Appeals filed on 9 books to be returned to Beaufort County schools. Board has final say
The Beaufort County Board of Education will have the final say on whether nine of the 97 books removed from Beaufort County will stay on library shelves.
This is the second round of review committee decisions the school board will reevaluate, having voted to agree with the first six.
“It Ends with Us” won’t be reevaluated and will remain banned from Beaufort County schools for at least five years.
Over the weekend, original complainant Ivie Szalai appealed review committees’ decisions to return nine books to school libraries in some capacity. She didn’t include “It Ends with Us,” which a committee decided to ban from all schools.
Original complainant, Mike Covert submitted an appeal to seven of the nine books set to return to schools. He didn’t appeal two books set to return to school libraries — “The Poet X” and “Thirteen Reasons Why.” He also didn’t appeal “It Ends With Us.”
As the original complainants, only Szalai and Covert can appeal decisions by the review committees, even on books that remain banned.
Covert said he didn’t appeal these books because he agreed with the review committee decisions, which were to limit “The Poet X” to grades 9-12, completely return “Thirteen Reasons Why” to circulation and ban “It Ends With Us.”
“I went back and looked at my notes from reading and I didn’t appeal them,” Covert said. “I changed my mind, I guess you could say.”
Szalai’s appeal was 92 pages long and Covert’s appeal was 72 pages, with much of the content being book excerpts. Covert cited court cases and South Carolina constitutional law. Szalai used information from BookLooks.org, the website she based her original complaint off of.
When asked why he believes review committees’ decision to ban a book is valid, but not their decision to return books to libraries, Covert said it wouldn’t make sense to think otherwise.
“That would be like a defense attorney trying to get his or her client out of trouble and the jury saying, ‘OK, you’re not guilty,’ but the attorney goes ‘Whoa, I’m not done talking about it yet,’” Covert said.
No date has been set for when the School Board will make a final decision, although it has to be within 15 days from the appeal.
