Are censorship and lack of challenging books factors in why your teen can’t read?

I know, I was a weird kid. Born during the time when parents bought sets of World Book or Britannica encyclopedias, I was the girl who would sit down and read the dictionaries that came with the set.

Hey, I was a latchkey kid and had a couple of hours to kill waiting for my working parents to get home.

Today, students aren’t reading as much and don’t seem to have the desire to. Teachers are concerned that students can’t handle reading assignments and are not coming to college prepared to do the work.

Recent studies have looked at some unsurprising key reasons: the prevalence of social media; the pandemic and online learning; schools expect less from students; people are reading fewer books than before.

But I propose we look at another reason that hits home across the country: persistent censorship and book ban challenges at every level of K-12 education, from elementary school through high school graduation.

In fact, restoring these banned books and teaching students to challenge their perceptions of these demanding works, and thus challenge their perception of all other media, might be the only way to turn the trend. And I’m not talking about only books with themes of diversity, equity and inclusion; books that discuss uncomfortable and shameful moments in U.S. and world history; or LGBTQIA+ or other themes related to relationships or human sexuality.

I’m talking about works considered to be classics — “To Kill a Mockingbird,” Shakespeare and Chaucer are on these lists, too. So is “The Handmaid’s Tale” by Margaret Atwood.

How do we expect to raise a generation of citizens who can question ideas if we take away the books that can help develop their young minds? How can we expect young people to have the patience and ability to read ballot initiatives and amendments if we don’t share difficult tomes that deal with issues of injustice and inequality?

Blaming the pandemic is too easy. Experts saw it happening before COVID-19. In “Reading and Engaging Sources: What Students’ Use of Sources Reveals About Advanced Reading Skills,” a 1990s survey of college sophomores compared with sophomores in 2012 saw a radical difference in the “inability to understand — or engage with — longer and more formal texts, especially in print.”

The trend to restrict access to books is on the rise in states across the country, according to the American Library Association. Books in public schools and libraries may be challenged, and if successful, banned. A book is banned when it is removed in response to a formal or informal challenge.

The American Library Association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom (OIF) recently released data documenting book challenges throughout the United States, finding that challenges of unique titles surged 65% in 2023 compared with 2022, reaching the highest level ever documented by ALA. In total, almost 1,250 demands to censor books in libraries were documented in 2023.

Hundreds of challenges to books about minorities

The reasons for the increase, according to the ALA?

ν Pressure groups focused on public libraries in addition to targeting school libraries.

ν Groups and individuals demanded the censorship of multiple titles, often dozens or hundreds at a time.

ν Titles representing LGBTQIA+ and people of color made up 47% of those targeted in censorship attempts.

ν In 17 states (Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Idaho, Illinois, Iowa, Kentucky, Maryland, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia and Wisconsin) there were attempts to censor more than 100 titles.

Look at the timing of increased challenges on the ALA’s trend map. Beginning in 2021, the number of challenges to books went up just when students were at home using online learning.

Simultaneously, politicians such as Missouri Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft introduced rules requiring public libraries to “adopt policies on the age-appropriateness of literature” and called for restricting the use of public funds for materials that “appeal to the prurient interest of any minor.”

On the surface, not a bad idea. However, the application went too far. In 2022, in response to Ashcroft’s new rules, Education Week reported that school libraries removed — either temporarily or permanently — almost 300 books from their shelves.

The books banned? “Graphic novels, such as Batman and X-Men, a copy of Reader’s Digest, works about artists including Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo, graphic novel adaptations of classics by William Shakespeare and Mark Twain, the Pulitzer-prize winning graphic novel ‘Maus’ and other books about the Holocaust, and ‘The Children’s Bible,’ ” Education Week reported.

The rule came at possibly the worst time, in my opinion. It was a time when students needed more, not less. Years later, we are reaping the penalties.

In high school, my advanced literature class had these classics on the syllabus: Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales,” the epic poem “Beowulf” and works by Shakespeare, among others. Many of those appear on challenged or banned lists.

Today, more than ever, we need young people who can read complex ideas, and are able and willing to engage in civic opportunities. Sure, the problem might be the compelling offerings on social media, but it also might be what they aren’t being offered — and that’s complicated, dense and important fiction and nonfiction.

We must resist future efforts by our local, state and federal governments that want to censor what our kids read.

The next generation needs our help to regain the skills they have lost. Their professors are seeing it. How about the rest of us?

Yvette Walker is a columnist for The Kansas City (Mo.) Star.