Hanover County bans books in schools
Free Press staff report | 11/22/2023, 6 p.m.
“The Handmaid’s Tale,” “Wicked” and “The Perks of Being a Wallflower” are among the 75 books Hanover County school administrators directed teachers and librarians to remove from their schools last Friday, according to various news reports.
Members of the Hanover County School Board voted to give themselves the authority to remove books from school libraries without the input of parents or teachers in June, with 19 books immediately removed following that decision.
In a statement to the news media, Hanover School District Spokesman Chris Whitley said the books were chosen for removal after a panel of principals, teachers and librarians ruled that they met “the School Board’s criteria for being sexually explicit.”
The removal process is expected to be finished by Friday, Dec. 22, and adds to a nationwide conservative effort to remove certain titles from schools and public libraries across the county.
Book-banning efforts have doubled in Virginia since 2022, with more than 300 titles challenged in the first eight months of the year over their contents.
