By james art 
Maryland schools banned 64 books in the 2023-24 school year, tied with South Carolina for ninth in the nation among 29 states ranked, according to a report released Friday by PEN America that said book bans have increased. since he started following three years ago.
Maryland’s position is due in large part to Carroll County Schools, which the report said banned 59 books last year under an updated policy from the county board of education that said educational materials deemed “sexually profane” would not be allowed in schools . According to the policy, “sexually explicit content is defined as unambiguously describing, depicting, showing or writing about sex or sexual acts in a detailed or graphic manner.”
Sabrina Baeta, one of the authors of the PEN America report and a book ban researcher, said in an interview that removing books from schools only hurts students, especially those who may not have both parents at home.
“It’s better for them to have information available and to have consenting adults that they have in the school system or their own parents at home to talk to,” said Baeta, a former middle school teacher.
“If they don’t, it’s because maybe they do.” [students] you don’t have that at home and the school provides it. We can’t pretend that we live in a society where they will get everything at home,” Baeta said Wednesday before the report was released.
Carroll County officials did not respond to requests for comment. But Susie Scott, chairwoman of Moms for Liberty’s Maryland Legislative Committee, defended the county and disputed PEN America’s definition of book banning, saying the county did not ban the books in question.
Support for banning the books varies in Maryland school board races
“It’s curating a library of educational materials that are appropriate for children,” she said of the district’s decision. “You only have so much room in your bookcase for books. You want to have the best books you can in that space.”
Some of the books banned from school shelves include The DUFF: A Certain Ugly Fat Friend, Empire of Storms and Deal with It! A whole new approach to your body, brain and life like gURL.”
PEN America categorizes book bans into three types: banned books that are banned; “prohibited pending investigation,” defined as books being reviewed to determine whether restrictions should be placed on them; and “prohibited by restriction,” which specifies grade- or school-level restrictions or books that require parental permission.
According to PEN America’s report in the 2023-24 school year. just over 10,000 book bans were reported. Florida and Iowa, where state lawmakers passed legislation to remove certain books from school and public library shelves, accounted for 8,232 of the statewide bans this school year.
It found that 29 states and 220 school districts registered book bans in the last school year.
PEN America began its review in the 2021-22 school year, when Maryland was at the bottom, tied with nine other states for 24th place among the 33 states that recorded book bans that year. Maryland did not report for the 2022-23 school year because it did not record any bans that year, according to PEN America.
The organization attributes the movement to ban the books to conservative and parenting rights groups like Moms for Liberty, which has about 10 local chapters in Maryland.
Scott said the state’s Freedom to Read Act, which went into effect this year, will make it harder to remove books. That law prohibits local school officials from removing materials “due to partisan, ideological or religious disapproval,” requires the development of a review procedure, and also requires that the books remain available to students and school staff until the review is complete.
That means the burden falls on parents, she said.
“Parents have the final say and control over what they think is appropriate for their children,” Scott said.