BERKELEY COUNTY, S.C. – Berkeley County school board members voted 6-2 Monday at their regular meeting to approve an amended resolution suspending board policy KNBA and administrative rule KNBA-R in light of proposed State Board of Education regulations.
The resolution provides for individual parents to decide if their child will have school access to books that have been selected for review due to concerns about age-inappropriate sexual and/or obscene content.
Board Chair Mac McQuillin, who proposed the amended language said that this action affirms the decision-making authority of every parent.
“It is best to have parents examine the content of materials for themselves and be responsible for determining whether their children are mature enough to consume these materials,” McQuillin shared during the meeting. “Ultimately, I trust parents to make the right decisions for their children on an individual basis. A parent knows better than school board members about what is appropriate for that parent’s particular child, and I am confident that those decisions will be better than the decisions that we could make…”
Previously, a parent of a student in the District requested reconsideration of approximately 93 instructional materials housed in library media centers at District schools based on their inclusion of sexually inappropriate content. Since October, those instructional materials have been under review pursuant to, now suspended, policies KNBA and KNBA-R.
Since the filing of the requests for reconsideration, the South Carolina State Board of Education (the “State Board”) proposed regulations to establish standards for determining if instructional materials available to students in public schools are:
- age and developmentally appropriate; and
- educationally suitable; and
- aligned with the purpose of South Carolina’s instructional program
District legal counsel, Brandon Gaskins, presented the resolution to the Board on behalf of the administration and provided an update concerning the published proposed regulations of the State Board. If approved, the proposed state regulations would effectively “pre-empt and supersede” Berkeley County policies regarding the same.
“The proposed regulations establish consistent definitions for determining whether instructional materials are age and developmentally appropriate, and create a uniform process for local school boards to review complaints about instructional materials,” Mr. Gaskins explained. “Both are inconsistent with our policy KNBA.”
Under the approved resolution, Board Policies KNBA and KNBA-R and all pending reviews of instructional materials thereunder is suspended until the earlier of the effective date of the proposed regulations of the State Board or June 30, 2024.
“Parents know their kids better than we ever will,” McQuillin said. ”And we need to empower them to be aware of and involved in their kids’ education.”
The approved resolution provides for the Superintendent, and/or his designee, to review the 93 books under the proposed state regulations. If a book is found to be non-compliant with the proposed state regulation, schools will be informed that written parent consent is required before a student can check out that particular book.
*Source: Berkeley County School Board News Release
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