‘Scary’: public-school textbooks the latest target as US book bans intensify ( www.theguardian.com )

autotldr Bot , 1 month ago

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The wave of book bans sweeping the US, typically reserved for works of fiction deemed controversial, has hit textbooks used in public schools, marking the next step in Republicans’ war on education.

The board of trustees for the Cypress Fairbanks independent school district in Houston voted 6-1 earlier this month to redact certain chapters in science textbooks, including those about vaccines, human growth, diversity, and climate change.

Blasingame, who has served on the board since 2021, did not give a specific explanation for the decision, but said the subjects go beyond what the state requires to teach and creates “a perception that humans are bad”.

Education experts say the move could have far-reaching consequences, prompting similar decisions to omit information in other subjects, and public school districts across the country.

“To ban entire chapters of textbooks and withhold that information from students is not only unconstitutional, but it is taking away their access to real-life ideas that exist in this world,” said Laney Hawes, co-founder of the group.

Kasey Meehan of PEN America, the national non-profit organization committed to free expression, said school board members – who are often publicly elected and do not necessarily have an education background – are increasingly having an outsized influence on the instruction being delivered to students.

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