NCTE SLATE GIVES THREE NATIONAL INTELLECTUAL FREEDOM AWARDS

The Blue Springs Board of Education, Missouri, is the 2006 winner of the NCTE SLATE National Intellectual Freedom Award (http://www.ncte.org/groups/affiliates/awards/109295.htm).  Honorable mentions go to Judy Martin and Fredonia Ray of Valdosta, Georgia, and David Moshman of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

The Blue Springs Board of Education, Missouri, is winner of the 2006 NCTE SLATE National Intellectual Freedom Award.  Early in the fall of 2003, five parents of students in the Blue Springs School District, a suburban district of 13,000 students in metropolitan Kansas City, Missiouri, requested the Assistant Superintendent for Curriculum and Instruction that Lois Lowry’s novel The Giver be removed from the district’s curriculum. The parents contended that the novel implicitly condones infanticide, teen suicide, euthanasia, governmental brainwashing, and disobedience to parents, and they objected to its general negativity.  The district followed its policy by having the parents fill out a “Reconsideration Request” form and organizing a review committee, to which the parents spoke.  The committee recommended that the novel stay in the curriculum and it was retained.  However, in the fall of 2004, the parents requested that the Board of Education review the committee’s recommendation.  In the meanwhile, challenges to many of the texts used in grades 6-12 were being challenged throughout the metropolitan area. Some districts were giving in to the challenges and the press, including the Kansas City Star reported on the cases. The Blue Springs Board of Education held firm.  Over winter break, each school board member read the novel in preparation for the hearing in which the parents were to present their case.  The March 2005 board meeting was well publicized and a great many people attended.  During the meeting board members expressed their admiration for Lowry’s work and their intention to protect the right to read quality texts which depict what one reporter referred to as “the dark side” of life (Mike Hendricks, Kansas City Star, January 10, 2005, B-2).  While districts all around the Kansas City metropolitan area were busy removing challenged books from their curricula, the Blue Springs Board of Education stood firm.  As the district’s Director of Information Services said, “We don’t haphazardly create our curriculum, and we don’t haphazardly change it” (Kansas City Star, January 16, 2005, pages A-1 and A-8).  –summarized from nomination materials submitted by Maridella Carter.

Judy Martin and Fredonia Ray are honorable mentions for the 2006 SLATE National Intellectual Freedom Award.   During a school Open House the parent of a student in Martin’s class complained about The Bean Trees by Barbara Kingsolver, calling it pornographic.  The book  had been included on the summer reading list for the American Literature and Composition class.  Two days later the parent met with the principal and provided him with what she considered to be the offensive excerpts from the novel,  excerpts which then began to circulate in the community through faxes and emails to board members, ministers, radio stations, and other parents.  Soon excerpts from Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye began to circulate as well.  Fredonia Ray had selected the books on the reading list which had been approved by the colleagues, school administrators, and the district curriculum director.  Ray went to the support of her colleague by writing a letter to the school board to ask for support for the English department, all of whom signed the letter, and she gave a copy of the letter to the principal.  Shortly after a formal complaint was made against The Bean Trees, four members of the community spoke out against both novels at a school board  work session.  Ray was reprimanded for trying to speak at the meeting.  A review committee was organized and it recommended that the books remain on the reading list, but that a statement be included informing parents of their right to request alternative readings to those they found offensive.  A few days later an article in the Valdosta Daily Times stated that the superintendent had rejected the committee’s recommendation and removed the books from the reading list.  In addition, the superintendent gave both Martin and Ray letters of reprimand for “not being able to diffuse the situation.”  Both appealed the reprimands to the school board which upheld them, so both appealed to the state board of education.  The board found in Martin’s favor but ruled against Ray.  Ray appealed in state court and won a reversal.  Both veteran teachers left the high school and transferred to another district.
--summarized from nomination materials submitted by Gloria Pipkin and ReLeah Lent

David Moshman, professor of educational psychology, University of Nebraska-Lincoln is an honorable mention for the 2006 SLATE National Intellectual Freedom Award. Moshman was a member of the 1988 founding group of the Academic Freedom Coalition of Nebraska (AFCON), an organization created to counter the effects of Hazelwood and the move to restrict the freedoms of teachers and students.  David Moshman wrote AFCON’s first constitution, secured the membership of the ACLU, and he has been an active members of the board ever since. Currently AFCON is a group of 18 organizations including the Nebraska State Education Association, several subject-matter teacher organizations, the AAUP and the Academic Senates of the two main University of Nebraska campuses, along with librarians, journalists, writers, and citizens dedicated to academic freedom.  As Policy Coordinator for the organization, he continues to bring to the board’s attention cases from across the nation which threaten academic freedom or which indicate positive developments in that area.  One supporter said,

I have seen Dave meet with public school and university administrators to persuade them, for the sake of students and faculty, to cease censoring or suppressing ideas, or people with unpopular opinions.  He has published letters to the editor or guest editorials in newspaper after newspaper, calmly and persuasively defending academic freedom both in principle, and in specific cases of frightened and oppressed students and faculty.  He has appeared on panels and has given seminars on academic freedom.  He will stand and fight alongside anyone else who will stand for academic freedom, but he will stand alone if need be, and he has.  He has taught a course in academic freedom and has published a book (now in second edition) on adolescent development with academic freedom of adolescents as part of its core argument for healthy development.

--summarized from nomination materials submitted by Clark Kolterman, Robert S. Haller, and A. Dwayne Ball