US public schools banned 10,000 books in most recent academic year

Survey by PEN America suggests bans nearly tripled nationwide from previous year’s figure

More than 10,000 books were banned in US public schools from 2023 to 2024, according to a report, marking a stark increase over the year before as Republican-led states pass new censorship laws.

The survey from PEN America suggested that bans of books nearly tripled nationwide, from 3,362 the previous year.

At least 13 titles were banned for the first time, including Alex Haley’s Roots: The Saga of an American Family, which describes the journey of an enslaved person from Africa to the US, and James Baldwin’s Go Tell It on the Mountain, the acclaimed semi-autographical work set in Harlem, New York.

PEN America, a non-profit organization dedicated to freedom of expression, said that approximately 8,000 instances of book bans took place in Florida and Iowa, as both states enforced sweeping laws targeting classroom material.