Archives for category: Censorship
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Sara Stevenson: Texas GOP Would Criminalize Librarians

By dianeravitch
April 7, 2023 //
14

There is a popular stereotype of librarians: Mild-mannered, quiet, unassuming, and of course, bookish. But the Republicans in the Texas legislature seem to think that behind that compliant demeanor lies a sinister purveyor of dangerous ideas and books. What other explanation can there be for proposed legislation that would place book selection in the hands of a parent committee? And why strip away the legal protections accorded to librarians doing their job?

Sara Stevenson, a retired middle school librarian in Austin, wrote the following article, which was published in the Dallas Morning News.

As a former school librarian and mother, I have always believed parents have total control over what their children select to read from the school library.

However, Senate Bill 13 goes too far. Between July 2021 and June 2022, only 22 of 1,650 Texas school districts experienced formal book challenges in the past school year, less than 2%. All school districts already have formal challenge and reconsideration policies in place.

SB 13 transfers the decisions for acquiring library materials into the hands of a council of parents, the majority of whom do not work for the district but only have children attending. What possible experience or credentials or rights does this committee have to make decisions on what children can and can’t read in an entire school district? After a long, convoluted process spelled out in the bill, the school board must then approve the list of library books before they may be purchased.

First of all, it is clear the authors of this bill have a poor understanding of school library programs. In Austin ISD, there are 116 schools. This Local School Library Advisory Council, appointed by the school board, is required to meet only twice a year to decide on the library collections for all 116 schools. A single campus librarian purchases materials throughout the year. It’s not a one and done process.

This bill will greatly delay the timeline between ordering books and getting them into the hands of children. The additional 30-day waiting period further impedes the process. As a librarian, I had the freedom to pre-order the next book in a popular series so that I could add it to our collection the very day it was published. Kids clamoring for the next book in a beloved series will now have to wait for months if not all year.

The bill also invites parents to opt in to a program in which the librarian emails them each time their child checks out a book, including the book’s title and author. One elementary school in south Austin averages 196 checkouts per day. How is it possible for the librarian to send these emails while also running her library program? Instead, why not integrate the library catalog information into the parent portal, the website which parents already access to see their child’s grades? Parents can then look up their students’ library records. It would even help librarians with the bane of our existence: long overdue books.

The portion of the bill that enables anyone to prosecute individual librarians for distributing “harmful material” under the Texas penal code (Sec. 43.24) is the most shocking and destructive piece in this bill. It removes affirmative defenses for educational purposes. Does this also remove legal protections from members of the advisory council if a “bad” book slips through the cracks?

I can’t believe the state of Texas wants to allow frivolous lawsuits against librarians, school boards, principals, and teachers. We are already experiencing a teacher shortage, with at least 59 districts switching to four-day weeks.

If passed, this bill will bring a culture of fear and intimidation to our schools.

The men and women who choose to serve as school librarians are among the most intelligent and ethical people I know. They are not just serving the children of the five parents on the Local School Advisory Committee; they are representing the interests of all children and the parental rights of all families at their schools, upholding their First Amendment Rights to read.

If the Senate Public Education Committee had only consulted in good faith with the vast majority of school librarians whose patrons are extremely satisfied with the library collections they curate, this bill would have been able to find a balance between respecting parental rights and ensuring better oversight in purchasing materials without adding unwieldy, impractical layers of bureaucracy and red tape that will prevent children from having ready access to the books they want and need to read.

Sara Stevenson is a former school librarian in Austin ISD. She wrote this column for The Dallas Morning News.

Categories Accountability, Censorship, Disruption, Ethics, Extremism, Freedom to Read, Librarians, Libraries, Lies, Literacy, Literature, Students, Stupid, Texas

Idaho: Bill Would Allow Parents to Sue Libraries and School Districts

By dianeravitch
April 5, 2023 //
17

Republicans have gone stark raving mad. They are terrified that their children might read a book that will turn them gay or transgender or might make them feel bad about racism. of course, their children have access to the internet, where they can see stuff far more sensational than anything in a book.

Somebody has to be punished for the racy books in the libraries.

In Idaho, parents will be able to sue libraries and school districts if they find an inappropriate book on their shelves. The fine would be $10,000 for each time a dangerous book is accessed.

A bill that would allow parents to sue libraries and school districts for allowing books containing material considered “obscene” on their shelves is one step closer to becoming law.

