Board votes 5-1 to keep book on shelves
A library book that’s only been checked out twice since its purchase in 2018 will remain available at Greeley Central High School after undergoing Greeley-evans School District 6’s book review process.
Though “The God of Small Things” by Arundhati Roy has received little attention from students, more than 150 people signed forms in 2022 saying they wanted it banned or restricted from local school libraries.
Despite an appeal from one community member, the majority of the Greeleyevans Board of Education voted at Monday’s board meeting to uphold the District 6 Book Review Committee and the superintendent’s recommendation to keep “The God of Small Things” without any restrictions.
Rob Norwood, absent from the meeting due to an illness, was not included in the motion.
The book initially received 165 complaints in December 2022, according to Wes Tuttle, assistant superintendent of school leadership. In January, those who challenged books received notice for complainants to speak up, talk with committee members or submit additional written complaints, but the committee received none.
Meetings for “The God of Small Things” review started in November.
The committee consists of 19 members, including a pastor, employees from North Range dealing with youth trauma, six parents, two recent graduates from the past four years, four teachers, a certified librarian, four district administrators and two facilitators.
After several meetings, the committee landed on the recommendation for the book to continue to remain openly available in high school libraries without any restrictions. Superintendent Deidre Pilch backed the recommendation after her review.
In the three-page decision, guided by 12 criteria, the committee said the book allows readers to challenge world views such as generational poverty and trauma, according to Tuttle. The book, which was described as “poetic, well-written and deeply insightful,” empowers readers to become more emphatic with their peers and broadens their perspectives, the committee ruled.
As part of the process, people with initial objections can appeal the decision. Stacey Casteel, who previously ran for school board in November, was the only one out of 165 people to do so.
Casteel’s appeal from Feb. 27 disagreed with the finding to allow the book to stay in the school. However, she said on Monday that her request doesn’t mean pulling the book from the shelves.
Instead of the district allowing parents to opt their child out of a book, which is currently the case for the school district, Casteel said the librarian should call the parent to tell them their child wants to check out a book on the “banned book list.”
Casteel thinks parents don’t know the current restriction opportunity is available to them or they aren’t aware of the challenged books’ content, which is why communication between the librarian and the parent would be beneficial. But board members argued this approach would create an extra burden on the librarian and that the banned book list could potentially become too long, complicating the process.
Although District 6 received public backlash for having certain books in its schools, which resulted in hundreds of people in the community challenging books, only two parents have requested to restrict access to books since implementing parental choice, according to Tuttle. A majority of the 211 people who filed nearly 4,500 paper complaints on 11 books in December 2022 also indicated they had not read the books nor had students in District 6 schools, according to a previous Tribune article.
As for “The God of Small Things,” Casteel and other initial challengers had major issues with the book’s content, particularly the sexual nature of the book. At Monday’s meeting, Casteel indicated the sexual acts that took place in the book can stunt educational growth. However, Natalie Mash, vice president of the school board, said the act is portrayed as abuse and nothing positive comes out of it.
Mash cited the book committee’s take on sexual assault from the book, stating the topic could help students openly discuss trauma’s impact. She then cited that 1 in 4 women will be sexually assaulted in their lifetime, and District 6 has 22,00 students.
“This is the experience of some of our students,” she said.
Only one board member, Taylor Sullivan, expressed a desire to remove the book from the high school, going against the recommendation from the committee. She believed the book encouraged and promoted infidelity, sexual assault, spousal abuse and incest.
Sullivan argued the book is a “depressing read” that doesn’t make children feel safe or protected, going against the district’s values.
Unlike the Sullivans, board member Brenda Campos-spitze called the book one of the best reads of her life and “proudly” voted yes to keep the book on shelves. She argued it doesn’t promote or glorify the topics of concern in its depiction of them.
Campos-spitze said high school students should not be shielded from “difficult conversations in the real world.”
Before “The God of Small Things,” the last appeal to the board occurred in June with the books “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close” by Jonathan Safran Foer and “The Kite Runner” by Khaled Hosseini. The board upheld the committee recommendation and Pilch’s evaluations of the rulings with both books, which remain available to students in schools where the books were located at the time of the review.
The book committee’s next reviews will be “Me, Earl and the Dying Girl” by Jesse Andrews and “Real Live Boyfriends” by E. Lockhart, according to the District 6 website.