Wicomico County Executive Julie Giordano responds to concerned parent group over explicit themes in WCPS books

SALISBURY, Md. – Wicomico County Executive Julie Giordano is responding to calls that the county is not doing enough to ban explicit materials in the classroom.

This comes after a petition was started by a concerned parent group Delmarva Parent Teacher Coalition to remove certain books.

“Anything that has obscene content, should not be in a school library, should not be in a school classroom. I’m a firm believer in that,” Giordano tells 47 ABC.

The County Executive tells 47 ABC that DPTC sent a letter asking for her to weigh in on books they called explicit, which they say were found in school libraries.

The books contain references to sexually explicit acts and other content the group says should not be in schools.

The County Executive agrees but warns against using excerpts from books when making a call on whether or not it is appropriate.

“I do feel like that they are valid complaints as well, so some of the books, you know, sometimes it’s you take it in a small context and when you actually read the book holistically, it sort of changes,” Giordano said adding, ” I think it’s hard to just look at certain excerpts, I do think the book needs to be looked at holistically.”

The group started a petition to get those books taken away, including books like Beyond Magenta and Gender Queer.

But Giordano says there is already a process for that in place that has yet to be utilized.

“if a parent or a student has a material put in front of them or a book that they find inappropriate, the first step is to obviously email that teacher or email the principal, and an alternative assignment or an alternative book can be given to that student specifically,” Giordano said adding that parents also have the ability to escalate to the school principal if they feel it is not good for all children and even go to the superintendent with issues.

However, she says that in her conversations with the WCPS that has not yet happened.

“I’m not by any means promoting any books to be pulled because it’s just not my lane, not so much. I mean, I could do it as a parent based on my son going to Mardela, nothing has been put in front of him that I really questioned.” Giordano said. ,” she said.

47 ABC reached out to the WCPS and the DPTC for a response and did not hear back.