Freedom to Read Act would protect books from censorship in Maryland public schools, libraries
MARYLAND – “There have been challenges to content in almost every county in the state of Maryland. That is concerning and shows the need that we should kind of pick a direction on a state level,” Zwerling said.
Maryland lawmakers are pushing to protect books and other reading materials from censorship in public libraries and schools, introducing House bill 785 or the Freedom to Read Act.
The Maryland State Education Association is in support of this legislation and want to make sure that students have access to an honest and fair education. “If you talk to any of our educators, they’ll tell you that if a student can’t see it, they feel like they can’t be it,” MSEA Managing Director for Political and Legislative Affairs Samantha Zwerling said. “We want to make sure that students are able to understand content in a contextualized manner with an educator who’s trained to help them learn from it.”
The bill would also require public libraries to have policies in place for how books and other materials are added to a collection and how members of the public could challenge a book. “That process is in place and it’s not impossible that it could happen, or the board would agree that the material isn’t appropriate for the library. That’s entirely possible,” Wicomico Public Library Executive Director Seth Hershberger said.
Hershberger believes the bill wouldn’t impact them as they already have similar procedures in place. He told 47ABC that the bill also supports their core value of providing access. “You’re going to find some books that are for you and some that you probably don’t want to check out. That goes for children’s materials too. We expect parents to be involved in selecting the materials that they want their children to have access to,” he said.
Under the bill, funding for public libraries would contingent upon whether they adopt policies that align with the state standards. It now sits in the House Ways and Means committee where it awaits consideration.
