CHICAGO TRIBUNE
Graydon Megan | April 17, 2013

Rejecting claims of a direct link between violent video games and violent behavior, Elmhurst Public Library board members Tuesday turned down requests by a small group of residents to change the library’s selection policy for violent video games.

“There’s no evidence I can see between these games and violent behavior,” said library director Mary Beth Campe.

Campe and board members made clear they see the inclusion of the materials in the library’s collection as an issue of First Amendment freedom of expression.

Schuetz, who spoke for the citizen group Tuesday, insisted the group is not asking for a ban on the games.

“We are asking the library to implement improved selection criteria and procedures,” Schuetz told board members.

Read on…

Related NDLA IF postings

CBLDF (Comic Book Legal Defense Fund)
Carol Tilley | April 19, 2013

Last month a Chicago Public Schools’ (CPS) directive seemed to require that copies of Marjane Satrapi’s memoir Persepolis be removed from classrooms and school libraries. A later memo clarified that the book was allowed to remain in libraries; the concerns about its content — specifically, visual depictions of acts of torture — were limited to its instructional use in seventh grade.

How CPS handled this particular situation is beyond the scope of my comments. Similarly I don’t intend to address whether seventh graders are equipped to handle a couple of pages of visually stylized barbarism. Instead, as a librarian, I want to touch on the issue of what belongs in a school library’s collection.

Read on…

Original NDLA IF post

Related article:
“Sex, violence, and Radical Islam: Why ‘Persepolis’ Belongs in Public Schools“
(The Atlantic | Noah Berlatsky | March 19, 2013)

5 NBC CHICAGO
March 15, 2013

Some Chicago Public Schools students are up in arms over a perceived book ban, but officials are calling it a misunderstanding.

The book in question is Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi, a graphic memoir of a girl growing up in Iran during the Islamic Revolution that features descriptions and images of torture.

Some CPS schools starting receiving directives this week to remove the book from the library, prompting some students and teachers to plan a free speech demonstration at Lane Tech High School Friday.

“We believe that removing books from kids is chilling and an act of censorship,” said Barbara Jones, director of the Office for Intellectual Freedom. “It reflects a totalitarian society that this book is all about … the Iranian revolution.”

But CPS Superintendent Barbara Byrd-Bennett issued a letter Friday denying that the book was not being banned, but was being removed from the curriculum for seventh graders where it was deemed not appropriate.

Bennett says the book is only appropriate for junior and senior students and those in Advance Placement classes, and a determination is being made whether it can be added to the curriculum for eighth through tenth grades.

However, Jones says CPS officials have not explained why the book initially being removed from high schools when it’s an issue for seventh graders.

UPDATES:
“Persepolis removed from Chicago Public Schools for “graphic illustrations and language”; OIF & FTRF respond”
(ALA OIF & FTRF BLOG | March 15, 2013)

“Chicago School District Under Fire for Restricting Access to ‘Persepolis’”
(Publishers Weekly | Claire Kirch | March 15, 2013)

“CPS students were driving force in protest against book ban”
(Chicago Tribune | Lolly Bowean & Kim Geiger | March 15, 2013)

“Lane Tech Students Hold Morning Sit-In To Protest Persepolis Book Ban”
(Progress Illinois | Ellyn Fortino | March 18, 2013)

“Kids Right to Read Project Responds to Chicago Public Schools Demand to Remove ‘Persepolis’”
(National Coalition Against Censorship | March 18, 2013)

Follow @oif and @ ftrf on Twitter for more updates on this continuing situation.

PATERSONPRESS.COM
Joe Malinconico | January 27, 2013

City youths looking to hone their “Call of Duty” video game skill can’t do it at Paterson’s libraries anymore.

The library’s board this month voted to ban the playing of direct-shooter video games on the computers at its facilities.

“We felt we should do everything we can to prevent our kids from learning these behaviors,’’ said library board member Irene Sterling.

“We feel a responsibility to the kids of the community,’’ said the library’s director, Cindy Czesak.

Read on…

Related article:
“Letter: Library should reconsider loaning violent video games“
(MySuburbanLife.com | January 21, 2013)