CCPS pulls explicit text
Associated Press
Anne Frank is seen in a photo made available earlier this month by Yad Vashem holocaust memorial. Culpeper County Public Schools have pulled a version of her memoir that contains a graphic passage.
Published: January 28, 2010
Updated: January 29, 2010
A version of an iconic autobiography detailing a young Jewish girl’s two-year experience hiding from Nazis in a cramped “Secret Annex” has been pulled from the shelves of Culpeper County Public Schools.
“The Diary of a Young Girl: The Definitive Edition,” a vivid memoir of Anne Frank’s private thoughts during the German occupation of the Netherlands during World War II, will no longer be assigned to CCPS students, according to Jim Allen, director of instruction for the school system.
This book is usually given to eighth-grade middle school English students to read.
Citing a parent’s concern over the sexual nature of the vagina passage in the definitive edition, Allen said school officials immediately chose to pull this version and use an alternative copy.
“What we have asked is that this particular edition will not be taught,” Allen said from his office Wednesday morning. “I don’t want to make a big deal out of this. So we listened to the parent and we pulled it.”
Apparently, Anne’s father, Otto Frank, the sole survivor of the “Secret Annex,” felt the need to censor his daughter’s most intimate thoughts as well, eliminating about 30 percent of the original diary published in 1947.
He omitted parts where Anne criticized her mother and other Jews living in the confined quarters as well as some sexually suggestive references.
However, during the 50th anniversary of her death in a concentration camp, the Anne Frank Foundation published the unedited definitive version in 1995.
Sometimes dubbed controversial, this book has been translated into more than 50 languages — an English version in 1952, and transformed into a play and several movie versions.
The diary, which Anne received on her 13th birthday, chronicles the teenager’s life from July 1942 until she was arrested in August 1944. It is considered the most widely read literary composition about Holocaust victims.
According to Allen, a teacher had already assigned the book in the fall and students had completed the assignment before the complaint was made.
“I’m happy when parents get involved with these things because it lets me know that they are really looking and have their kids’ best interest (in mind). And that’s where good parenting and good teaching comes in.”
The alternative version will be used for future assignments,
he said.
The process of pulling a book
According to the school division’s “public complaint about learning resources” policy, a review committee consisting of the school’s principal, library media specialist, teacher, complainant, parent and/or student usually convene to discuss this type of issue.
The committee’s responsibility is to read, view or listen to the challenged material, read several reviews, check standard selection aids, talk with knowledgeable people about the material in question, make and file a recommendation with the principal and superintendent and notify the complainant of the recommendation. The complainant has the right to appeal any decision.
Allen suggested teachers become more familiar with any reading material before issuing an assignment and described this situation as a “teachable moment.”
Asked about other “pulled material,” Allen said there’s no specific list that he’s aware of for educations to use as a refernce.
“I don’t think a list exists,” he added. “We just try to deal with everything on a case-by-case basis.”
Any pulled material, Allen said, is usually stored in the librarian’s office.
According to Amazon.com, “Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl,” tops the list of commonly banned children’s books in public schools nationwide.
The reason listed for banning this book is “for being too depressing for students.” Other books that made the Amazon list include “The Catcher in the Rye,” “Harry Potter,” “Of Mice and Men,” and “Harriet the Spy,” to name a few.
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Reader Reactions
Thanks for that explanation nuvy- it is so refreshing to challenge someone and they actually have a coherent response. Pico was an interesting case. And in a split decision the SC sided with our good friends at the ACLU that a Long Island school board had acted improperly in removing a number of books from the school library. There were actually 7 opinions so clear that it was difficult to find anything that resembled a consensus.
Worth noting that the lone woman on the bench Justice O’Connor sided with the dissenters.
But the ruling did find that local school boards do have limited power to remove school books from libraries.
The majority conceded that if it were demonstrated that the removal decision was based solely upon the “educational suitability” of the books in question, then their removal would be “perfectly permissible”.
So a school could remove a book from the library and the aclu or whoever was challenging the removal would have to convince a judge that the removal was not educationally related.
Now here is the strange part. This ruling only applies to the removal of any book. It says nothing about whether the book should be put on the shelf in the first place.
So apparently the SC found that a child’s 1st amendment rights can be violated if the schools remove a book but they can’t be violated if the schools refuse to put it there in the first place. Oh, one more thing, the ruling only applies to 6th grade and up. Schools may remove whatever book they wish from a 5th grade or under book shelf. Pretty convoluted thinking there.
That’s called a narrow decision.
I can’t imagine that the founding fathers were thinking of this when they penned that free speech stuff. The interpretation of the 1st amendment has gone a long way from the original intention in my view.
This might have been the biggest news story in Culpeper since the attempted burial of George Lincoln Rockwell. Too bad that no one will fuss about the lack of ANY material in any school about the US response to the rise of Hitler and our refusal to bomb the railroad tracks leading to Auschwitz. But I sure hope many of the people here have some righeous indignation for the upcoming school budget crisis.
Regardless of the genitalia content, I still don’t see a compelling interest in printing this book.
Why shouldn’t the privacy of the last owner of the script (Anne’s father) be respected. Maybe a $300K payment to the guy he gave the pages to?
Well said Nuvion!!!!
First of all, rogersk, I do apologize to you and MOST of the people in your county. I had followed a link from FoxNews sent by another librarian that took me to the original story, early last week. I just read the most current article on this topic in this paper (Friday) and am very pleased to see your Superintendent taking the correct and appropriate action to follow your school board procedure.
