Iowa School District Uses AI to Ban Books
19 books have been pulled from Mason City, Iowa, school shelves after the school board used artificial intelligence to find books that violate Iowa’s Senate File 496.
The legislation “[prohibits] instruction related to gender identity and sexual orientation in school districts, charter schools, and innovation zone schools in kindergarten through grade six.”
The Mason City School Board turned to AI because “Our classroom and school libraries have vast collections, consisting of texts purchased, donated, and found. It is simply not feasible to read every book and filter for these new requirements. Therefore, we are using what we believe is a defensible process to identify books that should be removed from collections at the start of the 23-24 school year. After this, we will continue to rely on our long-established process that allows parents to have books reconsidered. We are confident this process will ensure the spirit of the law is enacted here in Mason City; parents will always have a voice in their students’ education,” according to Assistant Superintendent of Curriculum and Instruction Bridgette Exman.
According to the district, a list of commonly challenged books were “filtered for challenges related to sexual content.” Those books were then scanned by AI software for sex acts and 19 books were identified for removal.
The books removed from shelves, as reported by the Mason City Globe Gazette, are:
- Killing Mr. Griffin by Lois Duncan
- Sold by Patricia McCormick
- A Court of Mist and Fury (series) by Sarah J. Maas
- Monday’s Not Coming by Tiffany D. Jackson
- Tricks by Ellen Hopkins
- Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Picoult
- The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
- Beloved by Toni Morrison
- Looking for Alaska by John Green
- The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
- Crank by Ellen Hopkins
- Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher
- The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie
- An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser
- The Color Purple by Alice Walker
- Feed by M.T. Anderson
- Friday Night Lights by Buzz Bissinger
- Gossip Girl by Cecily von Ziegesar
- I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
Discussion Questions
- Should parents or other adults be able to ban books from schools and libraries? Why or why not?
- Should artificial intelligence be used to determine which books are appropriate for school shelves? Explain your answer.
- Have you read any of the banned books above? Do you think the books were age-appropriate? Should other kids be able to read the books? Explain your answer(s).
Sources
Althea Legaspi, “Iowa School District Bans Books by Toni Morrison, Margaret Atwood After AI Review for ‘Depictions of a Sex Act’,” rollingstone.com, Aug. 14, 2023
Alexander Schmidt, “19 Books Pulled from Mason City School Libraries,” thegazette.com, Aug. 11, 2023
