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F eat ur es C R E D I T: S t e v e n M a y / A l a m y “I think it’s just so that we’re not leaving some poor, single-staffed library person to deal with any challenges that come in, that we give them all the tools to be robust in any answers,” she said. As well as surveying librarians, Index sent out FOI requests to a selection of schools. One Catholic school in Coventry confirmed that its headteacher complained to the local school library service about a handful of books which contained “inappropriate language and didn’t support the Catholic ethos of the school”. The four titles contained themes of crime and the supernatural. They were replaced with different books. Another – a comprehensive boys’ school in London – told Index that a pupil had requested the removal of Salman Rushdie’s books, but that his request was refused. The school library service in Milton Keynes works with primary schools. In response to an FOI request, it told Index that it had never had a book rejected by a school but had received negative feedback about a children’s picture book of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales by Marcia Williams, owing to an abundance of “naked bottoms” and other bawdy content. It added: “It is also worth noting that it tends to be the faith schools that do have higher standards, or are more censorious,” later adding that it avoided sending books about witches and wizards or with antifaith themes to Catholic schools. Several schools and school library services claimed they had not had bookchallenge experiences. Many others failed to respond to the FOI requests. Ofsted said it had found no evidence in inspection reports of censorship in school libraries since April 2021, although it also acknowledged that the automated search method meant this was not a guaranteed result. A spokesman said: “It is for schools to decide what they include in their own curriculum, within the requirements of the law and the Department for Education (DfE).” He added that a good curriculum must ensure “that pupils understand, appreciate and respect difference in the world and its people, as well as engage with views, beliefs and → INDEXONCENSORSHIP.ORG   19

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F eat ur es

C R E D I

T: S t e v e n

M a y /

A l a m y

“I think it’s just so that we’re not leaving some poor, single-staffed library person to deal with any challenges that come in, that we give them all the tools to be robust in any answers,” she said.

As well as surveying librarians, Index sent out FOI requests to a selection of schools. One Catholic school in Coventry confirmed that its headteacher complained to the local school library service about a handful of books which contained “inappropriate language and didn’t support the Catholic ethos of the school”.

The four titles contained themes of crime and the supernatural. They were replaced with different books.

Another – a comprehensive boys’ school in London – told Index that a pupil had requested the removal of Salman Rushdie’s books, but that his request was refused.

The school library service in Milton Keynes works with primary schools. In response to an FOI request, it told Index that it had never had a book rejected by a school but had received negative feedback about a children’s picture book of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales by Marcia Williams, owing to an abundance of “naked bottoms” and other bawdy content. It added: “It is also worth noting that it tends to be the faith schools that do have higher standards, or are more censorious,” later adding that it avoided sending books about witches and wizards or with antifaith themes to Catholic schools.

Several schools and school library services claimed they had not had bookchallenge experiences. Many others failed to respond to the FOI requests.

Ofsted said it had found no evidence in inspection reports of censorship in school libraries since April 2021, although it also acknowledged that the automated search method meant this was not a guaranteed result.

A spokesman said: “It is for schools to decide what they include in their own curriculum, within the requirements of the law and the Department for Education (DfE).” He added that a good curriculum must ensure “that pupils understand, appreciate and respect difference in the world and its people, as well as engage with views, beliefs and

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INDEXONCENSORSHIP.ORG   19

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