Lodi Unified faces next chapter in book ban controversy

Lodi Unified School District’s new opt-out policy has not ended the controversy over access to books that parents do not want their children to read.

In June, flawed votes by an opaque advisory committee on three specific books led to accusations that they had banned the books, but schools superintendent Neil Young later said they had exceeded his authority.

Supporters of the book say they will raise student access and district procedures again at the July 16 school board meeting.

“There is this opt-out option, OK, but that still doesn’t solve the problem of school policy and this appeals committee,” said Lisa Lennon Wilkins, president of the district’s teachers union.

For the upcoming school year, district officials had already determined that parents could choose whether or not their children would have access to “young adult (14+) and adult books that may contain adult themes, graphic violence, vulgar language and/or sexual content.”

Tensions reached a public peak in June after the district convened the advisory committee to review 10 books, including “Push” by Sapphire, “Speak” by Laurie Halse Anderson and “This is Kind of an Epic Love Story” by Kacen Callender. The seven-member committee included teachers, administrators and parents, including one who had filed a formal complaint against “This is Kind of an Epic Love Story.”

According to district documents requested by Stocktonia, the committee took three votes in the hours-long June 4 meeting, deciding unanimously to keep “Speak” available, 6-1 to remove “Push” and a 3-3 tie on “This is Kind of an Epic Love Story.” Some community members told the school board, which met later that evening, that the district appeared to have banned the books.

Published in 1999, Push is about Precious Jones, an illiterate African-American girl living in Harlem who is sexually and physically abused by her parents. The book was also adapted into the 2009 film Precious. In recent years, it has been targeted by school districts for its sexual content; a 2023 analysis by the free speech organization PEN America found it to be one of the most banned books in the country.

The district received at least 20 formal complaints about “Push” in February and March, with many objecting to the book’s sexual content or raising similar concerns about morals and family values, according to copies obtained by Stocktonia. Only district employees, residents or parents can file formal complaints.

“Supporting an immoral lifestyle among young people is unconscionable,” several complaints say. “Explicit sexual activities and lifestyles destroy families and culture.”

“The downfall of our civilization has no place in our schools,” another complainant wrote about the book.

The films “Speak” and “This is Kind of an Epic Love Story,” which deal with sexual assault and LGBTQ+ youth, have also been challenged and banned in other school districts.

Complaints against all three books the district received included attachments from BookLooks.org, a book review website whose reviews are often used in attempts to ban titles, a USA Today investigation found last year. The website has come under fire for its ties to the Moms for Liberty organization, although BookLooks.org says it is not affiliated with any of those groups.

On June 10, nearly a week after the board’s meeting, Superintendent Young wrote in a message to community members that the board had no decision-making authority and that the votes had been conducted improperly. He then announced the district’s new opt-out policy, which had been adopted before the review board meeting.

Young told Stocktonia that district librarians were responsible for determining which books fell under the policy, adding that the feedback he had received from parents so far had been positive.

“I hear from several families that … they feel like this is a great opportunity for each family to take responsibility for their own family and not for another family’s children,” he said.

But for some, the new policy isn’t the end of the story. Although he doesn’t have children in the district, David Diskin lives in Lodi and is working with parents and staff to push for clarification of district policies related to the review board.

“There was no public call for proposals, there was no nomination process. It was certainly not public,” Diskin said of the committee’s founding.

Young said Assistant Principal Robert Sahli made the decision to convene the committee and selected the members. Sahli, who retired from the school district at the end of the school year, did not respond to requests for comment.

The committee includes middle school teachers Laurie Johnson and Madeline Mettler, instructional coach Sean Campbell, principals Joe Ward and You Lor, and parents Esiteli Hafoka and Becky Harper. Harper filed a formal complaint against “This is Kind of an Epic Love Story” in November 2023 after the book was offered as an elective in her daughter’s ninth-grade English class. She had spoken about her objections to the book at a school board meeting last summer.

Further details remain unclear about the committee, which did not take minutes during its meeting. Young said he had “no information” about whether the committee would meet again.

Diskin and others have asked the school board to clarify policies for convening a review committee, voting on complaints and deciding whether and how to remove classroom materials.

Existing district rules allow the principal or other appropriate official to convene a temporary committee — consisting of two teachers, two administrators, two parents, a coach, and a librarian in an advisory capacity — to review formal complaints about books and instructional materials. Officially, the committee’s job is to determine the age and educational suitability of the materials and their usefulness in the school curriculum; it does not have the authority to remove books from shelves.

However, last year Lodi Unified revised the composition of the committee, changing the role of the librarian to an advisory position and increasing the number of parents and administrators. The requirement that a high school student be a member was also removed.

The committee’s June 4 agenda included 10 books for discussion; some of them, like Samira Ahmed’s “Internment,” deal with race and religion in America, while others, like Gabby Rivera’s “Juliet Takes a Breath,” deal with LGBTQ+ youth. Other titles included “A Court of Silver Flames” by Sarah J. Maas, “Tricks” by Ellen Hopkins, “Looking for Alaska” by John Green, “All Boys Aren’t Blue” by George M. Johnson and “Me and Earl and the Dying Girl” by Jesse Andrews – all books that have been challenged or banned in other districts around the country.

A California law passed last fall prohibits school districts from banning books that address issues such as race, gender or sexual orientation and allows the state to fine districts that violate those laws. Still, some districts in California have addressed the issue.

In Elk Grove, parents engaged in heated discussions about LGBTQ+ books in school libraries at several school board meetings last summer, although no specific books were addressed. In May, the Kern County Board of Education passed a policy that allows parents to challenge the suitability of books; there, too, community members accused them of banning books. The Fresno County Board of Public Libraries recently created a committee to adopt standards that advocates say could disproportionately target books that address topics like gender identity.

Miriam Waldvogel is doing a summer internship at Stocktonia. She attends Princeton University and is a Stockton native.

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