The “Children’s School and Library Protection Act” passed the Idaho House on a 40-30 vote Monday afternoon.

The bill lays out a proposed definition for what it calls material that is “harmful to minors,” including material that contains description or representation of nudity, sexual conduct, sexual excitement or “sado-masochistic abuse.”

The bill also specifically mentions representations of “intimate sexual acts, normal or perverted” along with descriptions of “masturbation, excretory functions, or lewd exhibition of the genitals or genital area.”…

One legislator made a good point:

A representative from Latah County says libraries are not the main place where kids are being exposed to mature content.

“This telephone and this computer has more damage than any library is ever going to have to our children,” Lori McCann (R), representative of Legislative District Six, said.

How many of those voting went home to watch porn on their phone or computer?

Categories Accountability, Bigotry, Censorship, Democracy, Extremism, Fascism, Freedom, Freedom to Read, Idaho, Librarians, Libraries, Literacy, Literature, Students, Stupid

Florida Plans to Eliminate Tenure in Higher Education

By dianeravitch
April 5, 2023 //
16

Florida is the state where freedom goes to die. The state university system intends to eliminate tenure and replace it with a five-year evaluation system. Theoretically, the review won’t include political views, but all professors will be expected to comply with state laws. Anyone who teaches courses about race, racism, gay studies, or inequality is unlikely to get a favorable evaluation because those subjects are banned by state law. Anyone who teaches or defends critical race theory is likely to be ousted.

Florida’s state university system is making major changes to long-time tenure protections, meaning that established professors would have to undergo a review every five years to determine the faculty members’ “productivity.”

However, Florida-based professors and other advocates say that the new rule, approved by the Florida Board of Governors Wednesday, could hurt academic freedom and impact a faculty members’ livelihood.

The issue of Florida’s five-year post-tenure evaluations, among other changes to the state’s universities, is getting nationwide criticism from multiple organizations, including American Association of University Professors, the American Psychological Association, Modern Language Association, and American Historical Association and a dozen others.

Faculty in other states are even voicing their opposition to Florida’s new higher education policies, such as the University of Rhode Island Faculty Senate and the Professional Staff Congress of the City University of New York.

“Over the past two years, Florida elected officials have attacked the independence and integrity of the state’s public higher education institutions…introducing a requirement for five-year post-tenure reviews, they have undermined tenure and academic freedom,” the Professional Staff Congress said in a written statement.

The American Association of University Professors explains that tenure serves as a “safeguard” for a professor’s academic freedom.

“A tenured appointment is an indefinite appointment that can be terminated only for cause or under extraordinary circumstances such as financial exigency and program discontinuation,” the AAUP explains on its website.

It continues: “When faculty members can lose their positions because of their speech, publications, or research findings, they cannot properly fulfill their core responsibilities to advance and transmit knowledge.”

But new rules adopted Wednesday by the Florida Board of Governors tasks each university board of trustees to adopt policies that evaluate tenured professors on a handful of unified goals from a statewide standpoint.

The rule adoption is due to a new law from the 2022 legislative session, which was pushed by then-Sen. Manny Diaz Jr., who added in a last-minute amendment calling for the 5-year tenure review. Then Sen. Ray Rodrigues was a co-sponsor. Diaz is now the Florida Education Commissioner. Rodrigues is the Chancellor of the university system.

Under this new rule, faculty are to be evaluated on “productivity,” “meeting the responsibilities and expectations associated with assigned duties,” and “compliance with state laws, Board of Governors’ regulations, and university regulations and policies.”

The chief academic officer of the university, often referred to as the ‘provost,’ would make the final call on a professor’s performance, according to the rule.

But the Florida higher education system has experienced an overhaul by the DeSantis administration, facing a mountain of changes that cater to Gov. Ron DeSantis’ conservative views regarding a variety of concerns, including tenure protections. That’s why some Florida professors are concerned that the state is becoming a hostile environment for current and prospective faculty.

The rule says that a professor evaluation “shall not consider or otherwise discriminate” based on a professor’s “political or ideological viewpoints,” but some are skeptical on whether that provision will be adhered to.

“The way that many of our faculty are looking at it is that this is intentionally designed from the ground up to allow bad actors to cull faculty from departments with whom they personally disagree or who have politics that are inconvenient to the institution,” Andrew Gothard, president of United Faculty of Florida, told the Phoenix.

