Utah’s school book bans, 2018–2026.
moms4all is an independent research project about who decides which books students can read.
Follow the public records from parent complaints to school reviews and statewide removals.
Start with a chapter, follow eight key records, or browse events by date.
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These eight records follow the story from early book lists to a state review. Each stop has sources and Next and Previous links.
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Parent groups shared book lists and used outside reports to ask schools to remove books. RatedBooks, a private rating site, then appeared in state hearings. A later state audit used one of its lists.
Utah passed HB29 in 2024. The law calls certain sexual content “objective sensitive material.” Public schools statewide must remove a book when either group below reaches that finding in final reviews:
After the statewide notice, a State Board member has 30 days to request a review. The law allows the Board to place the book on a public-meeting agenda within 60 days of notice and vote to end the statewide removal requirement.
Why it matters: Your school can lose a book even if your district never reviewed it. A private rating alone cannot require that result. Read the chapters to follow an issue, or open the records to check who made each decision and what supported it.
What if families want a book back?
These dates show past rulings. To check a book’s current status, use your school or district catalog and review notices.
Each chapter follows one question through the records.
This talk shows how these advocates describe the school debate. The timeline follows their documented roles in book lists, challenges and public decisions.
In these clips, Cari Bartholomew and Christine Sefein Wolk blame Marxism for changes in schools and culture. They describe what they see as a long, planned effort.
Bartholomew is Utah Moms for America’s state director. She also interviewed Brooke Stephens about her work on school-book lists.
The question runs both ways: Who shapes Utah’s school-book rules, and what happens when families disagree?
This timeline follows the lists, ratings, book challenges, and votes. It shows who asked for books to be removed and what school and state leaders did next. It also asks what options families have when they want a book back.
The talk is about The Devil and Karl Marx. The video was posted October 11, 2026. The Southern Poverty Law Center lists Utah Moms for America as an antigovernment group in its 2025 map.
1:05–1:23 in the full recording
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[00:01:05] that we're at. I mean, when we talk [00:01:07] about ideology in schools and we're [00:01:09] talking about the wokeism and all of [00:01:11] this stuff, it's really easy to just [00:01:13] think about 2020 and on without [00:01:16] realizing that the groundwork had been [00:01:18] laid for minimum, I don't know, four [00:01:20] decades or so, at least 40 years. So, I
1:46–2:05 in the full recording
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[00:01:47] so well with so many different [00:01:51] people, so many different ways to [00:01:54] infiltrate systems from so many [00:01:57] different angles. [00:01:58] And I don't think that people understand [00:02:01] enough how coordinated of an effort this [00:02:04] has been for the last many decades. Like
5:02–5:34 in the full recording
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[00:05:02] watch what one group of human beings can [00:05:04] actually do to another and it's [00:05:06] difficult to see how you may not even [00:05:09] recognize what's happening to you and [00:05:13] the change that's happen. I mean so [00:05:15] that's that's what I mean when I say [00:05:16] it's difficult. [00:05:18] >> Yeah. I I totally totally agree. It it [00:05:22] is hard [00:05:25] it's hard to not hate the people who do [00:05:28] this. [00:05:29] >> And one thing that I found interesting [00:05:31] in these la in this last few chapters is
Posted October 11, 2026 · Book-club talk: The Devil and Karl Marx
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2018
Aaron and Brooke Stephens’ app company takes shape
These filings identify the people behind StoryLabs. Later records follow its school products and Stephens’ work on book ratings. The filings help us check which people and organizations took part.
S&S Apps became a California company on January 24, 2018. Its filing said more than one manager would run it.
Later records show S&S Apps’ StoryLabs language-learning and sex-education products. This filing dates the company’s formation.
S&S Apps’ Statement of Information lists Aaron Stephens in the manager/member section and as chief executive officer. The attachment lists Brooke Stephens as an additional manager or member.
The company describes its business as “Software Development.”
Apple’s saved app record dates Storylabs’ release to August 5, 2018 and names AARON STEPHENS as the seller. Its bundle identifier is com.sandsapps.llbookclub.
