Radnor school district will review its library policy after backlash over book bans

Radnor school officials said they will review their library selection policy amid community backlash over the district’s decision to ban three graphic novels last month.

During a school board policy committee meeting Tuesday, administrators — who have said the removals of Gender Queer, Fun Home, and Blankets were in line with the district’s policy — acknowledged the complaints. They said they would research other school policies, consult with librarians, and review best practices from the American Library Association before bringing information to the committee in April.

Susan Stern, the policy committee chair, said board members want to give administrators time “to do that work thoroughly.”

But the promise of a review did not stop community members from speaking out during meetings Tuesday against the district’s process in banning the three books — two of which are LGBTQ-themed — and objecting to a lack of transparency around the removals, which stemmed from challenges filed by a parent in January.

The parent, whose name was redacted from records provided by the district, objected to illustrations of sexual scenes in each of the books and alleged they contained “child pornography.”

A district spokesperson, Theji Brennan, said the books were removed from the high school library Feb. 28 after an ad hoc committee appointed by the superintendent voted 5-1 that they were “not age-appropriate.”

Brennan also said committee members — who she said signed confidentiality agreements “to safeguard their anonymity” — had discussed how Gender Queer “has been in the library for six years and has never been checked out by a student except for the time it was checked out to be challenged.” Blankets, Brennan said, had not been checked out by a student since 2022.

Circulation records obtained by Radnor parents indicate physical copies of Gender Queer were checked out seven times since 2019, and an electronic version once. Blankets was checked out eight times since 2013, while Fun Home — which Brennan had not addressed — was checked out 17 times since 2019.

Asked about those records, Dan Bechtold, an assistant to Superintendent Ken Batchelor, on Wednesday supplied a different version of circulation data that showed only five checkouts for Blankets and one checkout for Gender Queer. The reason for the different data was not immediately clear, though the parent record for Gender Queer appeared to include a prior copy of the book in circulation from 2019 to 2022.

At Tuesday’s policy committee meeting, some parents and students said that even if books had not been checked out often, that was not a valid reason to remove them. (One Radnor student, Caitlin Roeltgen, told the board that “if you’re going to go through the library and remove every book that has not been checked out in the past year, there will not be a lot of books left — like maybe five books.”)

Others said kids may be privately reading books in the library. Michael Roche, a Radnor parent, recalled how when growing up, his brother, who was gay, would sneak The Color Purple out of the library due to its depiction of a lesbian relationship. “If he checked out that book, what would people say?” Roche said.

Roche suggested that by removing biographical memoirs, Radnor was “telling students and adults, ‘Stay in the closet. We don’t want to hear from you.’”

Mia Kripke, who is 18, told board members that when she started to question her sexuality at age 13, she was confident she would be accepted in the Radnor school community.

Now, however, “I’m worried about the community that is being created,” Kripke said. “I’m worried about this precedent you guys are setting, and I’m honestly really disappointed.”

Kripke said books had helped her discover her identity, including by reading Girl Made of Stars, a young-adult novel featuring a bisexual character.

“If you’re taking this away, you’re taking away their ability to discover who they are. That’s not what Radnor is about,” Kripke said.

Others objected to the policy underlying the removal decisions, noting that it had not been updated since 2008, though book challenges have surged since then.

The policy allows “individuals, organizations or groups” to file requests to reconsider library materials, and directs the superintendent to appoint a committee including “an administrator, a principal, a librarian, a board member, a classroom teacher in the subject area and a parent” to review the challenge. It does not provide further directions on how the evaluation should proceed.

Joanna Bell-Mariam, a Wayne resident, told the board that the public should be notified if someone challenges a book — saying that the recent removals, which residents learned about after the fact, “really restricted the voices of the community.” She also questioned whether the superintendent should have unilateral power to appoint the committee.

Others said that a student should be on the committee, and that there should be an appeals process.

Sarah DeMaria, president of the Pennsylvania School Librarians Association, pointed to recommendations that review committees for high school library materials should include students.

Policies should also make clear that “excerpts of books do not automatically discount a book from inclusion in the collection,” according to the recommendations. “Rather, the decision is made based on whether the book is of literary value, and suitability for the intended audience is determined by consulting reviews by professional literary critics for children’s and young adult literature.”

Committee members should remain anonymous “to protect the objectivity of the deliberation,” DeMaria said, though she said the committee’s report on its decision can be public.

She also drew a distinction between “weeding” library books due to limited use and removing books after a challenge. Weeding should be a librarian’s decision, DeMaria said, and “not done on the basis of an individual or group’s disapproval of a book’s subject matter.”

Some expressed hope Tuesday that Radnor might return the books to library shelves — a prospect that Stern, the board member, said would require full board discussion.

Carl Rosin, a Radnor English teacher, said he used Fun Home in his classes as an optional choice for students analyzing the development of two characters. Losing the book, he told the board’s curriculum committee Tuesday, “would impoverish some students’ exploration of the world of ideas.”

Arguing that literature “is all about analyzing the human condition,” Rosin said that depictions of sex were not necessarily pornography and had to be viewed in context.

“Without the consideration of complexity, we can’t come to an appropriate judgment about the pluses or minuses of any work of art,” he said.