At MHS, we do not have a wide variety of books. Our school's library is very small and limited; it does not take up half of the library. Mrs. Brown, our school library, explained that the district only gives $200 a year to each school’s library to buy books and any supplies needed in the library.
Some books in the library are a bit outdated or might not interest students at MHS, with most books aged around 19-60 years old. The problem is not that we don't have enough space, it is that we don't have the funding to afford new books. If we get rid of old books that don't hold as much importance and replace them with new modern books, it might get people to want to read or even complete their AR.
Now, a couple things came to mind with getting new books into the library. One idea was that if parents wanted to help out in the library, we could make a wish list of a couple books; that would be a great addition to the library, and the parents could pick one or more to purchase as a donation.
Another idea was to have people donate unwanted books and then sort through them to see which would be best for our library. Mrs. Brown also is working with other class, so she doesn't really get to spend as much time as she intended/wanted to with finding books.
With recent debates flourishing across America, something that could be affecting other libraries is the Banned Books Movement. This movement consists of a couple states wanting to ban (or already have banned) certain books that talk about race/ethnicity, gender identity, and sexual orientation, etc. With this movement, it filters and restricts books that might educate people on topics that others might relate to. Unfortunately, most modern books contain a lot of information on these topics.
In California, they are planning to pass a bill to prohibit book bans, meaning that books containing topics such as LGBTQ+, Race, Religion, etc will be available in public schools/districts in all Californian counties. If schools refuse to make certain, inclusive books accessible, they are subject to fine due to the discriminatory action. If the bill does not pass it would limit others on how much information they can get if some books are banned.
The New York Post mentions that almost 1500 books were banned last school year. New York Post states, “According to PEN America’s Index of School Book Bans lists, there were 1,477 instances of individual books banned during the first half of the 2022-23 school year.”
Mrs. Brown does not know a lot about the Banned Book Movement, nor have an opinion about it, but she says that people offended by certain books or topics should not be picking those books. Let those who are interested read it as long as they aren't being offensive/ offending anybody else. The library has and will have many more options available for all parties and interests.
Overall, we can grow our library by increasing funding, supporting donations, and ignoring the Ban Books Movement. It should be educating students, instead of taking away from their education.
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