Dorchester 2 schools face the biggest book purge yet. The school board should fight back.

SUMMERVILLE – In the largest recent attack on the freedom to read in South Carolina schools, a book-banning activist has demanded that 160 books be removed from Dorchester School District 2. The ACLU of South Carolina urges the Dorchester 2 school board to stick to its existing policies and reject this book-banning attempt at its next meeting February 12.

In December, one person submitted a spreadsheet of 572 titles that she wanted the district to purge from its classrooms and libraries. According to district records, only 160 of those titles were present in the schools at the time of the request. The challenged books include contemporary classics like Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner, 20th-century masterpieces like Toni Morrison’s Beloved, and award-winning young adult novels like I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter by Erika L. Sánchez.

This total exceeds the scale of mass book ban attempts in Berkeley County Schools (where 93 titles were challenged in 2023) and Beaufort County Schools (where 97 books were pulled from shelves in 2022 and all but 5 were ultimately returned after a lengthy review).

“School board members should take courage in the fact that copy-and-paste book ban requests like this one are both immensely unpopular and clearly prohibited under existing district policy. We encourage the district to throw this book challenge in the recycling bin and continue the vital work of education,” said ACLU-SC Executive Director Jace Woodrum.

The ACLU-SC makes the following recommendations:

First, the school board should be aware of the coordinated nationwide effort to harass educators and purge books, particularly those by LGBTQ+ and Black authors. The ACLU of South Carolina has tracked hundreds of book challenges in 12 counties since 2020 and is currently suing the Pickens County School District over its politically and racially motivated ban on the book Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You.

Second, we believe the board should adhere to its own policies regarding book challenges, which are an effective safeguard against mass book bans. Board Policy IJL (Library Materials Selection and Adoption) clearly states that book challenges may only come from a parent or guardian of a student in the district. This person must complete a challenge form for one book at a time and submit it to their child’s school principal. An in-school materials review committee will then review a book within 30 days, at which point the parent or guardian may appeal to a District Citizen’s Review Committee.

What we have seen instead is that one person with no children in the district submitted an entire spreadsheet of books that she wanted to ban. Instead of reading the books and filling out forms demonstrating her comprehension of the material, she copied and pasted ratings from the book-banning clearinghouse websites BookLooks and Rated Books.

Third, the board should consider the damage done to students' learning environment by overriding the judgment of school librarians and teachers. The book banners want the district to remove books that were already selected and approved by educators. Overriding their judgment without a public due process is a disservice both to students' education and an insult to the professional expertise of educators. At a time when schools are already struggling with a staffing crisis, Dorchester 2 can scarcely afford to chase its employees away.

The following is a list of titles currently held in Dorchester 2 schools that book-banning activists are seeking to remove. The full PDF showing all 600+ challenged books, including ones that were not on school shelves, is available at the bottom of the page or via the Dorchester 2 school board minutes.

