A Conroe ISD teacher, tired of seeing so many books taken off the shelves in the district, decided to do something about it and organized an appeal writing campaign.

The teacher, who did not want to be identified so we'll call them Alex, decided to organize a complaint writing campaign after trustees approved a way to file complaints about the newly banned books in an attempt to return them to the district.

Alex said prior to the board's decision, those who were against titles up for review or recent removals had no way of fighting to keep these books on the shelves.

"At first, there was no conversation. Now, the conversation includes more than the people sending lists of books to the district," Alex said. "In a conversation, anything can happen. But in silence, nothing can happen. Silence is not a defense.”

Alex knew they had to take advantage of the opportunity while they had it. With the assistance of a handful of people from a community-led Facebook group, Alex sent appeals for 27 of the 44 individual titles taken from classroom collections and sent back to the district. Most of these texts had been removed as a result of informal reviews.

Alex received one hearing to make their case as to why all 14 books they wrote appeals about should stay on district shelves. The others who wrote appeals were also given a singular hearing for the titles they appealed as well. The same administrator will be hearing all of the complaints.

“At this point, we all are guaranteed another appeal – not that the board will hear it – but that our justification could be heard twice,” Alex said. “That has to be hopeful because before, we had no voice. This is a voice.”

Those who sent these challenges to book removal requests were initially somewhat hesitant to do so. As a CISD educator for more than 20 years, Alex said their “sympathies lie with the district.” Those sending these appeals were not trying to make more work for the administrators or other employees.

“This was really the only option we had,” Alex added. “We’ve got to put the kids first. We really have to say this is for freedom of thought and what’s best for students and teaching and thinking.”

Although the basic procedures for formal and informal review are laid out online in the district’s policies covering library and instructional materials, details of the informal committees' makeup and the basis for their decisions to retain, remove or restrict a book remain murky.

A panel of librarians, usually seven or eight, meets in informal review committee meetings for library materials. They are responsible for reviewing library books that community members, parents, outside individuals or groups want off district shelves.

According to reports from multiple librarians, these committee meetings occur monthly. Ahead of at least some of the meetings, librarians had not read the books and were not made aware of what titles they would be discussing. Instead, they read reviews by professional literary publications and one “nonprofessional” website — BookLooks, whose reviews are focused on whether or not a title contains objectionable content such as profanity, nudity or sexual content.

The website offers no information regarding who determines the ratings of titles or whether those rating the books have the qualifications or education to do so. It is described as an objective source for deciding whether texts are age-appropriate; however, the operators of the book-rating platform, Emily and Jonathan Maikisch, have ties to the right-wing group Moms For Liberty.

Moms for Liberty is a national organization with local chapters that promotes book bans in school libraries, endorses school board candidates who reflect the group's conservative values and advocates against content that features the LGBTQ community or references critical race theory in schools.

Emily used to be a member of the extremist group, but according to reports, she left the group in 2022 to start BookLooks. Despite claiming Moms for Liberty has no affiliation with the book-rating website, the rating system is nearly the same as the one used by Moms for Liberty chapters. Moms For Liberty also features a link to BookLooks as a book resource for parents in the group.

These reviews are used to decide whether or not titles should stay. One librarian said they usually discuss the appropriateness of what could be considered sexual content in high school titles and whether or not social issues are presented in an age-appropriate way in elementary and middle school titles.

They may also discuss older books that are not checked out often and decide to remove these titles. Some librarians disagree with this, arguing that weeding—the routine process of removing outdated, low-circulation titles—is needed, not outright removal of these titles.

Several librarians have said they sometimes feel they should refrain from objecting to removing a book despite wanting to. They added that if they did choose to speak out in opposition, they think that their defense of arguing why a book should stay would likely not be listened to.

One librarian said the district is trying to make the best of a bad situation and that the issue was a community-level issue – a few individuals putting pressure on the district to review books they think should be removed from the district.

“What maybe started as a good purpose kind of morphed into something that isn’t,” Alex said. “It’s [informal review process] just become a rubber stamp.”

According to district records, when a committee has to read the books, titles under review are kept 77 percent of the time and removed 23 percent of the time. When a committee does not have to read the books, those reviewed are kept 21 percent and removed 79 percent of the time.

A source with ties to the district, who requested anonymity, said Dr. Hedith Sauceda-Upshaw, the assistant superintendent for Teaching & Learning, oversees reviewing instructional materials. However, there is no indication of who makes up these committees or if the titles used in the curriculum or that are a part of classroom collections are reviewed the same way as library books are.

Alex said they felt compelled to file complaints due to the lack of discussion, to their knowledge, of artistic or literary merit during these determinations. They added that they were also against removing titles that featured what could be considered controversial subjects in age-appropriate ways, as they argued those books hold value when made available to students.

Alex added that teachers always find alternative titles if parents complain or question what their children are reading. Instructors have worked to ensure that what students read is educationally suitable for them.

“Maybe education actually works to protect students as well. The group of parents out there banning books just wants to protect kids — and maybe there is something nefarious — but they really are pushing hard to protect kids,” Alex said. "Their belief is that the way you protect kids is to wrap them up and keep them from the real world for as long as possible, and it’s just not my opinion of protecting kids.

“I think the world is going to be out there, and the kids are going to have to interact with it," Alex added. What are the warning signs? What to look out for? What can you learn from a villain in a book so you don’t have to learn it in real life?”

Alex wants to give the committees pause to review the book in its totality and not “a page here or a page there.” Actually, Alex said, they would like to see the district to choose to do away with informal reviews altogether.

The teacher said they did not want to leave the recently removed library books without appeals, but they need more people to help file the complaints, especially now that those who appealed received one hearing to try to make the case for multiple books.

The district source assisted Alex and the others with formatting and editing several complaints forms. The source said because the complaint process was not designed to reverse book removals or oppose pending book reviews, the board will have to work out many additional unknowns as it unfolds.

“It’s definitely interesting how difficult it is to put a book back after it is removed,” the source added. “Nobody thought about what would happen if a book got removed, and it shouldn’t have.”

Alex and the others who filed complaints have received their scheduled hearing date but have not been told what to expect during the hearing. Alex said the matter may not be resolved until the summer.

“The end goal is to return [these books] to the shelves,” Alex added. We have to do what we can. If each of us does something, we can get a lot done.”