“Or, as we’ve seen with the narrative that’s been coming out of Tallahassee, who have politics that disagree with those of the governor,” he added.

Categories Academic Freedom, Censorship, Democracy, DeSantis, Evil, Extremism, Fascism, Higher Education

Missouri: State Senate Restores Funding for Public Libraries!

By dianeravitch
April 5, 2023 //
16

Good news! After Republican legislators in the state House defunded the state’s libraries for daring to sue the state to overturn a censorship law, the State Senate restored the libraries’ funding of $4.5 million. Yes, there are some sane Republicans in Missouri.

JEFFERSON CITY — The chief Senate budget writer said he plans to restore state funding for Missouri’s public libraries that was stripped out of the House version of the state’s spending plan.

Sen. Lincoln Hough, R-Springfield, who chairs the Senate Appropriations Committee, said Tuesday that the panel will place $4.5 million back in the budget, which covers spending for the fiscal year beginning July 1.

“There is no way that money is not going back into the budget,” Hough told the Post-Dispatch.

The restoration could mark the second reversal of a House budget prioritythat has stirred controversy under the Capitol dome. Hough and Senate President Caleb Rowden earlier said they oppose Republican language in the House blueprint that would prohibit the state from spending tax dollars on diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives….

The library money was removed from the House blueprint by House Budget Chairman Cody Smith and backed by the Republicans who control the chamber last week. He cited a lawsuit by two library groups to overturn a new state law banning sexually explicit material in school libraries.

The ACLU, the Missouri Association of School Librarians, and the Missouri Library Association in February asked a judge in Kansas City to find the law unconstitutional or clarify how and when it applies.

Smith, R-Carthage, believes the state shouldn’t subsidize the lawsuit by giving public libraries money.

Hough’s hometown library district, which covers Springfield and Greene County, would receive an estimated $368,000 if the money is restored.

Hough said libraries serve multiple purposes in communities, allowing people to not only get books, but internet service, job assistance and programs for adults and children.

“Libraries are an important resource for so many people,” Hough said.

Categories Censorship, Librarians, Libraries, Literacy, Missouri

Missouri: GOP Votes to Defund Public Libraries

By dianeravitch
April 4, 2023 //
28

Republicans in Missouri, ascendant in the Legislature, voted to defund public libraries in the state because librarians objected to censorship and filed a lawsuit. There are 399 public libraries in the state. The bill has not yet been approved by the State Senate yet, so there’s a chance that the cuts might be reversed. PEN reported that nearly 300 books have already been withdrawn from circulation in response to censors.

Late Tuesday night, the Missouri House of Representatives voted for a state operating budget with a $0 line for public libraries. While the budget still needs to work its way through the Senate and the governor’s office, state funding for public libraries is very much on the chopping block in Missouri.

This comes after Republican House Budget Chairman Cody Smith proposed a $4.5 million cut to public libraries’ state aid last week in the initial House Budget Committee hearing, where Smith cited a lawsuit filed against Missouri by the American Civil Liberties Union of Missouri (ACLU-MO) as the reason for the cut.

That will teach them a lesson! Reading is dangerous! Stay home and watch unfiltered porn on your computer, and you don’t need to learn any new words. Why read a book when you can get the real deal at home and be completely illiterate?

Categories Bigotry, Budget Cuts, Censorship, Extremism, Funding, Librarians, Libraries, Missouri, Stupid

Tennessee: GOP Threatens to Expel 3 Democratic Legislators Who Joined Anti-Gun Protest

By dianeravitch
April 3, 2023 //
17

The statehouse in Nashville, Tennessee, was surrounded by parents and students demonstrating in favor of gun control and against the GOP-controlled legislature’s protection of guns. The protest follows the murder of three children and three staff members at the Coventry School in Nashville.

Three Democratic members of the legislature joined the protest, chanting with the protestors.

The GOP leadership threatened to expel the Democrats. The speaker of the House absurdly claimed that the three Democrats were encouraging an insurrection.

Parents and children held signs and shouted chants during a large protest at the Tennessee capitol last week following a deadly school shooting. And while no one was arrested or injured, Republican House Speaker Cameron Sexton is comparing the demonstration to the Jan. 6 insurrection.

