Banned Book Policies Not Fair For Families, Schools and Libraries

By
Mountain Jackpot
-

Dear Editor:

I believe raising readers is something that all parents can support.

Reading opens up minds, hearts, and opportunities. It is an essential skill to assure a successful future.  Libraries and librarians play a key role in helping to develop readers in partnership with parents.  Parents have a crucial role in helping to develop their children into readers by reading together with their kids every day and modeling reading of books.  Parents can help build a reading-rich home and creating reading traditions such as family book talks and bedtime stories.

Public librarians and school teacher-librarians help develop readers with their extensive knowledge of fiction and non-fiction books. Parents are always encouraged to partner with librarians to help their children find just what they need and want to read- within any boundaries set by the parents of course.

As we recognize another Banned Book Week, during an extraordinary year of conflict within families and school boards regarding their child’s/students’ right to read, please remember that above all, parents always have choice in what their children can and cannot read.
That agreement needs to remain within a family, where values of the family are always honored. However, in our pluralistic society, it is simply not fair for the values of any one family to dictate what children in another family can access in their school or public libraries.

Nancy White

Colorado Springs

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