There is now enacted or pending legislation in more than 30 U.S. states prohibiting certain kinds of books from being in schools – mostly LGBTQIA+ titles and books that engage with the presence of racism in our country. Because Scholastic Book Fairs are invited into schools, where books can be purchased by kids on their own, these laws create an almost impossible dilemma: back away from these titles or risk making teachers, librarians, and volunteers vulnerable to being fired, sued, or prosecuted.
To continue offering these books, as well as even more high interest titles, we created an additional collection called Share Every Story, Celebrate Every Voice for our U.S. elementary school fairs. We cannot make a decision for our school partners around what risks they are willing to take, based on the state and local laws that apply to their district, so these topics and this collection have been part of many planning calls that happen in advance of shipping a fair.
I don’t think I’m seeing what you’re interpreting as them being worried about breaking federal laws. They’re worried about breaking state laws when they’re invited into schools in states with these don’t say gay bills. So scholastic has moved anything that could get them in trouble now goes in this separate collection that schools have to specifically ask them to bring and isn’t included with the normal offerings. Nor am I seeing how doing so would violate any kind of federal law.
“feds are going to be forced to act” for a federal agency to act that would require the enforcement of federal law, short of that it is all down to state action. Or am I misinterpreting intent, happens a lot to me?