Brevard school board revisits book review policy: Should anonymous complaints be accepted?

The new superintendent of Brevard Public Schools, Mark Rendell, had been sworn in for all of about two and a half hours when an old topic was revisited — the book review policy.

Just days before Brevard Public Schools’ book review committee was scheduled to meet for the first time, the idea of revising the policy was floated at the end of Tuesday’s board meeting.

The move comes after a list of nearly 300 challenged books was submitted anonymously to the district earlier this month. Board members said that was an unintentional consequence of the revised policy and called the list revenge.

“We know it was out of spite and revenge,” said board member Gene Trent, adding that he suspected the anonymous person who submitted the list of 296 books was someone who complained that media specialists did not have a vote with the new book review policy.

What we know about BPS book committee: What's appropriate for kids to read in books? New Brevard schools review committee forms

Bible, related texts challenged at BPS: Ban the Bible? Someone sent the book to Brevard schools for review

That new policy was approved at a March 28 meeting after board members elected in November 2022 decided to revise it at a December meeting, saying they wanted those on the book review committee to reflect the views of current board members.

The new policy created a five-member committee, with one appointed member per board member. There are no designated media specialists on the committee with a vote on what books can or cannot stay in circulation, and though a board member was free to choose a media specialist as his or her appointee, no one did.

The new policy also allows people to anonymously submit books for review — something board member Katye Campbell said was put in place because people didn’t want to write their addresses down. However, at Tuesday’s meeting, Campbell offered the idea of revising that aspect of the policy, saying it was having unintentional consequences.

“This is ridiculous and it’s wasting time for, to me, what seems spiteful,” she said.

The specific books on the list made her question the sincerity of the request, she said, with the list containing multiple translations of the Bible, books about the Bible and unrelated titles including “Johann Gutenberg and the Printing Press” and the joke book “All-Time Awesome Collection of Good Clean Jokes for Kids.”

“It was clear that the person didn’t even really, in my opinion, vet their own list,” she said.

Her suggestion was to revisit the policy to stop the “logjam” caused by anonymous requests.

“If we have any movement on the board to go back into rulemaking on this, we don’t stop the process — we keep going with the committee as it is, but (we) redo the policy in the meantime,” she said, adding that they will likely have to look at it anyway due to changes to state law.

Trent agreed, though he had concerns about not keeping people anonymous, saying he would support keeping that aspect of the policy.

“People’s careers, their families, have been threatened,” he said.

He added that he believed the anonymous list was sent by those who opposed the new policy, specifically the change that removed media specialists from voting, and said that media specialists will have to review these books during the informal review process before they go through the formal review process.

“Just my suspicion, it’s the same people that got up here for months talking about how we don’t have respect for media specialists, putting them off the (formal review) committee,” he said. “They are not going to win on this.”

Megan Wright and Jennifer Jenkins did not comment on the matter.

Rendell, whose official start date is not until June 1, did not speak on any matters at the meeting outside of his swearing-in.

"I care about this community, I care about the kids and the families in this community, so hopefully, in this role, I can make a difference," he said after being sworn in by Pastor Ron Meyr of Faith Viera Lutheran Church, with Rendell's wife, Heidi, at his side.

"I can't do it by myself. It's all going to be about teamwork."

Board Chair Matt Susin said the long list would go through the informal review process as laid out by the policy, but agreed with Campbell and Trent's sentiments.

"I do think it's pretty ridiculous that they made that request," he said. "They're making a big argument over this process and everything like that, and then they just go throw all that down."

No decisions were made regarding the policy.

Finch Walker is the education reporter at FLORIDA TODAY. Contact Walker at 321-290-4744 or fwalker@floridatoday.com. Twitter: @_finchwalker.

This article originally appeared on Florida Today: Brevard school board may revise challenged book policy yet again