A Canadian public high school has sparked outrage for removing all books published before 2008 in a so-called effort to make its library more inclusive for students.
Erindale High School in Mississauga, Ontario, destroyed about 50% of its library books — including the Harry Potter series and “The Hunger Games” — under new “equity-based book weeding” directives implemented by the Peel District School Board earlier this year, CBC News reports.
“This year, I came to my school library and there were rows of empty shelves with no books at all,” said Reina Takata, a 10th grader.
The student said he had been prepared for such a purge after administrators warned him at the end of the previous school year: “If the shelves look emptier now, it’s because we have to remove all the books [published] before 2008.”
The school’s controversial move comes after the education minister issued wider directives to school boards earlier this year in an effort to ensure library books are more inclusive.
“The Board shall evaluate books, media and all other resources currently being used for the teaching and learning of English, History and Social Sciences for the purpose of using resources that are inclusive and culturally responsive, relevant and reflective of students, and the wider school community in the Board of Directors. ,” the memo said.
Erindale High School in Mississauga, Ontario, destroyed about 50% of its library books under a new “equity-based book weeding” directive implemented by the Peel District School Board earlier this year. Reina Takata
But parents and students have argued that the Peel District School Board’s “seemingly inconsistent” process it then implemented to comply with the directive led to some schools – including Erindale High School – strangely removing thousands of books simply because they were published before 2008.
They said the directive was to blame for books, including “The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank” and “The Very Hungry Caterpillar,” disappearing from shelves at other schools as well.
The board will not address concerns that schools are weeding out books based solely on publication date. Instead, it argues that the weeding process has always been part of the responsibilities of teacher librarians with the district and across the country.
“Books published before 2008 that are damaged, inaccurate, or do not have solid circulation data (not being checked out by students) will be removed,” the board said in a statement.
Damaged books with strong circulation numbers will be replaced regardless of publication date, while older titles can remain on the shelves if they are “accurate, appropriate to the curriculum, consistent with board initiatives and responsive to student interest and engagement,” the board added.
Tenth-grader Reina Takata said the move to remove all books published before 2008 “worries me a lot.” CBC News
“The Peel District School Board strives to ensure that the books available in our school libraries are culturally responsive, relevant, inclusive and reflect the diversity of our school community and the wider community.”
However, Takata, who is of Japanese descent, argued that issuing books by publication date would erase important history.
“I think the author who wrote about the Japanese internment camps will be deleted and the whole event that happened historically for Japanese Canadians will be removed,” he said.
“That worries me a lot.”
Ontario Education Minister Stephen Lecce, who initially would not comment on the weeding process, said this week he had written to the school board instructing it to end the practice following the backlash.
“Ontario is committed to ensuring that the addition of new books better reflects the diversity of our society,” Lecce said in a statement.
“It is offensive, illogical and counterintuitive to remove books from years past that educate students about Canadian history, antisemitism or famous classic literature.”
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Source: thtrangdai.edu.vn/en/
