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- Familiarize yourself with district and state policies related to book selection, book challenges, and book removal
- Select books for your classroom library and curriculum with intention, using professional and trusted reviews
- Communicate with parents and guardians about classroom materials and curriculum to avoid misunderstandings
- Keep notes on how students react to books to help explain their value
- Stay aware of book challenge trends
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- Prepare a rationale explaining why the book was selected and how it is used
- Listen to challenger(s) concerns, and share how and why the book is used in your class. Offer alternative texts or assignments.
- Follow school and district policies, and keep administrators involved in the process
- Document the challenge, and keep all notes and emails
- Report the challenge to National Coalition Against Censorship, American Library Association, NCTE, and PEN America
Who Challenges Books? Why?
Book challenges are not new, but they are on the rise, and the way books are being targeted is changing.
Who?
Pre-pandemic, most book challenges were initiated by a single family looking to remove or restrict one book. This is no longer the case.
2023 Book Challenges Data
How?
Organized censorship groups are now compiling and distributing lists of books they believe should be removed from libraries and classrooms. Some censorship groups have held In 2022, 40% of recorded book challenges were targeting more than one hundred books. Groups like "Clean Up Samuels" in Warren County, Virginia, have held events to encourage small but vocal groups of community members to swamp local public libraries with requests to remove hundreds of books.
This collected activism toward censoring books and other materials has led to a rapid increase in the number of documented challenges. The number of unique titles challenged in 2023 was 65% higher than in 2022, at 4,240 unique book titles. Almost half of the challenged titles represented the experiences and voices of LGBT+ or BIPOC individuals.
Where?
Attempts to censor books in public and school libraries happen across the US. In 2023, Illinois was one of seventeen states where a group or individual demanded the censorship of more than 100 titles
