Recently the Clinton County leader, based out of rural Plattsburg, MO, published a story on its Facebook page about the Cameron High Schools social media post about CHS teacher Jennifer Reents-Dickkut’s Language Arts 2 classes. The Sophomore level classes visited the CHS library and took part in a “book tasting.” According to Reents-Dickkut, 9 different books were “tasted”. We have that list of books and would like to share it.
While viewing the schools social media post about the “book tasting”, a concerned member of the public identified 3 three books shown in those pictures that had been restricted by school superintendent Matt Robinson. According to Robinson and the 7 member school board, restricted books were not to be given to minors without express parental consent.
We have obtained an email record from Mrs. Reents-Dickkut about the books that was sent to a concerned parent. Dickkut appears to provide a list of the books used in her book tasting event. Dickkut denies that the book Me Earl and the Dying Girl shown in the pictures for the event was used in the class. Apparently another district employee was making that restricted material available to the students.
Here is the list of book titles sent to the concerned parent. Some of the books listed here are rated by Book Looks, we will provide a link to those books after the book titles. Those links will open a PDF which will give you an overview of the book, a summary of the concerns with that book and the page numbers with the text of the concerning passages. Books with excessive vulgar language will also include word counts on that PDF. The books Speak and Hate U Give are the two books that have been restricted by the school district. There are links provided for both of those books.
1-The Sun is Also A Star by Nicola Yoon, –
2 Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson, – Link to Book Looks
3-All American Boys by Brendan Kiely and Jason Reynolds – Link to Book Looks
4-The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas – Link to Book Looks
5-Dear Martin by Nic Stone – Link to Book Looks
6-The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie – Link to Book Looks
7- Long Way Down by Jason Reynolds – Link to Book Looks
8-Eliza and Her Monsters by Francesca Zappia
9-A very Large Expanse of Sea by Tahereh Mafi etc.
This screen shot was taken from the email that Mrs. Dickkut sent to the concerned parent. The admissions from Dickkut in this letter are concerning and will be featured in its own topic soon. In this screen shot made from that email, you can see students were told in advance that restricted books were on the tables. The school board assured the community the restricted books wouldn’t be given to students without parental consent. Clearly that directive wasn’t followed.
What is the curriculum objective for these 9 books that Mrs. Dickkut selected for that class? What is the literary value of those books? We have asked those very questions dozens of times about the books we find and challenge within the Cameron, Missouri, school district. In 2 years, neither the district nor any member of the board of education will so much as acknowledge they have received our questions. So without any answers, we have been left to trying to draw our own conclusions.
Because the Cameron school district refuses to allow parents or members of the public to inspect these books, we have to resort to using the only available resource they provide us, Destiny Discover. Jumping into Destiny I found a reoccurring theme to these books selected for this class. Racism and oppressed minority groups. Is this DEI in our classrooms?
In the following video, you will see and hear Mrs. Dickkut addressing the school board about the restriction of books in the Cameron school district. She strongly supports children reading these books with adult sexually explicit content. In this video, Dickkut mentions diversity 5 times along with references to race, minority groups, LGBTQ issues and a few other topics addressed in DEI. Is this a radical teacher pushing DEI on our kids? You tell me.
Here is the full settlement agreement between myself and the Cameron R-1 school district relating to the federal lawsuit under 42 USC 1983 for violations of my 1st and 14th Amendment. The lawsuit ends with this agreement. All of the details are included in this document.
Here is the video from the Cameron R-1 school districts board of education meeting from December 19, 2023. There are time stamps in the description for the video. There was an update in this video to the ongoing book fight.
In March of 2023, the board of education amended policy BDDH-1 to allow them to place specific restrictions on citizens addressing the board of education during public meetings. One of those changes allows the board to restrict a citizen from discussing a topic which has previously been discussed before the board in the past 90 days.
The problem is that the school district and board of education are selectively enforcing that policy. Watch the video below for details.
Mrs Debbie Cox addresses the Cameron school districts board of education to talk about the sexually explicit books they are making available to students in the school libraries. Some of those books violate Missouri law and statute 573.550, prohibition against schools providing sexually explicit content to minors.
In the Cameron high school library, the process and reason behind the sexually explicit books which have been added to the school libraries makes sense when you know the players behind the scenes. Or in this instance, it is the state library association known as MASL. It is the position of this organization that children should be permitted to read any content they want to read.
Listen to this interview with the President of the Missouri Association of School Librarians (MASL) and then ask yourself, should an organization with these stated goals and opinions about parents be creating our guidelines on what content will be made available to children?
In the video below is a bit of a reading from the Dave Pelzer autobiography, A Child Called IT. This book is made available in the Cameron R-1 school district to children as early as the 6th grade. We also read from the review of this book by a current high school ELA teacher who refers to it as “horrific and terrifying.“
No restrictions of any kind are placed on this book by the Cameron school district. The district does not require parental approval for their children to read this book. Call me old fashioned, but the school district should REQUIRE the express permission of parents before they give them books to read that contain content like this.
Recently a local Cameron resident, Mr Dan Landi, shared with me a book he found in the Cameron high school library. He found it with the school districts online book catalog through the school districts website. The book was the graphic novel version of Slaughterhouse Five. This was of particular interest because it contains pictures of people having sex, making it illegal for school to provide to children under Missouri statute 573.550. I confirmed the book showed as being in the online catalog through the resource Go Follett by selecting the state and appropriate school. I was able to find it in the CHS library catalog.
I found a website dedicated to the book fight in the Rockwood, MO, school district called Library Exposed. Searching their website I was able to see some of the images found in the book Slaughterhouse Five. I was able to determine why MO schools were pulling it. I will link directly to that page for the adults who want to be informed.
