When Book Bans are a Form of Discrimination, What is the Path to Justice?
By Guest Writer Kavita Mohan* for EveryLibrary As we previously discussed in Politics in Practice (May 2023), U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights (OCR) entered into a Resolution Agreement with the Forsyth County School District in Georgia following its investigation into whether the District’s removal of certain books [...]
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The Seven Bills That Will Safeguard the Future of School Librarianship
The future of school librarianship requires strategic legislative action to safeguard these vital roles. This article outlines seven key legislative and policy proposals designed to protect and strengthen school libraries, ensuring equitable access to resources and intellectual freedom for all students.
Talking with the Class of ’99 about Censorship at their School
Mobilizing Alumni Networks for School Library Advocacy High school alumni are a potentially useful group for advocating about school library issues and initiatives. While some alumni have left your area, many towns and neighborhoods continue to have well-established networks of local graduates who can be mobilized for advocacy. With the [...]
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Navigating the High School and Academic Library Policy Landscape Around Dual Enrollment Students
As more students take advantage of dual enrollment programs during a time when more states are adopting restrictive laws about access, academic freedom, and the right to read, we need new policy-focused partnerships between high school and academic libraries that will support student success and maintain institutional integrity.
Fighting Public School Book Bans with the Civil Rights Act
The First Amendment is a crucial defense against book bans, particularly those targeting LGBTQ+ stories, critical race theory, and BIPOC authors. However, schools often navigate around these protections through "educational discretion." Beyond the First Amendment, the Education Amendments to the Civil Rights Act's Title VI and IX provide avenues to challenge bans based on race and sex discrimination. A notable case in Georgia's Forsyth County School District demonstrates how these civil rights statutes can combat bans, offering a more direct path to restoring banned books. This approach highlights the importance of considering discriminatory impacts over intent in the fight against book bans, providing a potentially more effective strategy for upholding students' rights to information.
Parsing Religion in Public Schools
The First Amendment's Establishment and Free Exercise Clauses create a constitutional balance: the government cannot establish a state religion nor impede individual religious practices. This delicate equilibrium has posed challenges for public schools, which must remain religiously neutral while not infringing upon personal religious expression. Historical Supreme Court rulings have defined this balance by prohibiting school-led religious activities, while recent decisions have leaned towards protecting individual religious expressions, such as personal prayer, even in public school settings.
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Engaging Parents in the Future of School Libraries
Parents play a crucial role in the ecosystem of school libraries. Their advocacy, support, and involvement are often key to securing the budget to maintain and expand library services. Engaging parents effectively means communicating the multifaceted value of the library not just to individual students but to the entire school community.
Elevating the Visibility of School Library Programs Through Social Proof
Empower your school library advocacy through the power of social proofs. Discover how endorsements drive coalitions and funding success.
The Annual Report as an Advocacy Technique
The culture, needs, and interests of schools, students, and faculty are always changing and evolving. Because of this, funding and budget allocation must be reexamined regularly. While budget reallocations can free up a lot of extra money from unnecessary spending, many worthwhile efforts are caught in the crossfire. Making annual (or even monthly) reports on […]
So What Rights Does a Student Shed at the Schoolhouse Gate?
Understanding Students’ Rights to Speech and Information under the First Amendment by Catherine E. Ferri*, Guest Blogger^ Understanding a K-12 student’s rights has always been complicated. The Supreme Court famously wrote in 1969 that students do not “shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate.” In that landmark case, […]
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