During the House Floor session on Thursday — days after the Covenant School shooting — Reps. Gloria Johnson, D-Knox, Justin Pearson, D-Memphis, and Justin Jones, D-Nashville, stood up and chanted with protestors in the gallery.

Pearson and other Democrats attempted to acknowledge the large group of protesters during session, but were told to stick to the subject of the bill by Speaker Cameron.

“We listened to them and helped to elevate the issue that they are demanding justice for,” said Pearson.

House Speaker Cameron Sexton said their actions were more than a breach of decorum, comparing it to the January 6th insurrection in remarks to outlets.

“Two of the members; Representative Jones and Representative Johnson, have been very vocal about Jan. 6 and Washington, D.C., about what that was,” said Sexton. “What they did today was equivalent, at least equivalent, maybe worse depending on how you look at it, to doing an insurrection in the State Capitol.”

Sexton warned that there will likely be consequences for the trio.

“It could be removal of committees; it could be censorship; it could be expulsion from the General Assembly. Anywhere in between,” said Sexton.

Leaders in the Democratic caucus are defending their colleagues. Nashville Democrat John Ray Clemmons says he believes Speaker Sexton is exaggerating.

“You show me the broken windows, you show me anyone who went into the speaker’s office and put their chair up on his desk and trashed his office, you show me where a noose was hanging anywhere on the legislative plaza,” said Clemmons, citing damage committed during the Capitol riot, which resulted in five deaths before and after the event.

The three rebellious Democrats were stripped of their committee assignments. Their member badges were deactivated. Their telephones were disconnected.

In a press conference Monday, Jones says Sexton is more focused on politics than addressing last week’s mass shooting.

“We are members, who are standing in the well, telling our speakers and our colleagues that kids should not be murdered in school,” Jones said, “and rather than address that issue, the speaker has spent more time on Twitter this weekend talking about a fake insurrection than he did about the deaths of six people including 9-year-old children.”

It is not yet clear if the lawmakers will face expulsion. Sexton has not commented on whether they will face further discipline.

A tweet:

Three Tennessee Democrats have been stripped of their committee and subcommittee assignments by the Republican dominated legislature for speaking out against gun violence in the wake of the Nashville shooting that killed three children.

Democracy is dead in Tennessee.

@Sethaweitz

Rep. Gloria Johnson, one of the three Democrats, tweeted:

Categories Accountability, Censorship, Civil Rights, Courage, Democracy, Freedom of Speech, Guns, Guns in Schools, Nashville, Parents, Republicans, Resistance, Safety, Tennessee

Disney CEO Plans $17 Billion Expansion, Knocks DeSantis

By dianeravitch
April 3, 2023 //
14

Governor Ron DeSantis should be careful whom he picks on. Not only did Disney outsmart DeSantis and retain control of DisneyWorkd, but its CEO announced at a shareholder meeting in California that Disney plans to grow in Florida. He also rapped DeSantis for trying to punish Disney for exercising its constitutional right to free speech.

The Orlando Sentinel reported:

The Walt Disney Co. plans to invest $17 billion in Walt Disney World over the next 10 years and create 13,000 new jobs, CEO Bob Iger said Monday, as he accused Gov. Ron DeSantis of being vindictive over Disney’s response to the so-called “don’t say gay” law last year….

Disney World will host 50 million visitors this year, and its planned expansion will bring even more guests and employees to the state in the years to come, along with generating more taxes, Iger said.

“Our point on this is that any action that thwarts those efforts, simply to retaliate for a position the company took, sounds not just anti-business, but it sounds anti-Florida, and I’ll just leave it at that,” he said….

During the company’s annual meeting, Iger also said Disney loves Florida and has heavily invested in the state over the past 50 years in its expansion of the Disney World resort, as the state’s largest taxpayer and through its charitable actions.

The state’s relationship with Florida has “kind of been a two-way street,” Iger said.

But that changed last year when former CEO Bob Chapek spoke out against Florida’s Parental Rights in Education legislation, which restricts discussion of sexual orientation and gender identity in early-grade classrooms. That drew DeSantis’ ire and led to a law dissolving of the company’s special land use, utilities and public service district, Reedy Creek.

“And while the company may have not handled the position that it took very well, a company has a right to freedom of speech just like individuals do,” Iger said.

He said DeSantis dissolved Reedy Creek “in effect to seek to punish a company for its exercise of a constitutional right.”