That got me curious, I wondered how many other books were in Cameron high school that had been pulled from Missouri schools for containing porn, as defined by Missouri statute 573.550. A quick internet search and I found an article from November of 2022 which said 300 books had been banned in Missouri because of the then newly implemented law. The article linked to a google document where there is a list of books and their authors which have been removed by various Missouri school district. A little copy and paste and I was able to see how many of those books still showed up in the Cameron high school library. To my dismay, I found 20 books in the Cameron high school library which appear other schools in Missouri determined were sexually explicit enough to remove . Twenty books which other Missouri school districts pulled from their shelves because they contained pictures which they were concerned would cause them to be in violation of Missouri law prohibiting schools from providing sexually explicit books to children.
In a previous blog entry, I discussed the graphic novel book Watchmen. I showed some of the content from that book, also found on the Library Exposed website. I include a video in that blog entry where I show the content and relevant statutes. You can find the blog post and video at Graphic novel Watchmen.
The image to the right is from a screen shot taken of the high school library catalog which shows Watchmen was in the library and was checked out to a Cameron high school student.
We obtained records from March 3, 2023 from the Cameron school district through Missouri Sunshine Law requests that show Robinson informed the board of education by email about a conversation he had with all the district librarians in August of 2022. He told the board “I sat down with all librarians in August and shared my thoughts on controversial books and shared that our day is coming, it’s only a matter of time.” That indicates he knew there were books that would concern parents and members of the community. Did they know about these books then? Why didn’t they take steps in August to avoid this issue? Has their day arrived? Hopefully it has and this means these books will finally be removed.
In April of 2023, Andi Lockridge, the attorney who sits on the Cameron board of education, asked the superintendent Matt Robinson during that months board of education meeting if any of those books, as defined by the statute she read aloud, were in the Cameron school district. He responded by shaking his head and said “no”. You can watch a recording of that board meeting that was live streamed on Citizen Observer Facebook page. The relevant portion begins around the 46 minute and 20 second mark.
Here is the current list of books which we found on the library catalog for the Cameron high school.
- Autopsies by Jeffrey Gary
- The Dark Knight series by Frank Miller
- Brazen:Rebel Ladies who rocked the world by Penelope Bagieu
- Grass by Gendry-Kim
- Himawari House by Harmony Becker
- How It All Blew Up by Arvin Ahmadi
- Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi
- Red Rising by Pierce Brown
- Salughterhouse Five graphic novel by Vonnegut
- Speak the graphic novel by Laurie Anderson
- Spinning by Tillie Walden
- The Best We Can Do by Thi Bui
- The Giver by Craig Russell
- The Sacrafice of Darkness by Roxane Gay
- Watchmen by Allen Moore
Graphic novel Watchmen violates MO statute 573.550, is available for children to read in Cameron, MO
The graphic novel book Watchmen has been removed from Missouri school districts for being in violation of MO revised statute 573.550 which prohibits schools from providing porn to minors. These books were pulled from schools back in 2022. Not in Cameron. This book is currently checked out and in the hands of a child in the Cameron school district at the time of this post and the video below.
You can confirm the book is currently in the Cameron school district for yourself, don’t take our word for it. In March of 2023 Dan Landi shared instructions on how concerned parents and citizens can look for themselves. I will like to his blog and that post, DON’T LOOK ETHEL!
In April of 2023, Andi Lockridge, the attorney who sits on the Cameron board of education, read aloud during the board meeting the complete revised statute 573.550 to make clear how the state defines pornography. Lockridge asked the superintendent Matt Robinson if any of those books, as defined by the statute she read, were in the Cameron school district. He said no. The video of the board meeting can be found on the Citizen Observer Facebook page. Lockridge begins around the 46 minute and 20 second mark.
This book Watchmen, despite being pulled by numerous Missouri school districts for violating law, doesn’t violate any district policy. There are no policies in place which would allow them to remove content like this, or to prevent something like it from being added. Currently the Cameron school district has two very vague and subjective policies for the selection and reconsideration of books. Those policies are IIAC and IIAC-R1. Those policies are so vague that the outcome of the reconsideration process will be dependent on the beliefs of those who are involved. Shouldn’t this be an objective process with clearly defined guidelines?
There is no policy in Cameron which currently allows parents or concerned tax payers to challenge a book, despite the majority of other Missouri schools having such a policy. The only option currently for Cameron residents to challenge this pornographic book is to address the board during the next school board meeting. Unfortunately the school board president Pam Ice has placed a ban on book discussions until the December 2023 board meeting.
It is time that the Cameron school district and the board of education stop ignoring this problem and take it seriously. They keep placing hurdles in the way and take no steps to make any meaningful change. They need to pass or change district policy that will protect our children, give citizens and parents a meaningful role in the education of our children.
One of our constant concerns about the Cameron school district and the board of education is that we do not feel they are listening to us. We have been saying consistently for some time that they are ignoring us. On Tuesday night two of the board members, Pam and Staci, proved it.
In this video clip you will hear a portion of the address that Paula Allen made to the board. She referred to the April board meeting when a student told the board about sexual comments being made by teachers. Pam and Staci both asked about this teacher and when he left the school district. Had the looked into the complaint of sexual harassment of students by teachers back in April, wouldn’t the know the answer to this question? Shouldn’t they know?
This clearly indicates to me this board of education does not take our concerns seriously. It appears they dismissed Kassidy Wilcox entirely. This is why parents and students say that when they come to the district with concerns and problems that we feel ignored and dismissed. Because they are ignoring and dismissing us.