In 47 Maine schools, the diversity of characters and experiences in books just got broader thanks to a Rockland organization’s campaign to distribute more inclusive books to school libraries.
Through the “Read the Rainbow” campaign, OUT Maine ― which works to support LGBTQ youth in Maine ― has purchased more than 900 books with LGBTQ themes for school libraries across the state and is currently working to fundraise to fulfill additional requests from schools. The campaign was started in response to recent efforts across the country and in Maine to remove certain books — often ones representing LGBTQ perspectives — from school libraries.
“There is just a lot of the pendulum swinging backwards in terms of acceptance, so it’s really easy to get discouraged. So what we really wanted to do was to give people a very concrete way to counter that, especially those of us who have found this book banning approach very disturbing in a country that values freedom of speech and really is founded on equality and equity for everyone,” OUT Maine Executive Director Jeanne Dooley said.
Since launching the campaign in October, OUT Maine has received requests for 149 book sets from 75 schools in nearly all Maine counties. With the donations they’ve received so far, the organization has been able to order enough books to fulfill 47 of those set requests, according to Dooley.
OUT Maine has curated book sets ― each with about 20 books ― for four different levels, kindergarten to second, third to fifth, sixth to eighth and ninth to 12th grade, that schools can request through the program.
The books represent an array of LGBTQ related themes that vary based on the grade level, with the sets for the younger grade levels “starting with kindness and respecting other people and experiencing people who are different than you,” Dooley said. “Then of course as they move onward into the upper grades, those people are dealing with more complex issues. So each of the book seats is really designed to recognize the different developmental phases that young people are in so they get a little bit more complex with each set of books.”
About 20 percent of students in Maine schools identify as LGBTQ or are questioning their sexual orientation and gender identity, according to the 2019 Maine Integrated Youth Health Survey.
While it varies from school to school, LGBTQ perspectives are underrepresented in the books available to students within school libraries, according to Dooley, who said it’s essential for all students to see themselves in the content and curriculum they are experiencing.
“When you don’t see yourself reflected around you in your books, in the images that you see and the language that you see, that just makes you feel more and more different and when you’re a young person it’s hard to be different,” Dooley said.
Greely High School Librarian Heather Perkinson, president-elect of the Maine Association of School Libraries, said her students frequently request books with LGBTQ themes, especially ones that depict a range of experiences. Instead of just books that deal with the adversity or difficulties that individuals with diverse backgrounds or identities face, Perkinson said students increasingly want books with diverse characters having normal experiences that offer exciting plots.
Having more inclusive books in school libraries isn’t just a benefit for students who see themselves reflected in those books, but for the student population as a whole, Dooley and Perkinson said.
“It’s important not just for the kids who share the experiences of the diverse characters, it’s important for all of our kids to develop empathy by learning about different perspectives,” Perkinson said. “That’s what reading offers. It allows you to experience other perspectives.”
Dooley said the efforts across the country, and even some challenges here in Maine, to get books ― often ones with LGBTQ themes ― banned from school libraries is damaging, divisive and denigrating to the students who see themselves represented in these books.
But the response that OUT Maine has gotten from donors who are helping buy the books, and the number of schools requesting them, gives Dooley hope.
“We weren’t sure how this was going to play [out], we weren’t sure about whether people would resonate with donating the money, we weren’t sure with whether the libraries would want it, and I am truly encouraged by the response, it’s really awesome,” Dooley said. “There are so many people in our communities in Maine who want to do the right thing and support these young people.”