We received a kind letter from our Senator, Ben Cardin, responding to our request for favorite books he read as a child. Here is his response, below.
Letter From MD Senator Ben Cardin on Summer Reading June 24, 2011
Tell us what you have been reading this summer. Post here as a comment.
In South Carolina, the book Angry Management (Chris Crutcher, author) has been 'temporarily banned' from the summer reading program after a student's parent complained about the language in the book. Has any book ever been banned in MCPS? I read a few pages on Amazon, looking for language about which the parent might have complained. I'm not sure what the SC parent focused on, but I would choose to reconsider using this book for high school because it is poorly edited. I found two instances among just four pages when 'your' is used instead of the appropriate 'you're'. Some of the punctuation is questionable, too.
ReplyDeleteSee story here: http://www.wltx.com/news/article/143202/2/Angry-Management-Temporarily-Banned-From-Kershaw-County-Schools
Anonymous, I am not sure if a specific book has been 'banned' but I do know from my own experience that there is a lengthy and cumbersome bureacratic process and many roadblocks that can keep many books from being read in the schools. The summer reading program in Maryland is sponsored by the state and each county library system can participate; the school system is not involved in that program. After your post I googled Chris Crutcher, and the issue of the book banning and responses is at his website, here: www.chriscrutcher.com. Happy reading.
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