Called2Action.org :: ActionGram :: Wake County School Book Issue

Friends,

Wake County public schools began the new semester on Friday and we need your help to hold them accountable on two fronts regarding the reading list issue. You may recall the battle fought back in April over the offensive content found in several of the required reading books (assigned WITHOUT parental consent). We should all be grateful to the families that were brave enough to bring this issue out into the light (see the ActionGrams here) . We are pleased with the progress that has been made so far, but we need to address these last two points:

We would like 20 more volunteers to serve on the Parents Council. One result of our efforts was the posting of the required reading lists on each school's website so that parents could check them out before books are ever given to the children. The Parents Council will be starting with Middle Schools (dividing up the list), and checking first for the availability of the reading lists, and then second, cross-referencing these lists with known lists from C2A-like groups that have already identified hundreds of questionable books (www.pabbis.org and www.classkc.org ). This is easy web-based volunteer work that will help protect our children from inappropriate materials. Please send a note to parents.council@called2action.org to join this important effort.

We need to flood the email & phones of Superintendent Del Burns, Chief Academic Officer Donna Hargens, and School Board Chair Patti Head with the following request: Teachers should be required to send home a parent permission letter if a book they have gotten approval to use contains "Potential Challenges" like "Objectionable language", "Sexuality", "Violence" or "Cultural/Ethnic" passages (from WCPSS form: Request For Prior Approval). This form is used by a teacher to make their case for the use of questionable reading materials. It is given to the Principal for approval. The current form only asks if the teacher is going to send a parent permission letter. Our request is simple: If the teacher indicates that there is objectionable content, then the WCPSS should require them to send a parental permission letter home! (we have attached the current form for your review)

Think of it this way: if a teacher were going to show an R-rated movie to their middle-school class, the LAW requires parental consent! One of the books we dealt with in April ( given to 12 year-olds!) actually was made into a movie. It's rating? R. This fail-safe measure only requires a minor change in the current form being used by our school system. Your message should read something like this: