LG School Library Book Scrutiny Takes Sad Turn

“Yes, books are dangerous. They should be dangerous — they contain ideas.”

— author Pete Hautman 

What should our kids be reading?

What shouldn’t they?

I guess we will be finding out every meeting now courtesy of the La Grange School Board.

It was with great sadness that I read about last week’s La Grange school board meeting – a meeting that was detailed in Tuesday’s edition of the newspaper.

I’ve also listened to a recording of the entire 30 minute discussion on the subject at the meeting.

It’s clear that attacks on school library books have expanded from an original, understandable, goal of trying to keep explicit and vulgar language, and sexually explicit content out of the libraries (particularly the elementary) into something far more.

For those of you who might have missed the story, the school board has granted itself power to remove any books it deems objectionable from the to-be-purchased list.

One school board member got to test out his new authority last week. Out of a list of more than 600 books they had previously been given, four were flagged as objectionable by a board member. He made a motion not to purchase them and it was seconded by another board member.

From the discussion, it was clear that nobody on the school board had actually read the four books, or could even articulate why they were deemed objectionable. The board member who made the motion cited a trusted source (“I would back him up on anything he has done,” the board member said in the meeting) who told him the four books, or their authors, had been banned at other schools.

(We as parents tell our kids all the time not to do something just because everybody else does, but I digress.)

Thankfully a pair of board members (Dr. Karen Robert and Mary Gunn) spoke up and convinced others to postpone the vote so all could make an educated decision.

I guess we will find out what they really think at the Feb. 19 meeting when the fate of those four books gets voted on.

Before the meeting was over, our publisher Regina Keilers, who was covering the meeting, took out her phone and ordered all four books.

In two days time, three had arrived and newspaper staff have read all three.

We’ve struggled to find why these books would be even remotely objectionable.

None of the three contain any sexual references or bad words.

One of the four books in question, “The Eyes of the Forest” is a book intended to be ordered for the high school library.

A newspaper staff member has read it and says it reads like a normal mystery thriller. A board member incorrectly said in the meeting that the Frisco district had banned the book, but they had actually just moved it only to the high school library.

The other three books in question, interestingly, all have minority main characters navigating their way through growing up, including issues of race relations.

“Finally Seen” is about a Chinese girl who moves to America to live with her parents and sister after five years apart. (This is the one that hasn’t arrived yet so we haven’t been able to read it) Here are the two I personally read: “Class Act” is a graphic novel (like a long comic book) about a pair of very different black kids at an affluent mostly- white private school. It’s an engaging look at all sorts of challenges facing middle schoolers and how they navigate them. After a parent complaint it was removed from libraries in Katy ISD for about a week in 2021 before being reinstated when no evidence for its removal was found.

The final book up for removal is an elementary-level poetry book “Can I Touch Your Hair?: Poems About Race, Mistakes and Friendship” is about a pair of students, a black boy and a white girl, put together for a fifth grade poetry project. They write poems about different but parallel aspects of their life and in the process find out they aren’t that different.

It’s a beautiful, thoughprovoking book and it took me all of 20 minutes to read.

Out of 232 reviews on Amazon, 82% of readers gave it the top rating of five stars.

I read some of those online reviews and I would like to share one with you that I found summed it up very well: “Sometimes kids (and adults) need books to help us build empathy and understanding, and to see that we are more the same than we are different as people. We all want new shoes, a friend to play with on the playground, to be forgiven, to understand the world around us, to be seen for who we are on the inside. Can I Touch Your Hair? is a unique book in that it gives readers windows and mirrors on a topic from the perspective to two kids, Charles and Irene. Irene and Charles are paired together to work on a poetry project. It’s clear they wouldn’t have picked one another for many reasons, but the big difference they see in each other is the color of their skin. They decide on topics to write about for their project and we see the products of their work. Their shared joys, fears, worries, observations, embarrassments, rejections, and apologies ... Within its pages, a journey to friendship and a better appreciation for what makes us more alike than different.”

Not everybody loves the book. Two percent of people gave the book just a one-star rating on Amazon. Here’s one of those one star reviews: “Absolutely the worst book we’ve ever read ... Teachers, please stick to teaching reading, writing, arithmetic. We parents will take care of life lessons.”

But who loves every book? If that’s the goal what a boring – and really, really small – library that would be.

What’s the big deal though? It’s just four out of 600 books. But as a board member ominously said during the meeting last week – “this is just a start.”

If the board wants to keep up the fight to keep explicit and vulgar language, and sexually explicit content out of the school libraries that’s one thing, but when that attack expands to on-grade-level viewpoints in books, that’s not okay. A former librarian, Becky Snyder very eloquently addressed the school board about the need for a diverse library collection during the public comment portion of last week’s meeting. I encourage you to read her words in a story on Page B2 today.

Books that get our kids excited about reading, or that they can see themselves represented in, should be celebrated not vilified. And books that really get our kids thinking? Or challenge us? Even better.

But what happens in a society where books become the enemy? Clay County School District in Florida leads the nation in banning books. Frisco ISD has banned books including “The Hobbit” from their elementary library. But both those schools districts were specifically mentioned by a La Grange school board member last week as school that had issues with some of these four books in question, and should serve as an example to us.

Are those schools really who we want to model LGISD after? Really?

But if anybody on the school board wants to continue to tell people what not to read, please do me and everybody in this school district a favor: 1. Don’t hide behind a anonymous “trusted source” for your book removal recommendations, own it yourself.

2. Actually research the books you are voting on.

In the meantime, we here at the newspaper will continue to do our job – we’ll keep covering those school board meetings, and we’ll keep reporting on those books you don’t like.

After all, the surest way to get a bunch of people to read a book is to tell them not to.

“Read the books they don’t want you to. That’s where the good stuff is.”

— LeVar Burton, 23-year host of PBS’Reading Rainbow 

* Three of the books called into question at last week’s school board meeting (the fourth still hasn’t arrived) are available for reading at The Fayette County Record office 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday (sorry but you gotta read them here and can’t take them home). We’ll give you a comfy spot to sit and might even offer you a cup of coffee while you read. School board members are especially invited.