“And that just seems really wrong to me, against any company or individual but particularly against the company that means so much to the state that you live in,” he added.

Categories Accountability, Bigotry, Censorship, DeSantis, Extremism, Failure, Florida, Freedom of Speech

Virginia: Spotsylvania Will Remove 14 Books from Its School Libraries

By dianeravitch
April 3, 2023 //
16

Virginia Governor Glen Youngkin sends his own children to an elite private school that never bans books and teaches critical race theory, But the governor ran on a platform of “parental rights,” which has unleashed censorship and book banning in the state’s public schools.

The schools of Spotsylvania have posted a list of 14 books that will be withdrawn to protect children from ideas their parents don’t like. Among the 14 are two by Nobel-prize winning author Toni Morrison.

The books were challenged for having “sexually explicit material” in them, according to a message to families from superintendent Mark Taylor.

The superintendent of Spotsylvania public schools has no prior experience in education. His appointment was made after hard-right conservatives won control of the school board. Aside from his lack of experience, Mark Taylor was controversial because of incendiary comments he made on social media. “They allegedly include memes mocking trans people and school shootings, racist innuendos and calls for parents to pull their children out of public schools.”

By the end of the week, the school district will remove:

“All Boys Aren’t Blue” by George M. Johnson

“Like a Love Story” by Abdi Nazemian

“Dime” and “America” by E.R. Frank

“Sold” by Patricia McCormick

“Out of Darkness” by Ashley Hope Perez

“Beloved” and “The Bluest Eye” by Toni Morrison

“Looking for Alaska” by John Green

“The Perks of Being a Wallflower” by Stephen Chbosky

“Water for Elephants” by Sara Gruen

“Neanderthal Opens the Door to the Universe” by Preston Norton

“More Happy Than Not” by Adam Silvera

“Nineteen Minutes” by Jodi PicoultSpotsylvania superintendent floats elimination of all school libraries

In a statement, Taylor pointed to a Virginia lawthat requires school districts to establish parental notification policies for instructional materials with sexually explicit materials, saying the 14 books fall under that category.

Taylor added that the division doesn’t have the resources to review whether the roughly 390,000 books in all school libraries have similar materials, so purging the 14 books from the shelves would be the only way to ensure they aren’t accessible….

Taylor noted in his message to families that the decision won’t stop teachers from including the pulled books in classroom assignments, which would have to be shared with parents under the law. According to the district, the books will be stored until they are donated.

What teacher will be brave enough or foolish enough to assign a banned book?

Categories Accountability, Bigotry, Censorship, Creativity, Democracy, Extremism, Freedom, Libraries, Literacy, Literature, Republicans, Virginia

Illinois: District Fires Outstanding Teacher Because of Book She Ordered

By dianeravitch
April 3, 2023 //
18

While traveling in the Midwest, I visited Illinois State University, which has an excellent teacher education program. A leader of that program recently wrote me while in a state of distress. One of her best students, she said, was just fired by her district. Why? One parent objected to a book in her classroom.

Who will want to teach when teachers’ lives and reputations can be jeopardized by one angry parent? Maybe that is the point: Demonize public schools and their teachers to build support for vouchers, where uncertified teachers are hired and the Bible is the beginning and end of all knowledge.

Here is an excerpt from the letter I received:

Tonight, I’m writing to you to share the story of the most amazing teacher I have ever worked with in my nearly 25 years in education–except she is no longer a teacher as of last Thursday. I know you have committed your career to fighting injustices like hers, so it is my hope that you might amplify her story in the fight against misinformation and teacher defamation.

As a teacher educator at Illinois State University, I met Sarah Bonner 10 years ago when she was in my action research capstone class as the final requirement for her master’s degree. During the year I worked with her, I was struck by her approach to education, and I encouraged her to continue working toward a doctorate degree. Since that time, I have had the opportunity to work closely with her, co-designing a framework that paired literature and inquiry as a way to expand 8th grade students’ in rural Illinois worldviews; co-teaching alongside her to maintain my connection to the classroom and to continue to evolve our work; guiding her in her dissertation work where she connected with teachers who were interested in transforming their own teaching; watching her mentor emerging, new, and experienced teachers; and witnessing the blossoming of students under her guidance–especially those who are often marginalized in largely conservative, small schools. I can honestly say that I have never had the opportunity to work with a more compassionate, innovative, and thought-provoking teacher. She’s by far a better teacher than I was when I was still in the middle school classroom, and working alongside her has pushed me to be an even better teacher educator than I was before.

