In classrooms in Iowa, books are being taken off the shelves in public schools out of fear of students reading mature content.
Last year, the legislature passed Senate File 496, banning books depicting sex acts. According to the Des Moines Register, over 3,400 books were removed from school libraries across the state of Iowa. At North Polk High School, books have been taken off the shelves in fear of not complying with new laws.
Tia Stubbs, an English teacher at North Polk High School described how new Iowa laws impacted her teaching. In previous years, she taught George Orwell’s “1984” in her Composition I class. After reviewing what other schools and teachers have done, she decided to pull the book from her curriculum. As a mother herself, Stubbs can understand a parent’s desire to control the media their children consume, but says it gets tricky and complicated. Though she can understand that as a parent she does not want her children to read mature content, she also believes that pulling books off shelves could hurt a student’s education.
When asked about the kinds of books being taken off shelves, Stubbs answered, “[a] lot of the books that are being removed are written by people of color, people of the LGBTQ community. So it doesn’t necessarily feel like a protection.”
Moreover, Michael Kline, the superintendent at North Polk High School expressed how he wished he could keep all the books on the shelves. “I think us having as much material for students to read and to grow as individuals is important. As many books as we can have in our library, I think that’s great,” Kline reported.
Kline reported that there were about five or six books that the school board decided to take off North Polk’s shelves. As the superintendent, Kline tries his best to both listen to the community’s concerns while keeping up with new Iowa laws. Furthermore, he conveyed how he believes context is essential.
Similarly, Stubbs believes that the way one approaches the way they teach a book is vital. She understands context and tries to teach her students about the importance of knowing what kind of background, culture, and identity one is reading about.
“I think it is valuing the culture that people come from, and also having expectations with the environment that you’re in,” Kline concluded.
