If they’re really serious about teaching the Holocaust, it seems pretty dumb to ban Maus because it’s one of the most effective books for teaching it to students at that age.
I don't really have an opinion on how to choose school curriculum. That's not my wheelhouse. As I've said, I've not read Maus, so I don't have an opinion on that either.
I do have an opinion on the meta level though. That is, I have an opinion about the "controversy" which is that it has been sensationalized. A school board decided to sideline this book if they could find a suitable replacement and use it if not. They are the proper authorities to set the curriculum and they seem to be following a reasonable approach (listening to complaints from parents, and taking time to see if they can find a solution, defaulting to what they have if they can't). There is absolutely no reason for this to repeatedly hit national news outlets. Further, I think it's perverse to sensationalize non-events like this and act like they are censorious or evidence of latent-Nazi'ism.
I disagree. School boards are supposed to be leaders in a mission to provide the best education to their students, and should be influenced primarily by educational experts and the “boots on the ground,” i.e., school administrators, teachers, and other leaders with training and experience in curriculum development and education. While parents’ opinions do matter, they aren’t experts in education, and school boards should be influencing the parents instead of the other way around. Otherwise education is going to be beholden to irrational whims, fads, and politics, and I believe society will be far worse off as a result.
And that’s really the story here - that politics, rather than educational effectiveness, seems to be prevailing with this and other school boards across the U.S.
