State Weeds Out Old, Inaccurate Books at Schools

California elementary students perusing school libraries learn that John F. Kennedy is president, asbestos and atoms are “our friends,” and, one day, man might go to the moon.

From public school library books, children discover that farmers in the 15-republic U.S.S.R. are not ambitious, girls should exercise so that they may properly push vacuum cleaners, Africans are savages who live in grass houses, and Indians have bright red skin.

Because of decades of little or no funding, old, musty books full of inaccurate, irrelevant and often offensive information can be found in most California school libraries. They sometimes comprise more than half the books in a collection and, experts say, contribute to the state’s literacy crisis.

But for the first time since many elementary schools opened in the 1950s and ‘60s, teams of certified librarians are going into libraries and weeding out the bad books. To restock shelves, the state is spending $158.5 million this spring for new books and materials for all grade levels, making it the single-largest infusion of school library funds ever in California. The figure amounts to $28 per student.

In the Los Angeles Unified School District, the nation’s second largest, certified librarians, serving as weeders, have pruned hundreds of thousands of books at about half the elementary schools.

“Weeding is starting to happen all across the state,” said Barbara Jeffus, a school librarian consultant for the California Department of Education. “It didn’t happen before because schools were afraid that if they weeded out books, there would be nothing left.”

The problem is most acute at elementary schools because so few can afford a professional librarian, although intensive weeding is also going on at some middle schools and even a few high schools. Most elementary school libraries are run by clerks, paraprofessionals or volunteers.

Unlike many other states, California law does not require school districts to employ credentialed librarians, a major reason why the state’s school libraries are ranked as some of the worst in the nation.

Despite strong evidence that children who cannot read by the end of third grade are headed toward academic failure, the state Department of Education noted that the book problem is most severe in elementary schools, where there is an estimated one school librarian for every 6,173 students. The ratio is the worst in the nation, Jeffus said.

The ratio of books per elementary and high school student is also below the national average of 20 to 1. In California, the ratio is 11 to 1, although state education officials say that if the old, inaccurate and inappropriate books were weeded out without replacements, it would more likely be 3 to 1.

Given those figures, the nation’s top literacy experts say it’s no coincidence that California’s fourth-graders ranked second to last among 39 states on last year’s National Assessment of Educational Progress.

“The state is focused on phonics for solving the literacy crisis,” said Stephen Krashen, an education professor at USC who has conducted literacy studies, “but what we really need are more books.”

In her fifth-floor office in Sacramento, state Superintendent of Public Instruction Delaine Eastin keeps a “little shelf of horrors”--a collection of about 60 books she has plucked recently from wealthy, middle-class and poor schools alike.

They include books on the nonexistent Belgian Congo, African savages, and one called “I’m Glad I’m A Boy! I’m Glad I’m A Girl!” which informs children: “Boys are doctors. Girls are nurses. Boys are presidents. Girls are first ladies. Boys fix things. Girls need things fixed.”

“And we wonder why our students aren’t doing well,” Eastin said.

Although grateful for any funding, some educators worry that the state money won’t be ongoing or sufficient to replenish the depleted libraries. Others said that the state also needs to designate money for certified librarians in elementary schools.

The state funding “is a godsend,” said Dean Waldfogel, a deputy superintendent for the Irvine Unified School District. “But it’s a drop in the bucket. . . . We’re dying out here.”

Historically, the state has budgeted little or no money for school libraries, forcing schools to rely on local support and the federal government. Spurred by Proposition 13, which sharply curtailed property tax revenues, school library cutbacks occurred in the 1970s and continued into the 1990s.

In addition to state funding, the Los Angeles district spends $4 per student per year for library books--nice, librarians say, but not enough. A professional, one-day weeding costs a school $500 for the clerical workers who help weeders. Many schools rely on parent groups to pay for weeding.

At Colfax Avenue Elementary School in North Hollywood, L.A. Unified weeders recently wiped out more than half the library’s 6,400 books. Wearing surgical gloves, district librarians Marilyn Robertson, president-elect of the California School Library Assn., and Janet Sklar spent the day examining every book, stacking many in piles to be stamped obsolete.

Sometimes weeders wear masks because the dust is so thick. Good weeders must have strong arms for lifting books, training in and sensitivity for detecting stereotypes, and a “Jeopardy”-like mind for finding factual misinformation about geography, science, technology, history and health.

Most are professional librarians and have received training in detecting stereotypes and assessing a book’s relevance, appeal, content and physical condition, Robertson said.

Well-intentioned teachers or parents who have not had such training can do more harm than good, she added, by weeding out a quietly praised children’s author or keeping a historically inaccurate book.

In California, however, where the average copyright date for a nonfiction public school library book is 1973, often only basic knowledge is needed.

“Some books are easy,” Sklar said as she scanned the science section and pulled tattered, yellow-paged books on solar energy, the wonders of asbestos and space exploration, some of which hadn’t been checked out since the 1960s.

Published in 1959, a passage from “What Is a Rocket?” reads: “Rocket men today are working hard to learn how to make a rocket fly straight and steady.”

Several neighboring books optimistically inform children that “some day man will land on the moon.”

Sklar rolled her eyes. “We find so many of those,” she said, shaking her head. “It’s sad.”

Then there are the double-whammy books, those that are not only outdated but also promote racial or gender stereotypes.

Published in 1957, “The Boy’s Second Book of Radio” is such a work. Written by the author of “Things a Boy Can Do With Electricity” and “The Boy’s Book of Engines, Motors and Turbines,” a passage from the book reassures boys that: “You do not have to win the Irish Sweepstakes before you can afford to build your own record player or phonograph.”

“No good,” Sklar said, laughing at the book’s dated outlook.

In the history section, Sklar quickly spotted “California Today,” published in 1937.

“Books in this section can be easy, too,” Sklar said. “When I see a title such as ‘R is for Redskin,’ I don’t even need to open the book.”

Indeed, the section was rife with racial stereotypes.

In a 1938 book on American history, illustrations depict Native American skin as brick-red, and stories tell of happy slaves, “working hard and singing on the tobacco plantations.”

“We don’t want this,” Sklar said.

Even though they might smell old or have pages missing, some weeded-out books--usually fiction classics--are given to classrooms desperate for reading material.

Others are recycled, a difficult notion for book lovers who cringe at getting rid of books, as if it were a sin.

“As hard as it seems, sometimes it’s better to throw out a book,” said David Loertscher, a professor of library and information sciences at San Jose State University who is helping to compile a state survey on weeding.

“Who needs books on savage Indians and happy slaves?” he asked. “We could give the books to Third World countries, but they probably have better books than California schools.”