Alberta’s school book removals spark backlash from educators, authors, students

Alberta's new order to purge school libraries of sexually explicit content is creating a wave of controversy.

Hundreds of books—including Canadian classics and internationally acclaimed novels—are set to be removed from Edmonton Public Schools this fall under a new provincial directive targeting “explicit sexual content.”

The list of more than 200 books, shared internally within Edmonton Public Schools and later confirmed by the board, includes titles by Margaret Atwood, Alice Munro, Aldous Huxley and other authors long considered staples in Canadian classrooms.

It comes after Education Minister Demetrios Nicolaides introduced a ministerial order in July requiring schools to eliminate sexually explicit materials from libraries by Oct. 1.

School divisions across the province are now scrambling to review thousands of titles.

Edmonton trustees voice opposition

Edmonton Public Schools confirmed staff reviewed the ministerial order and developed a list of books flagged for removal.

Board chair Julie Kusiek said the policy is forcing out valuable works.

“As a result of the ministerial order, several excellent books will be removed from our shelves this fall,” Kusiek said in a statement.

“Families and community members have raised numerous concerns to the Board of Trustees regarding the list of books that will be removed. … We encourage anyone who has a concern about a book being removed, or the criteria for book removal set out in the ministerial order, to contact the Minister of Education and Childcare directly.”

Kusiek said the board opposed the changes before the order was issued.

Calgary boards reviewing collections

Alberta’s two largest school divisions outside Edmonton are also responding.

The Calgary Board of Education said it is “in the process of reviewing more than half a million individual book titles and aligning policies to the new regulations.”

The Calgary Catholic School District confirmed it will comply with provincial rules.

“Our staff have just returned to work this week and will continue to work on this process, in alignment with provincial direction,” CCSD said in a statement, adding the division remains committed to “safe and caring learning environments.”

Premier defends policy’s intent

Premier Danielle Smith has defended the order, saying the intent is to keep graphic sexual imagery out of elementary school libraries.

“We’re trying to take graphic pornographic images out of elementary schools so that kids are not exposed to age-inappropriate material,” Smith said at a Friday news conference, where she displayed examples she described as inappropriate for young children.

Smith accused Edmonton Public Schools of “vicious compliance” with the order, suggesting the division overreached by listing books such as Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale and Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged.

“They’ve obviously put books on there that there was never any intention of having them target those books,” Smith said.

“If they need us to hold their hand through the process to identify what kind of materials are appropriate for senior high, junior high or elementary school students, we will more than happily work with them.”

The premier said while some novels may be suitable for older grades, “graphic images depicting the kind of acts that I just showed … are not appropriate for elementary school kids.”

Education minister seeks answers

Nicolaides also said the province will seek clarification from Edmonton trustees.

“Our primary interest with the ministerial order is to ensure that books containing graphic depictions of sexual acts are provided to children in an age-appropriate way,” Nicolaides said.

“I want to get a better understanding of how these books were selected and what mechanisms Edmonton Public Schools has used.”

He stressed the government did not provide the division with a list of titles and he committed to reviewing the decisions.

Authors respond with criticism

The inclusion of well-known novels has drawn sharp criticism from celebrated authors.

Atwood made the following post to social media on Friday:

“Hi kids … #HandmaidsTale (the book not the series!) has just been banned in #Edmonton,” Atwood said on X.

“Don’t read it, your hair will catch on fire! Get one now before they have public book burnings of it.”

Jodi Picoult, whose novels have also appeared on challenged-book lists in the U.S., said she was disheartened to see Canada following the trend.

Her book Nineteen Minutes was included on the list of books removed from Edmonton Public Schools’ libraries.

“It’s disheartening to see that the American epidemic of book banning has spread to Canada,” Picoult said in an emailed statement to CTV News.

“While it is fine for one parent to decide what his or her child reads, it’s unconscionable for that same parent to make the decision for someone else’s child.”

She said removing a book based on isolated passages ignores its broader literary merit.

“We have years of research proving that book bans do not protect children but instead remove tools to help them navigate an increasingly difficult world,” she said.

Concerns from academics

Kit Dobson, an English professor at the University of Calgary, said the removals could have long-term consequences for students.

“I think when the government announced their policy over the summer, the concern was what that was going to look like in practice,” Dobson said.

“Now that we’re seeing it in practice, this order indeed is going to involve the removal of really a lot of books from school libraries.”

Dobson said literature is about complexity and nuance, and she is worried the order could disproportionately affect LGBTQ+ representation.

“There’s a lot of fear that there is picking and choosing by the government in terms of what is going to go in and what is going to go out,” Dobson said.

“The directives from the government seem to remove context, remove nuance and create a set of directives that school boards are going to be scrambling with now.”

Librarians warn of censorship

Library professionals have also raised alarms.

Laura Winton, past president of the Library Association of Alberta, said the policy makes Alberta the only province with an explicit framework for censorship in school libraries.

“We had real concerns at the time about the lack of clarity and the subjectivity that was going to be involved in making decisions about what actually had to be removed,” Winton said.

“It’s upsetting to look at all of the incredible titles on that list, but certainly not surprising.”

She said decisions about school library collections should be left to trained educators and librarians, not politicians.

“Censorship as a whole is the problem, not the specific list that was created,” Winton said.

“This violates children’s rights to free expression and access to information. … We should be leaving it to teachers, librarians and trained educators to make selections for school libraries.”

Debate far from over

As the October deadline approaches, school divisions are reviewing shelves under tight timelines and without additional provincial funding.

While Smith and Nicolaides say their focus is on protecting young children from explicit material, trustees, educators and authors argue the policy is already removing important works of literature from Alberta classrooms.

Dobson said the impact on students will be significant.

“The importance of literature for being able to share nuanced stories and for readers to see themselves reflected in the works that they’re able to engage with is deeply important,” he said.