Sexually explicit library books in El Paso ISD school libraries

This blog will show just SOME OF the books that students have checked out of the school library. You will see screenshots from the El Paso ISD online library catalogs showing the school libraries and shelf locations for the books and scanned pages from most of them. If the screenshot says "there are no local copies of this title", that means that the school I searched under does not currently have the book on their shelves and other school library locations are listed if they have the book. You can also see if the book is checked out, lost (which means it was checked out at some point), or available on the shelf for kids to read in the library (if they are afraid their parents would find out that they checked it out).

I have included several scanned pages, and please know that this isn't all of the inappropriate material found in these books. These books obviously have no place in a public school library at any level.

All information regarding library books and their locations are current as of when I researched them for my blog.

NOTE: Books may have different covers in several different schools. Publishers will publish a book with a new updated cover so they can re-market the book, but the contents remain the same.

Warning! Scanned pages from these books may contain profanity, drug use, and visual or written descriptions of sex, homosexual sex, rape, abortion, child sexual abuse, pornography, etc.

Searching the entire district's online library catalogs under certain search terms yielded some shocking results. Searching under "child sexual abuse fiction" yielded 42 results.

Searching under "rape" yielded 378 titles.

Searching under "rape fiction" yielded 225 titles in their school libraries.

WHY???? Why are they putting books with these themes in their libraries for kids to read? We will look at scanned pages from JUST SOME of these books.

Keep in mind that the READER Act passed by the Texas Legislature made it ILLEGAL to have sexually explicit material in school libraries. The part of the law being challenged in court is the part that requires vendors to rate the books they sell to the districts. Also, in Texas, parents must give their consent to sexual education for their children.

Again, I can't say enough how graphic and disturbing these books are. Please proceed with caution when viewing the scanned pages. When you think about these schools putting this material in a place where kids can read it in the library or check it out and take it with them, it's just sick.

Notice how graphic the graphic novels are. Visuals are difficult to get out of one's head! Plus, they know kids like graphic novels because they are quicker and easier to read besides showing them visuals. These graphic novels in this blog post are just SOME of the very graphic graphic novels that are totally inappropriate for school libraries.

Juliet Takes a Breath is in El Paso ISD's school libraries in both English and Spanish, but I only have the Enlgish translation available as scanned pages.

Many of these books are available as eBooks students can download, as audiobooks they can download and listen to, etc.

This book perfectly illustrates what people who provide these books to kids want to do. They have an agenda. They want to give kids their own values. To do that, they must.....

Separate kids from their parents. Parents must be portrayed as old-fashioned, small-minded, etc.

2. Separate kids from their parents' values and religion.

3. Introduce kids to ideas their parents probably don't talk about.

5. Introduce kids to LGBTQ+ ideas and give them resources to explore these ideas on their own.

Notice how they don't use the words "men" or "women". It's "people".

These are just SOME of the sexually explicit books that El Paso ISD provides to students to read without their parents' knowledge or consent. Please keep in mind that kids don't have to check the books out. They can read them in the library if they are afraid to check them out. Also, it is the last three weeks of school, so the librarians are requiring students to turn in books for the end of the year procedures. You can ask your librarian how many times each book has been checked out before.

What can parents in El Paso ISD do?

· Tell the school that your child is not allowed to check out any books in the library or read any books in the library. You will provide books from home for silent reading time at school. Send an email to the principal, classroom teacher/s, and school librarian so you have it for documentation. Teachers sometimes have books like this in their classroom libraries, so you can include that your child cannot read books in the teacher's classroom library either.

· Email your concerns to the campus principal and district superintendent.

· Sign up to voice your concerns at the school board meeting.

· Share this information with other parents, church pastors, neighbors, etc.

· Form a group of concerned parents to work together to fill out library book reconsideration forms to get the books removed and to support each other when speaking at school board meetings. There is strength in numbers, and if only a few people show up to the meetings the school board will assume that most people don't care.

· Help get conservative candidates elected to the school board. Volunteer to help their campaigns by putting up yard signs, knocking on doors, helping with text messaging campaigns or voicemail campaigns, helping with clerical duties at their campaign headquarters, etc.

What else is going on in your child's school? Get informed and get involved!