3,743 Book Titles Were Banned in U.S. Schools Last Year
Here’s what you need to know
Since 2021, PEN America has tracked the rise of school book bans and the growing normalization of censorship in the U.S.
Their newest report examines the 3,743 unique titles banned during the 2024–2025 school year and how the books being taken from shelves reveal the stories, identities, and facts being censored amid broader political attacks on public education across the country.
During the 2024–2025 school year, PEN America found a surge in bans on nonfiction titles, including more than 1,100 educational and informational books for young people, such as textbooks, reference materials, history books, biographies, and autobiographies.
This widespread removal of educational titles highlights the growing censorship of facts, history, and access to information in public K–12 schools across America.
Of the 3,743 unique titles banned this year, 1,664, or 44%, featured characters or people of color. That marks the highest percentage PEN America has ever reported in this category.
1,448, or 39%, featured LGBTQ+ themes or identities, up significantly from 25% the previous school year.
Book bans are actively harming children by taking away their opportunities to learn accurate history and gain better insight and understanding about themselves, their community, and people who are different from them.
The good news? Recent surveys show that two-thirds of Americans oppose book bans, and standing up to book-banning extremists works! We’ve seen many states pass anti-book ban bills to protect the right to read, but there’s still work to be done.
Want to get involved and stand up to book banners in your community? Sign up to be a part of our Freedom to Parent movement and become a Book Ban Buster too!
It was hard to like this since I am very much opposed to book banning, My will includes a provision that none of the books I own will be thrown out. They will go to either public libraries or senior centers in my area.
Back in the sixties, working as a reporter for a newspaper in a state Capitol in a Midwestern state, I did a story on the library that stated that the previous staff consisted of two ladies who removed any book that contained a single curse word. The replacing new librarian was a highly intelligent man with honored degree in library science and library administration. The city council of five met and fired him. The city responded well to my story but could do nothing to stop the firing. Sound familiar?