2023-2024 FAME Legislative Meetings Lucretia Miller FAME Past-President

“The only effect I ardently long to produce by my writings is that those who read them should be better able to imagine and to feel the pains and joys of those who differ from them in everything but the broad fact of being struggling, erring human creatures.” -George Eliot

In today’s extreme times of division, single-mindedness, and political disparity and partisanship, it is ironic that what is most needed to heal, connect, understand, and build empathy is what is legally being banned- books. As school librarians, those whose very job is to provide access to books and teach how to access and evaluate information, this rankles our very core and we start to assemble our arsenal of weapons, breaking out the Banned Books Week t-shirts, posters, and displays and “one-clicking” every poll that comes into our in-box. But what tools do we have that will actually make a difference? What do we possess that can affect change and start rational discussions? The answer is quite simple- we are readers. And as Malorie Blackman wrote, “Reading is an exercise in empathy, an exercise in walking in someone else’s shoes.” Reading is perhaps the single best way to understand beliefs, values, and points of view different from our own. In reading we can learn how best to understand that parent’s or politician’s desire to make decisions for all children, not just their own, so that we can listen, present, discuss, and hope to build change.

Your FAME (Florida Association of Media Education) leadership has been applying these strategies in several legislative visits this year. FAME recognizes that in order to make change, we need to find connections with those who disagree. While it is important to meet with like-minded legislators to reinforce our mission and encourage them to continue to produce bills in support of self-choice of diverse reading materials, they are not the ones we need to educate. Thus FAME’s strategy for this past year’s legislative visits was to target five areas for clarity of language and fine-tuning that are in new laws or on current bills already moving forward. In pointing out clarifications on bills they wrote or support, positive discussions could be had.

FAME’s five discussion items included:

1. Student Access and Parental Permissions: 
   

Currently included in Florida Statute 1006.28 and HB 1069 is a requirement that each district must establish a process for a parent or resident to be able to limit access to materials in the school or classroom library. Yet it is up to each district to determine what that process entails. Most counties have an opt-out policy, requiring parents who do not want their children to have access to school library materials to return a form indicating their desire. However, more counties are beginning to require an opt-in policy so that if a parent wants their child to have access to the library, they need to fill out and return a form. This results in high percentages of students not able to use their school library due to busy parent schedules, parents never receiving the form, parents signing the form and the student neglects to turn it in…

FAME advocated for keeping the requirement for school districts to have in place and post on their websites the process for a parent to limit access of school library materials for their own child, but suggested clarifying the bill to state the process an opt-out policy: “Districts that require parent/guardian permission before accessing the library still had a large student population without library access at the end of the first quarter, due to parental inaction, not parental restrictions.” FAME suggests that upon enrollment, all students be granted access to all resources available in the school library corresponding to their grade level, and parents who want to restrict or limit their child’s access may go through the process to opt out.

2. Book Removal:
FAME pointed out that some school districts are not following their own policies. For example, in some school board meetings, a parent will read out loud a passage out of context from a book and the school board will automatically remove the book without following the district-stated formal challenge process. FAME believes “Public participation, especially input from parents/guardians, are vital in the reassessment process. Without these transparent safeguards, we will continue to see removals occur without stakeholder input…”

3. Update Current Language:
…which brings us to number three. In HB 1069, there is language to assign a special magistrate process for a parent who “disagrees with the determination made by the district school board on the objection to the use of a specific material…” FAME would like clarification of language in the bills in order to support all parents’/guardians’ rights- both those who disagree with the decision to keep a book in the school library and for those who disagree with the decision to remove a book from the school library, especially if the district did not follow the review process.

4. Separate Training:
FAME leadership also met with the Florida Department of Education to discuss the training video prepared by the FDOE for the required training in HB 1467. FAME pointed out that there is confusion from the inclusion of instructional materials with the school library materials since they are two distinct groups with different selection criteria. School Library Media Specialists are responsible for the curation and purchase of school library materials, while subject area teachers are responsible for instructional materials. FAME believes there should be two separate videos so as to avoid confusion over selection criteria. In addition, when FAME met with legislators, we encouraged inclusion of the language proposed in HB1355 and SB1414 (Freedom to Learn bill) to be included in current bills to help distinguish between the two subsets of school materials: “School libraries may provide materials and information presenting all points of view on current and historical issues…(SB1414 451-454)” since school library materials are self-selected and instructional materials are not.

5. Set Restrictions:
In light of the evidence of extreme use of challenge objections seen in some districts or counties, costing them time and money, the current HB 7025 submitted by Representative Trabulsi includes language to fine a person who makes more than five challenges $100.00 per challenge after five challenges, with reimbursement of their money if their challenge is approved. FAME thanked the legislature for including restrictions on the number of challenges a single person can make, and suggested other options should they feel a monetary restriction would not pass, such as requiring a certain number of people to challenge a particular book before it goes through the review process rather than one single person challenging a specific material.

In recognizing legislators’ desire for more parental input in their children’s education and understanding the seasoning behind the legislators’ points of view, FAME was able to have civil discussions and point out clarifications in the bills the legislators wrote and submitted that will benefit all students and all parents. It is a start toward enacting the change so that students have the opportunity to self-select diverse materials from a variety of viewpoints that can be found in their school libraries. If you are interested in making sure the dialogue and advocacy continues and builds, let your Legislative Chairs know you would like to participate in next year’s legislative visits!

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