Dec. 9, 2025
By Leah Campos
Staff Writer
This article appears in the December issue of The Lighthouse under the headline “NJ pushes back on book bans with Freedom to Read Act.”
Last year, there were 821 attempts nationwide to censor library materials and services, with 2,452 unique titles being challenged, according to the American Library Association.
The Freedom to Read Act, a new law taking effect in New Jersey today, aims to counter such censorship efforts. It prevents public and school libraries from banning books based on the viewpoints, ideas or concepts expressed in the materials or by their authors. It also protects librarians from lawsuits for following these standards.
According to the New Jersey Department of Education, the law requires school boards to “provide standards for curation of library materials, establish criteria for the removal of existing library material and provide protection against attempts to censor school library material.” However, parents or guardians with students enrolled in the school district, the students themselves and teaching staff members could still request that a book be removed.
Media specialist Ms. Murru, who co-advises the Book Club with English teacher Ms. Cappiello, said she supports the Freedom to Read Act and the protections it offers librarians.
“I just don’t think that restricting access to different texts is always the best thing to do,” Murru said. “Reading is how people and kids, especially, open up to different worlds or different experiences, and a lot of the time, that’s their first introduction to it…. It can be damaging in certain aspects if you’re limiting them.”
Murru said librarians and media specialists should be trusted to make informed decisions about which books belong in school libraries.
INFOGRAPHIC BY MARIAH ALLEN Data in this infographic was collected in 2024 and made available by the American Library Association. The reference to pressure groups refers to administrators, Board of Education members and elected officials.
“We take collection development classes where we read and evaluate a number of texts for young readers,” Murru said.
She said she supports the Freedom to Read Act because it gives schools clearer procedures for selecting materials and limits censorship efforts.
“The Freedom to Read Act [will] push for policies to go into place at the Board of Education level, which would detail selection criteria for texts in school libraries,” Murru said.
Opponents of the Freedom to Read Act argue that the new law wrongly provides legal immunity to librarians. They believe that some language and topics are unsuitable for children, and that it should be up to parents to decide what their children read.
“I don’t want adults promoting explicit stuff to children,” said Republican New Jersey state Sen. Michael Testa when the bill was debated on the Senate floor last year. “How exactly does a person distribute obscene materials to a child in good faith?”
“The Freedom to Read Act [will] push for policies to go into place at the Board of Education level, which would detail selection criteria for texts in school libraries.”
Despite these concerns, the Bill passed in the Senate with a vote of 24-15, with one abstention, and passed in the Assembly by a vote of 53-20, with six “no” votes and one abstention.
Like Murru, junior Lila Pearce-Jaryno, an avid reader and vice president of the Book Club, said she supports the Freedom to Read Act.
“Books have impacted my way of thinking, and those were all school-mandated books, so I think it would affect my education if hundreds of book titles were banned,” Pearce-Jaryno said.
She said books that some people consider controversial still convey meaningful themes.
“‘Lolita’ by Vladimir Nabokov was undoubtedly inappropriate, but that’s kind of the point. ‘Huckleberry Finn’ [by Mark Twain] is undoubtedly racist, but that’s kind of the point,” Pearce-Jaryno said.
According to PEN America, a nonprofit organization that promotes cooperation among writers, Florida, Texas and Tennessee were the leaders in book banning last school year, with Florida banning 2,304 books, followed by Texas with 1,781 and Tennessee with 1,622.
History teacher Mr. Duus, who teaches Advanced Placement U.S. Government and Politics, said people should be more concerned with the flow of online information than with the content in books.
“First and foremost, students need to have information literacy. They need to be able to understand the reliability and perspective of a text that they’re assessing,” Duus said. “I’m not so sure how much keeping books out of libraries is really going to control the flow of information.”
Duus said book banning has repercussions.
“Students being prevented from learning and exploring content that could help them gain a greater appreciation of the world does them a disservice,” said Duus.
Click here to see the American Library Association’s list of five most challenged books in 2024.
