Parents petition to move racy books

AUSTIN (KXAN) - A group of Round Rock parents are outraged that middle school students have access to a book in a school library that discusses sex, porn, booze and an inappropriate teacher-student relationship. Parents of one sixth-grade student started a petition to move the book, TTYL, to a space where more sensitive material would be placed. So far, 150 parents have signed a petition to try to get the book and others like it in a separate section of school libraries.

"A lot of parents assume a middle school library is a safe place for your child to pick up any book they want and read," said parent Wes Jennings. "That is obviously not the case."

" TTYL " by Lauren Myracle is a bestseller, but some parents consider the content to be too graphic for preteen children who are looking for reading material.

"The girls are advising each other to wear crotchless panties for their boyfriends," said Jennings.

There are also words in the book that cannot be published on our Web site, as well as very specific sexual references.

"A few pages into it and it was clear, [it's] off the charts vulgar," said Jennings.

"The book has been in our library for at least three years, in quite a few of our secondary schools," said JoyLynn Occhiuzzi with the Round Rock Independent School District. "This is the first complaint we've received about this particular book."

For Jennings, the issue is not about pulling "TTYL."

"This is not just one book and one library," said Jennings.

Occhiuzzi said the school district has several other books with the same kind of language or subject matter. Occhiuzzi added, the process to protest the book is just in the first of three stages.

"As a public school system, there are many laws and policies in place that state you can't just pull books off the shelf," said Occhiuzzi. "There is truly a process you must go through."

Parents also have the ability to tell the school they do not want their children to check out any particular book at the library. Most schools do censor Web sites, magazines and television programming. Jennings said the goal is not to ban the risky books but to give parents a way of knowing which ones have mature content.

"The first thing that people think about is book censorship that's not what we are approaching," said Jennings. "We are trying to get the message out and make parents aware the type of material that is available.