Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) approved 58 requests to opt out of specific books and readings from 43 families as of Sept. 18, following the U.S. Supreme Court’s June ruling requiring the district to allow families to opt out of lessons based on their religious beliefs, according to district documents provided Thursday to Bethesda Today.
Many of the books include social justice, cultural diversity and LGBTQ+ themes, according to the documents provided in response to Bethesda Today’s Sept. 10 Maryland Public Information Act (MPIA) request.
The district implemented the opt-out provision after the Supreme Court’s ruling in Mahmoud v. Taylor, a case that raised the question of whether MCPS infringed upon parents’ right under the First Amendment to exercise their religion when it included storybooks with LGBTQ+ characters in its curriculum without allowing families to opt out based on religious beliefs. The court ruled in a 6-3 decision that parents with objections should be allowed to opt out until ongoing litigation filed by a group of parents against the school board and MCPS is resolved.
“A government burdens the religious exercise of parents when it requires them to submit their children to instruction that poses ‘a very real threat of undermining’ the religious beliefs and practices that the parents wish to instill,” Justice Samuel Alito wrote in the majority opinion for the court. “Based on these principles, we conclude that the parents are likely to succeed in their challenge to the Board’s policies.”
Ahead of the first day of school on Aug. 26, MCPS Superintendent Thomas Taylor announced that the district would be sending home one-page overviews of topics and readings every nine weeks that classes will cover, which he referred to as a “refrigerator curriculum” in order to allow families to opt out of books if they choose.
Taylor said in August that the district was focusing on the mandate as a “positive” and “a way to communicate better with our parents and our community.” Taylor also said the district would have a centralized process to allow families to opt out of lessons due to religious beliefs that included submitting a request form. If a family opts out of a particular book or assignment, an alternative assignment is created for the student.
The request form asks for student information and an opt-out list of books or chapters. The form doesn’t require an explanation for opting out, but says that by signing the form “you acknowledge that the basis of your request is that the text(s) you identify above substantially interferes with your sincerely held religious beliefs.” The form is due within the first 10 school days of each marking period or within 30 days of enrollment for new families.
Montgomery County Education Association (MCEA) President David Stein told Bethesda Today in August that MCPS seemed to be trying to minimize any burden on teachers by creating the one-page overviews and processing the opt-out requests in the central office, rather than having teachers do it themselves. Still, Stein said some concerns lingered about what the burden would be for teachers to provide alternative texts or assignments. Stein wasn’t available Thursday to comment on how the opt-out process was impacting teachers.
Who’s opting out of what?
According to the documents, MCPS has approved 46 opt-out forms from elementary school families, 10 from middle school families and two from high school. A total of 43 families submitted the 58 approved opt-out forms received by the district, with some families submitting multiple forms, MCPS spokesperson Chris Cram told Bethesda Today on Thursday.
Families with students in 20 elementary schools submitted forms, with many of the schools having received one or two forms. Olney Elementary School families submitted the highest number of opt-out forms with a total of seven, followed by Farmland Elementary School in Rockville with six, Potomac Elementary School with five, and Sequoyah Elementary School in Derwood and Wyngate Elementary School in Bethesda with four each. According to the documents, the most common items cited by elementary school families in their opt-out requests were books related to LGBTQ+, cultural diversity and inclusion themes.
Families from six middle schools submitted opt-out forms. Those schools are Argyle Middle in Silver Spring, William Farquhar Middle in Olney, Hallie Wells Middle in Clarksburg, John Poole Middle in Poolesville, North Bethesda Middle in Bethesda and Rosa Parks Middle in Olney. Farquhar and Rosa Parks Middle received the highest number of opt-outs with three submitted forms each, while the rest of the middle schools only had one. The most common themes of the books listed in the opt-put requests were LGBTQ+ and social justice.
On the high school level, families at Quince Orchard High School in Gaithersburg submitted two opt-out forms. The most common book families opted out of was All American Boys by Brendan Kiely and Jason Reynolds, a book about two boys who navigate racism and police brutality.
MCPS also provided Bethesda Today a list of the books that the families cited most frequently on their opt-out forms, defined as books that appear five or more times across multiple opt-out lists.
The list of 84 readings includes some books centered around LGBTQ characters that were at the center of the Supreme Court case, such as Uncle Bobby’s Wedding by Sarah Brannen, which tells the story of a young girl whose uncle is getting married to his boyfriend, and Intersection Allies: We Make Room for All by Chelsea Johnson, LaToya Council and Carolyn Choi. The latter book includes characters from a number of backgrounds and life experiences, including a genderfluid character.
The list also includes a number of other titles that have LGBTQ+ characters or include topics such as race and cultural stories that were not included in the Supreme Court case, such as Talk: Conversations about Race, Love, and Truth edited by Wade Hudson and Cheryl Willis Hudson, in which a variety of authors share conversations they’ve have with their children about race. Others are #NotYourPrincess, a collection of poems, essays and interviews that cover the experiences of Native women, and Planting the Rainbow: Places of LGBTQ History in Maryland.
The list also includes titles such as Alice’s Adventure in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll, Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp and Socially Curious and Curiously Social by Michelle Garcia Winner and Pamela Crooke, a book about social interactions with input from neurodivergent teens.