Richland School Board Minority Reports

Table of Contents:

Minority Report from J. Peterson

As I have been reflecting on the book challenges, and even the adoption of novels last year, it occurs to me that there are really two issues to be considered.

The book challenges assert that we have a number of books which really are not appropriate selections for our curriculum and should be removed from the list of books we teach. as approved curriculum. They base their position on content which is offensive for a number of reasons: sexual presentations, foul language, advocacy of undesirable actions, hopelessness, etc. The same type of concerns were brought up last year at the time of the adoption of the language arts instructional materials. The issue here might be framed in terms of what materials represent the preferred choices as instructional materials for our young people to be taught , and whether or not some of the materials selected may actually be counterproductive or harmful (and certainly offensive) to a segment of our conununity.

The second issue, appears to be one of so called "academic freedom." To many on the staff and the board, this in fact seems to be the overriding issue, the freedom of teachers to choose materials they deem appropriate for their class and students. As long as students have available an option to choose an alternative all is deemed acceptable.

It seems that some of the board and I suspect some of the staff, having viewed this issue entirely from the "academic freedom" vantage point, feel that if the board doesn’t approve of the selections somehow that means they don’t approve of the teachers, or consider them competent. That is certainly not the case. It is not the staff that is being challenged, it is the materials. I think it imperative that we acknowledge and separate out these two issues and really look at what academic freedom is and is not. I am confident that this will allow us to dismiss the academic freedom issue and focus on the selection of preferred materials which is our legal responsibility.

Points to Consider:

1. According to the unabridged edition of the Random House Dictionary of the English Language, academic freedom is: (1) freedom of a teacher to discuss any social, economic, or political problems without interference or penalty from officials, organized groups, etc. (2) freedom of a student to explore or hold any belief without interference from the teacher.

2. District Policy 2331 Controversial Subjects, addresses the academic freedom issue by safe guarding the right to have free access to information and to study controversial issues. We are in no way limiting the teacher or students' freedom to explore various issues (social, economic, or political) by choosing books which meet the community standard for decency (i.e. language usage and sexual descriptions) as already defined in Policy 3220 Freedom of Expression and Policy 8700 Sexual Harassment, and rejecting those which do not meet the standard.

To suggest that all is OK, because there are choices available for students does not make sense. We have already made a statement about the desirability of the book by putting it on the approved list, and by having the teacher identify it as the "preferred" text. To now suggest that the students opt themselves out of a book puts an unnecessary and awkward burden on the students. This is not what is best for our young people.

3. If we examine the review sheet and the minutes from the Language Arts Instructional Novel Committee (henceforth called the Review Committee), one will quickly note that though a number of teachers had significant content concerns about most of the books, not one was willing to actually break ranks and vote against those books. I would suggest to you that was the case because of the so called "Academic Freedom" issue and not because they all felt the choices were really "preferred selections," as evidenced by such comments as a book "they could not teach." The perception is, if a teacher wants to teach a given book, they are the "professional" and should be allowed to do so. In the Review Committee meeting coments, it was noted about two of the reviewing teachers, "Neither thought the books should be dropped, they just thought it was something "they could not teach."

Comments from members of the Review Committee express concerns on a number of fronts; from actual content (such as subject matter, language and sex, violence, etc.) to how that content was delivered. It was discouraging to me to see books on the approved list whose literary merit and content were both concerns to the teachers, (i.e. The Hot Zone, Jay's Journal). How is it we want to endorse books like these? The last two pages contain a brief summary of committee member comments on the challenged books. They are quite revealing.

Note that the elimination of these books from the list of adopted books does not restrict the teachers or students from studying the issues represented in these books, those issues are represented in other books on the adopted list.

4. To not approve a book for teaching in the classroom is not to " ban" the book. Nor is removing a book from the approved list "banning" the book. It is available in the library to be read, it may be on a supplemental reading list. Students are certainly able to read it. But it may in fact for whatever reason, not be the preferred text for the class. To not approve a book also does not mean the issues raised in the book cannot be dealt with in the classroom, this is not an academic freedom issue, it is a selection of preferred text issue.

5. We should be able to identify, in at least broad terms, what is and is not appropriate instructional material content. If we look at Board Policy, we see that this has already been done on a number of levels. As pointed out by our challengers, a number of the selections do not fit the criteria established for appropriateness, i.e. Policy 3220 Freedom of Expression and Policy 8700 Sexual Harassment.

Some may say that those policies are set up for different areas and so are not appropriate and there may be some merit to that argument. But in fact, the policies do identify a conununity standard and I for one need to be convinced that we should allow our teachers to use materials which contradict the community standards and the standards the school district enforces in other realms.

Community and district standards are important and mean something, especially as a matter of building trust with parents and community. We should not be taking action which contradicts policies which have identified those standards..

One only has to look at society at large to see it breaking down at many points. We need to take care in our selections to try and uphold the youth, encourage them and set high expectations for them; not present material which contains language and descriptions that our local newspapers would not publish.

If we are unable to establish any criteria to identify what is acceptable and what is not (other than that a teacher or teachers want to use it) we are in a boat adrift without a rudder.

Whatever we decide in this book challenge, we need to be able to articulate at least in broad terms what is and is not acceptable as part of approved curriculum. If we can identify that in policy in other areas we can do it here.