After a promising State Department of Education meeting last month where members of the committee tabled a decision to ban up to 10 more books from public schools statewide, this month, the committee voted to ban all of the titles. Those 10 titles join 11 others banned from every public school in South Carolina and the new decisions make South Carolina the leader in state-sanctioned book bans.
The South Carolina State Department of Education banned the following books at this month’s meeting:
Due to Regulation 43-170 (R-43-170), decisions over content in school libraries is in the hands of the South Carolina Department of Education. Materials deemed to have “descriptions of sexual content” are inappropriate for schools and must be removed. What that phrase means is intentionally vague, allowing for the opinions of a small number of individuals within the state to decide on behalf of all students and parents statewide.
The South Carolina Department of Education, headed by Ellen Weaver–who used taxpayer money to hire a lawyer to lobby in support of this school book banning bill–set up an Instructional Materials Review Committee (IMRC), where any parent in the state can submit complaints. This has allowed individuals to exert significant power in what’s available not only in their public schools but in schools statewide.
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The ten books voted onto the list of banned titles were all challenged in Beaufort County School District in 2023. Each was voted on by the school review committee and allowed to remain on district shelves. One parent, Elizabeth Szalai, was behind the demands to remove nearly 100 titles challenged in Beaufort County Schools, including the above-listed titles just banned by the state. With South Carolina’s new law, she and others like her now have the opportunity to take their complaints beyond their own school district and potentially have books pulled from all public schools in the state. Szalai was also behind the complaints that led to the state banning four books in February.
One single parent has had outsized power to have books banned across an entire state. One parent has been responsible for revoking the right for students to access books in every public school in South Carolina.
Complaints over each of the books, both banned and retained, are available the South Carolina Department of Education’s website (here is where final decisions and associated documents live and here is where pending decisions and associated documents live–note that the time between the decision and updating the lists may mean they are not entirely up to date as you read this). Take the time to read them and understand these decisions are being made on conspiracy theories and cherry picked passages being distributed by Moms For Liberty and similar groups. One member of the board in today’s meeting suggested that some of the titles in question could be used by older students or librarians to “indoctrinate” younger people.
For all the arguments about “local control,” the power given to the State Board of Education to remove books statewide is the precise opposite. The South Carolina Department of Education is the arbiter of what is and is not accessible to students in public institutions across the state, not those who live or work in those communities.
None of this went down without a fight. At the State Board of Education Committee meeting, advocates for the freedom to read showed up to speak in support of the books being discussed and in support of both public school librarians and educators. Many, including members of ProTruth South Carolina, Midlands APPLE, Families Against Book Bans, and Liberation Is Lit held a read in at the lobby where the meeting was held.
On Instagram, Families Against Book Bans shared the news of the Department’s decision:
We are truly disappointed there was no further discussion following last month’s vote to postpone the vote and potentially amend the removal. As always, we will keep fighting. Our work is far from over.
The full list of books banned in every public school in South Carolina is currently as follows:
Three states have legal mechanisms that allow for statewide book bans, though only South Carolina and Utah have used them so far. The other state is Tennessee. With the latest list of book bans, South Carolina has banned more titles than Utah, which currently has 17 books banned in all of its public schools.