity of the climate crisis and the [...]
A junior at New Albany High near Columbus organized an Amnesty International affiliate group at her school to discuss human rights and came under fire for promoting what some people thought to be an "anti-Israel" message. The school's principal ultimately reversed his decision to "protect" the student "from getting caught up in political lightning rod topics" and will allow the club to form next fall.
When students at Susan E. Wagner High School in Staten Island produced a photographic artwork critiquing rape culture and the sexualization of young women's bodies, the administration responded by removing the artwork, implicitly sexualizing the body of a young woman. Last week, a photo-collage was removed from a student exhibition in the lobby of the high school due to its [...]
A Michigan school board voted last night to keep The Bluest Eye in its AP curriculum.
Parents in Michigan are very upset about a Toni Morrison novel being taught in an AP English class.
Students in the Bronx wanted to protest a visit by Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz. But their school pulled the plug.
Calls to ban social media platforms to combat campus discrimination threaten students' free speech rights.
A school in Pennsylvania removed an award-winning novel in response to parent's complaints.
Another year, another challenge to Looking for Alaska. This time, a parent in conservative Marion County, Kentucky, is challenging its use in a 12th grade classroom.
It looks like a Tennessee high school will have a gay-straight alliance club after all. But do the district's new rules for all clubs go too far?
A high school production of 'The Producers' is altered after parents complain about swastikas on stage.
An award-winning graphic novel was removed from high school libraries in Florida after the parent of a third-grader complained. The district thankfully reversed its decision.
Students are speaking out against legislation that would require parental notification of the teaching of "sexually explicit content" in public schools.
A bill that would require Virginia public schools to notify parents about 'sexually explicit content' should be vetoed by the governor, a coalition of literary and free speech groups argue.
Author Catherine Ross speaks to NCAC about schools and free speech: "In many communities across the country, the adults who would like to censor student expression are much louder and more influential that the adults who hope that schools will allow students to learn how to exercise their rights."
A Virginia bill that would require public schools to notify parents of "sexually explicit content" poses a profound threat to public education and First Amendment principles.
In Florida, a seemingly minor change to a policy regarding how schools handle book challenges could have far-reaching implications.
A Virginia school district's decision to ban a short video about affirmative action, along with the suggestion that it may ban other "racially divisive" material, raises serious First Amendment concerns.
The video, as it was intended to do, has sparked a lively debate. Shouldn't a school seek to nurture that discussion instead of stifling it?
A parent of an elementary school student complained about a graphic novel in the school library. Is that any reason to restrict the book in the same district's high school libraries?
At Franklin County High School in Tennessee, some students and parents are outraged by the very existence of the Gay-Straight Alliance.
A local TV news outlet is whipping up a frenzy in Florida schools over an award-winning graphic novel.
A series of proposed changes to the sex ed curriculum in Omaha, Nebraska generated intense opposition late last year, with hundreds of angry parents packing a meeting to denounce plans to teach students about gender identity, emergency contraception, and abortion. Now it is up to the board to decide how and what students will learn.
If a New Jersey high school is really treating a student's tweets as harassment, they need to cease investigating her words and apologize to her instead.
Two new bills are designed to empower ideologically-driven activists to shape what is taught in Florida's classrooms.
NCAC urges a Florida high school to reconsider its decision that a student painting was too explicit to display.
The reasons a private school in Pennsylvania offered for not teaching 'Huck Finn' are precisely the reasons it should be taught.
A parent in Etiwanda, California is complaining that a celebrated children's book about tolerance and diversity is not "appropriate" for a kindergarten classroom.
A conservative legal group's threat to sue a school over the planned reading of a book about a transgender child is based on a fundamental misunderstanding of how the First Amendment applies to public schools.
An ad hoc committee in Idaho doesn't think high school seniors are ready to read The Namesake. The school board has an opportunity to reject this recommendation and protect the freedom to read.
A reconsideration review committee that met on December 3 decided in a 7-4 vote to retain copies of Gayle Foreman’s award-winning young adult novel Just One Day in Rosemount-Apple Valley-Eagan Public School libraries.
Parents of a middle school student were upset to find their child read the novel 'One Fine Day.' So they want it removed from four school libraries in the district.
One parent's complaint about a graphic novel has apparently led a school in North Carolina to remove it from the school library.