A Child Called “It” by David Pelzer

A Clash of Kings by George R.R. Martin

A Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin

A Game of Thrones: The Graphic Novel, Volume 1 by George R.R. Martin

A Kingdom of Flesh and Fire by Jennifer L. Armentrout

A Lesson in Vengeance by Victoria Lee

A Stolen Life by Jaycee Duggard

All the Things We Do in the Dark by Saundra Mitchell

Allegedly by Tiffany Jackson

Almost Perfect by Brian Katcher

America by E.R. Frank

Ask the Passengers by A.S. King

Assassination Classroom, Vols. 1-8 and 11 by Yusei Matsui

Beloved by Toni Morrison

Blankets by Craig Thompson

Boy Girl Boy by Ron Koertge

Boy Toy by Barry Lyga

Brave New World: A Graphic Novel by Aldous Huxley, adapted by Fred Fordham

Bumped by Megan McCafferty

Burned by Ellen Hopkins

Cheer Up: Love and Pompoms by Crystal Frasier

Chosen by P.C. Cast and Kristin Cast

Clockwork Princess by Cassandra Clare

Collected Poems, 1947-1980 by Allen Ginsberg

Concrete Rose by Angie Thomas

Cool for the Summer by Dahlia Adler

Crank by Ellen Hopkins

Damsel by Elana Arnold

Daughters Unto Devils by Amy Lukavics

Dime by E.R. Frank

Dreaming in Cuban by Cristina Garcia

Eleanor and Park by Rainbow Rowell

Emergency Contact by Mary H.K. Choi

Empire of Storms by Sarah J. Maas

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer

Fade by Lisa McMann

Fallout by Ellen Hopkins

Felix Ever After by Kacen Callender

Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk

Flamer by Mike Curato

Follow Your Arrow by Jessica Verdi

Forever for a Year by B.T. Gottfred

Forever… by Judy Blume

From Blood and Ash by Jennifer L. Armentrout

Gabi, A Girl in Pieces by Isabel Quintero

Glass by Ellen Hopkins

Go Ask Alice by Anonymous

Grit by Gillian French

Grl2Grl by Julie Anne Peters

Grown by Tiffany D. Jackson

Guyaholic by Carolyn Mackler

Heroine by Mindy McGinnis

Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi

I Am Margaret Moore by Hannah Capin

I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter by Erika L. Sánchez

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou

I Never by Laura Hopper

I’ll Give You the Sun by Jandy Nelson

Identical by Ellen Hopkins

Impulse by Ellen Hopkins

Infandous by Elana K. Arnold

It’s Perfectly Normal, Fifth Edition by Robie H. Harris and Michael Emberley

Juliet Takes a Breath by Gabby Rivera

Juliet Takes a Breath: A Graphic Novel by Gabby Rivera

Kingdom of Ash by Sarah J. Maas

L8r, G8r by Lauren Myracle

Last Night at the Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo

Lawn Boy by Jonathan Evison

Let’s Talk About Race by Julius Lester

LGBTQ+ Athletes Claim the Field: Striving for Equality by Kirstin Cronn-Mills

Life is Funny by E.R. Frank

Like a Love Story by Abdi Nazemian

Little and Lion by Brandy Colbert

Looking for Alaska by John Green

Love Lies Beneath by Ellen Hopkins

Lullaby by Chuck Palahniuk

Man O’ War by Cory McCarthy

Me and Earl and the Dying Girl by Jesse Andrews

Monday’s Not Coming by Tiffany D. Jackson

More Happy Than Not by Adam Silvera

Native Son by Richard Wright

Nick and Charlie by Alice Oseman

Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Picoult

Not My Problem by Ciara Smyth

Out of Darkness by Ashley Hope Perez

People Kill People by Ellen Hopkins

Perfect by Ellen Hopkins

Push by Sapphire

Queen of Shadows by Sarah J. Maas

Ramona Blue by Julie Murphy

Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

Red at the Bone by Jacqueline Woodson

Red Hood by Elana Arnold

Relish: My Life in the Kitchen by Lucy Knisley

Rumble by Ellen Hopkins

Shine by Lauren Myracle

Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater

Shout by Laurie Halse Anderson

Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut

Slaughterhouse-Five: A Graphic Novel by Kurt Vonnegut with Ryan North and Albert Monteys

Smoke by Ellen Hopkins

Sold by Patricia McCormick

Someone I Used to Know by Patty Blount

Speak: The Graphic Novel by Laurie Halse Anderson

Spinning by Tillie Walden

Storm and Fury: Harbinger, Book 1 by Jennifer L. Armentrout

SuperMutant Magic Academy by Jillian Tamaki

Tangled Webs by Lee Bross

The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein

The Black Flamingo by Dean Atta

The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison

The Body: A Guide for Occupants by Bill Bryson

The Book of Pride: LGBTQ Heroes by Mason Funk

The Carnival at Bray by Jessie Ann Foley

The Crown of Gilded Bones (Blood and Ash Series) by Jennifer L. Armentrout

The Duff: A Novel by Kody Keplinger

The Female of the Species by Mindy McGinnis

The Fixer by Bernard Malamud

The Freedom Writers Diary by The Freedom Writers

The Girl Who Fell from the Sky by Heidi W. Durrow

The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood

The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas

The Haters by Jesse Andrews

The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini

The Kite Runner: A Graphic Novel by Khaled Hosseini with Fabio Celoni and Mirka Andolfo

The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold (this book is listed twice)

The Midnight Lie by Marie Rutkoski

The Opposite of Innocent by Sonya Sones

The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky

The Poet X by Elizabeth Acevedo

The Truth About Alice by Jennifer Mathieu

The Upside of Unrequited by Becky Albertalli

The War of Two Queens (Blood and Ash Series) by Jennifer L. Armentrout

The You I’ve Never Known by Ellen Hopkins

Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher

This One Summer by Mariko Tamaki

Tilt by Ellen Hopkins

Tower of Dawn by Sarah J. Maas

Traffick by Ellen Hopkins

Tricks by Ellen Hopkins

TTYL by Lauren Myracle

Unravel Me by Tahereh Mafi

Vampire Academy (Book 1) by Richelle Mead

Vanilla by Billy Merrell

Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen

We Are the Ants by Shaun David Hutchison

What Girls Are Made Of by Elana K. Arnold

Where I End and You Begin by Preston Norton

Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens

Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West by Gregory Maguire

Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson

Yolk by Mary H.K. Choi