One person I will NOT apologize to is rjma. Are YOU the parent who started all of this? Or closely related to him? Let me fill you in, sir:
“Under the umbrella of First Amendment “free speech”, (federal) court decisions have recognized a minor’s right to receive information. In Board of Education v. Pico, the only case of school library censorship to reach the Supreme Court, a plurality of justices… recognized that minors have a “right to receive information.“ (Adams 16)“ The school board has broad discretion in allowing the material it allows teachers to use in the classroom. Courts have consistently cited the purpose of the school as “inculcating fundamental values necessary to the maintenance of a democratic political system. (Ambak v. Norwick, 441 U.S. 68, 76-77, (1979)“ The board may also remove books from the curriculum as long as they have a reasonable educational basis for doing so. Case law differentiates between that broad control on curricular materials required in courses and the right to receive information in a school library. In B.ofE. v. Pico, Justice Brennan wrote that “although local school boards must be permitted to establish and apply… curriculum with broad discretion….. at the same time school boards are bound to uphold the First Amendment (Adams 19)“
So, my friend Mr. rjma, the issues here are that 1. RECEIVING INFORMATION is guaranteed by the First Amendment and 2. what can the school board do legally? They have much more discretion for determining classroom materials than library books. In this case of the Anne Frank book, I suspect the reasons they may give for using the watered-down version would not pass even a broad test of discretion - especially if they get a female judge. And their case would probably be summarily dismissed if they tried to keep the definitive edition of Anne’s diary out of the school library.
Any more questions about Intellectual Freedom and Access to Information? Then please consult the excellent book I have quoted from:
Adams, Helen. Ensuring Intellectual Freedom and Access to Information in the School Library Media Program. Westport, CN: Libraries Unltd Inc, 2008. Print.
A less-disappointed librarian
nuvion writes:
“I am a school librarian in another state…...It is a blatant violation of all student’s First Amendment rights.“
I won’t even get into what you mean by “all students” but how did you get to be a librarian without having even a rudimentary idea about the First Amendment?
For your review here it is again-
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.“
I have no idea which part of the First Amendment you are referring to but I’ll guess you thinking of the free speech part. Whose free speech rights were infringed?
Freedom of speech generally refers to the government forbidding someone from speaking or writing something. It does not refer to students not having access to a particular book. And no, it doesn’t help your case to use the term “blatant”.
Now if the govt. forbid the printing of the book, maybe arresting the publisher, then the publisher might have a first Amendment case.
You should also know that school boards have a wide authority to use whatever books they wish. If this sb wanted to ban the use of the “definitive” version of the Anne Frank book in their schools, they would be entirely within their rights and no court would even question it.
Citizens of course would have the right to turn the sb members out of office at the ballot box and elect new ones that approved of the text.
nuvion…If you read carefully, the comments made in this particular case, you would see that most of the bloggers agree that this was a disgraceful act on the parts of one parent and one administrator, not all of the parents of Culpeper students. Few people in the county agree with the decision that was made and because of this the decision was reversed. I should think that might make you feel differently about Thomsa Jefferson, the state of Virginia, and the parents and other citizens of Culpeper County.
Now that I have read most of the other posts about this Anne Frank controversy, let me point out two things. Please read the post by German1964, posted on January 28, 2010 at 9:00 pm. He/she, who grew up in East Germany, writes, “How stupid can you be?? What is wrong with you people?“
My second point is that the one parent who complained about the book is NOT the problem. EVERY parent has the right to determine what their minor child can or should read - AT HOME. That has been upheld by courts forever. The real problem here is Mr. Allen and his school system for letting ONE disgruntled parent determine what every, single eighth grader has to read in class. That, fair citizens of Culpeper, is unAmerican and unConstitutional. And I thought Virgina was the hotbed of Libertarianism and home of Thomas Jefferson? He is rolling in his grave.
A disappointed librarian
I am a school librarian in another state. CCPS’s decision in this case is receiving national attention. It is a blatant violation of all student’s First Amendment rights. If I lived in Culpeper, VA, I would be ashamed of my schools and their leaders. If I were Jewish I would be incensed, livid and prepared to sue. Aren’t your students taught about vaginas in Health class by 8th grade?
A disappointed librarian
There is no such thing as an “alternative copy”. Only a censored copy, be it by principal, committee or individual. The burning-of-books starts here. Without freedom of speech and press, America will
continue its dying.
“The right to refuse to stand for or recite the Pledge is about as fundamental as it gets in a free society. Free speech not only means that the government can’t suppress your beliefs, but also that it cannot compel you to profess a belief you do not have. Not standing for the Pledge won’t win any school popularity contests, but the same constitutional principle that protects this kind of expression also protects your right to possess and espouse the religious and political beliefs of your choice.” - ACLU of Virginia Executive Director Kent Willis
It was Spotsy’s own lawyers who recommended the policy of forcing kids to stand for the pledge be removed. Allowing a child to sit and not forcing the issue would have allowed F’burg classes to continue the pledge in the morning.
Sandlewood, don’t try and put this one off on the ACLU!
ONE PARENT. All it took was ONE PARENT and Fredericksburg schools stopped saying the Pledge of Allegiance before class. One kid thought it looked smart to refuse to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance, his parents complained, and it was stopped for all students. If the little #$&@&$ didn’t want to say the Pledge he could have remained seated or stood outside the door until the others had finished. Just another illustration of schools, etc, buckling under a treat from the ACLU.
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