For this reason, I cannot begin to describe the devastation that I experienced when I learned less than two weeks ago that not only was she being attacked by our local conservative “news” station, but that her district advised that she seek union representation to represent her while they investigated the story. She received this news on Wednesday, March 15. By Friday March 17 she learned that she was being put on paid leave the next week so they could investigate–and they hadn’t even talked with her yet.

What was the story? As a part of a book tasting day, Sarah consulted NCTE, ALA, and Good Reads to find award-winning and notable books that would reflect her students’ interests–and checked out nearly 100 books from the public library. One of those books was Juno Dawson’s “This Book Is Gay.” A student picked up the book, a sex education book for LGBTQ+ youth, snapped some pictures of its pages, and sent those pages home. Rather than approaching Sarah with questions or concerns, this child’s parents alerted the media outlet, and a witch-hunt began.

Suddenly, the wild and false allegations began: Sarah was requiring this book; the book was a regular part of her classroom library; she was sharing pornography with children; she was grooming children. And then, they went to her class website, which shared a link to Common Sense Media’s Netflix Documentary page, which so happened to feature Moneyshot, and now she was encouraging students to watch and learn about porn. Ironically, this film hadn’t even been released when she was last in the classroom. The story just kept growing until this award-winning teacher realized that she could not go back to that community again. And so, by this past Thursday, she had officially resigned. In just over a week, a teacher’s reputation, livelihood, and life was completely upended.

Sarah is fortunate brcause she’s got the deep knowledge and experience to bounce back and counter the current narrative. Unfortunately, this kind of experience is not unique, and too often teachers who aren’t equipped to handle it take huge hits. It’s impacting their mental health, their careers, their entire livelihoods. We have a narrative around a teacher shortage. We don’t have a teacher shortage—we have a shortage of respect and support for teachers. And we live in Illinois, a liberal state that requires LGBTQ+ history and contributions to be taught by 8th grade. Too many people are watching the antics happening in states like Florida and thinking those are outliers. They are not. Sarah is an award-winning teacher. She is a leader in and on the executive board of the National Council Teachers of English. And yet, she will no longer impact the lives of so many students.

Democracy is in peril as we continue to bow to pressures to restrict the books students can read. We cannot normalize allowing a few loud voices’ the power to destroy careers and lives. I have attached the statement she wrote and read to her board upon her resignation.

Here is Sarah Bonner’s statement to her school board:

Thank you to the Heyworth Board and Administrative team for allowing me to speak this evening. If you know anything about me as a professional, you know that this is not the way I would have chosen to be here tonight. Twenty years ago when I was given the keys to my very first classroom, I knew teaching was my calling. And, while I’ve taught in previous school districts over the years, Heyworth was the place that allowed me to become the professional I was meant to be.

Throughout my time here, I earned both my Masters and Doctorate degrees with the help of district tuition waivers. I became the National Council of Teachers of English (or NCTE) Media Literacy Teacher of the Year in 2018 along with the national Outstanding Middle Level Educator award the following year. I wrote and published a book through Teachers College Press to further the teaching field. Additionally, I hosted and supported numerous future teachers from Illinois State University as they began their journey into the classroom. Lastly – most importantly – I had the opportunity to connect with the best kids I’ve ever worked with in my career.


Our community – or even our nation – may never know the gravity of what teachers bear on a regular basis. For me, I not only worked tirelessly on designing and cultivating meaningful learning experiences for my students, but I also worked hard to maintain healthy relationships with students and families, upheld weekly and transparent communication among all shareholders, contributed regularly to the junior high teacher team, worked a second teaching job at Illinois State University to better support my family, served as the Middle Level Section Steering Committee Chairperson for NCTE, wrote a doctoral dissertation, published a book for teachers, along with being a partner, a mother, and a human wrestling with being newly diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.

With all of this weighing heavily on my plate, I depended on national communities like the American Library Association and NCTE as well as reading communities like Goodreads to help generate texts that engage all readers with a vast collection of interests. The activity my students and I participated in last week was made up of close to 100 different books recommended from these spaces. Given the nature of the lesson compressed with a heavy list of responsibilities, vetting each and every single text for explicit details was impossible. Should the book in question be available to students? Yes. However, should this specific book have been a part of the 100 choices during this class activity? No. Simply put, the title was on the ALA Rainbow Reading Awardee list and I picked it along with a few others because I knew students in my class had interests. To make students, families, community members feel unsafe was never the intention of my decision making.

