I thought staff may be interested in my response to a patron requesting that we relocate a particular book. There may be cases where relocation is appropriate (and I believe we’ve done it once or twice while I’ve been at JPL) but, in my opinion, this is not one of them.
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Hello!
My nine year old recently checked out “Breakaways” by Cathy Johnson in the children’s section. I was surprised to see it had a picture of two boys kissing in bed. I want to state I would also think it is not age appropriate for my nine year old to read a book with a boy and girl kissing in bed. I do not know what you think of this, but as a parent who visits this library often, I would like to suggest this book would be better suited in the young adult section.
Thank you
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Thank you for your message about The Breakaways. I looked through the book and can appreciate that some of the content is not what you’d like your child reading. Some parents, however, may not find it objectionable for their child. We feel that these kinds of decisions are best left with parents and not librarians.
We are cautious about moving books into sections of the library meant for books intended for an older audience (the recommended age-range for The Breakaways is 8 to 11 years). Doing such would make them less accessible to their intended audience and would also put us in the position of “deciding” that, in this case, a book written for 8 to 11 year olds should be less accessible than other books written for that audience.
I have decided that The Breakaways should stay in the library’s Juvenile Graphic Novels collection. I’ve attached the library’s Collection Development Policy which includes details about how we select library materials as well as a form you can complete to have the library board reconsider my decision.
Let me know if you have any questions or additional comments.