While I’m saddened by how the events have played out over the last week, there’s a piece of me that isn’t surprised. Being an innovator in teaching means that boundaries, perspectives, and ideas need to be pushed. When I realized years ago that our kids who would receive these amazing scholarships to these Big 10 schools were coming back the following year because they couldn’t adjust to life outside of a rural small town, I knew I needed to do something. I knew I needed to disrupt traditional learning practices to embody the needs of today’s world. Our kids deserve learning experiences that prepare them for our world and not just our town. However, being a changemaker often comes with a cost…especially if you’re one of the only ones willing to take risks and think differently.


London’s favorite soccer coach, Ted Lasso – the man who makes us all believe in the power of believe – said it best ”You know, people have underestimated me my entire life. And for years, I never understood why. It used to really bother me. But then one day, I saw this quote by Walt Whitman. It said, “Be curious, not judgmental.” All of a sudden it hits me. Of all those that used to belittle me, not a single one of them was curious. They thought they had everything all figured out. So they judged everything, and they judged everyone. And I realized that their underestimating me… who I was had nothing to do with it. ‘Cause if they were curious, they would’ve asked questions.”
As I leave here tonight, I hope you will remember a few things:

  1. Sometimes things need to break in order to rebuild it stronger. Encourage
    curiosity. As you enter a space of healing, I hope the district and Heyworth community can find a place to listen and understand that you all want the best for our kids. Our teachers especially deserve to be heard and questioned in responsible ways.
  2. Remember to support your teachers moving forward. If I were them at this point, I would feel scared, unsafe, and paralyzed knowing that I could be next. Our teacher community needs reassurance that innovation is still supported and protected as time moves on.
  3. And, remember the good I brought to our kids and community by taking innovative risks in Language Arts. While I’ve been here, I have witnessed students stand up for other students with disabilities, fight against racism, organize trash clean ups, create documentaries that tell the untold stories of their community, advocate for safe spaces, strengthen their own beliefs, shape their own personal identities, and critically think about the world around them. With the work I’ve been able to do with students, I’m reminded on a daily basis that our kids will be the hope our future needs.

The Heyworth school district has lost a teacher who is dedicated to their children and her profession.

Categories Accountability, Censorship, Creativity, Democracy, Extremism, Illinois, Teacher Shortage, Teachers and Teaching

Hillsdale College Cuts Ties to Florida Charter School That Fired Principal After Showing of Michelango’s “David”

By dianeravitch
April 1, 2023 //
37

Conservative Hillsdale College in Michigan has a chain of charter schools that use its “classical” curriculum. One of its affiliate schools, the Tallahassee Classical Charter School, made headlines last week when the principal was fired after a teacher showed the statue of Michelangelo’s “David” to an art class.

Apparently Hillsdale was appalled, it severed its connection to the school. Even super-conservative Hillsdale was mortified by the prudery of DeSantisland.

A Michigan college has ended its relationship with the Florida charter school whose principal was pressured to resign after parents complained that her Renaissance art syllabus, which included a picture of Michelangelo’s David, was inappropriate for sixth-graders.

The Tallahassee Classical School, which was licensed to use Hillsdale College’s classical education curriculum, is no longer affiliated with the small, Christian college, Hillsdale spokesperson Emily Stack Davis said in a statement to MLive.com.

“This drama around teaching Michelangelo’s David sculpture, one of the most important works of art in existence, has become a distraction from, and a parody of, the actual aims of classical education,” Davis said. “Of course, Hillsdale’s K-12 art curriculum includes Michelangelo’s Davidand other works of art that depict the human form.”

The chair of the board of the school explained that children should see only parts of the statue, depending on their age.

“Showing the entire statue of David is appropriate at some age,” said Bishop.

“We’re going to figure out when that is,” he added. “And you don’t have to show the whole statue! Maybe to kindergartners we only show the head. You can appreciate that. You can show the hands, the arms, the muscles, the beautiful work Michelangelo did in marble, without showing the whole thing.”

Yahoos are gonna yahoo.

Categories Art, Arts Education, Censorship, Charter Schools, DeSantis, Florida
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