The product description offers illustrated interactive stories, a text-to-speech reader, flashcards and games for language learning.
S&S Apps, LLC applied for the STORYLABS trademark on September 24, 2018, serial number 88128910. The application covers downloadable apps for teaching and learning foreign languages.
Its filed specimen shows the Storylabs App Store page, with Aaron Stephens named as seller and a “My Books” library screen.
In “Update on International Database Scandal,” Nicholeen Peck identified herself as president of Worldwide Organization for Women. The deck is marked Protect Child Health Coalition (PCHC), Indianapolis 2019.
Peck’s Utah work predates HB38. In September 2020, she presented a Utah-focused talk about school databases to the House Judiciary Interim Committee. The minutes say she discussed problems with databases used in Utah schools. At that same meeting, lawmakers voted to open a bill file on student access to pornography. In November, Peck presented more information on the School Technology Amendments draft. Utah passed HB38 in 2021. September 2020 committee minutes · Peck’s Utah presentation · November meeting.
Peck urged readers to search school and library databases, save screenshots and bring complaints to top officials and the media. She also called for lawsuits, audits and pressure to cancel subscriptions.
Peck described sex education and school databases as threats to children. Her plan targeted both school suppliers and the officials paying them.
Peck later spoke on Utah’s digital-resource bill in 2020 and supported Ivory’s book-rating proposal in 2023.
The saved StoryLabs page offers HEART, Health Education and Relationship Training, as a California sex-education course. Access costs $3 per student, $15 per teacher and $25 per classroom. The archive shows it was offered by this date.
This is an early record of the product later submitted for Utah instructional-material review. USBE’s review and decision appear in the 2022 entries.
S&S Storylabs was one of five finalists in the 2019 LaunchPad language-education technology competition. The organizer named Brooke Stephens as co-founder. The competition took place at the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL) convention in Washington, D.C.
StoryLabs let teachers share stories, give students web and phone access, and track reading. The company was selling classroom software before the book-rating campaign.
The organizer named Woodpecker Learning as the winner of both awards.
iKeepSafe announced two student-data privacy certifications for StoryLabs: one under the federal Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA), and one for California rules. It quoted co-founder Brooke Stephens saying parents donated toward the certification so HEART could reach schools. The certifications concern student data.
The 2020 HEART curriculum names Brooke W. Stephens on its advisory board and identifies her as StoryLabs’ co-founder. It names R. “Skip” Hellewell as writer/editor. Its description separates the free underlying curriculum from the enhanced digital version delivered through StoryLabs, a service of S&S Apps.
These certifications concern student-data privacy. They are separate from whether USBE approved HEART as instructional material; see the later state review.
S&S Apps, LLC files a New Jersey registration for a company formed in California on January 24, 2018. The filing states its business purpose as “Online Delivery of K-12 Curricula: World Language Reading & Sex Education.”
2021–2022
Parents bring materials to Ivory
Before the book campaign, Stephens’ StoryLabs site offered learning materials for sale. Peck’s 2019 slides had already cast school content as a threat and urged parents to press officials to act.
The next records show book complaints reaching lawmakers. Ivory later said parents brought him school materials in 2021. UPU recruited book-review teams. Stephens shared lists and taught parents to search school catalogs.
Brooke’s account · May 7, 2022 interview
How Brooke Stephens says her book campaign began.
In May 2022, Brooke Stephens told Bartholomew that All Boys Aren’t Blue led her to post about school books. She said she was on Utah Parents United’s board.
Later context: The Southern Poverty Law Center’s 2025 map lists Utah Parents United as an antigovernment group.
A woman at a conference taught her to search school library catalogs and shared a book list. Stephens said she combined lists from several people and posted her own.
She also described emailing a principal about a book. She then sent a neighbor’s child to see if it was still there. The principal later told her to file a formal book challenge.
Stephens said she asked for a sticker instead of removing the book. She wanted it to warn students about gender identity and same-sex attraction. She compared it to a surgeon general’s warning.
Her StoryLabs site also sells book warning labels and Youth Advisory rating stickers.
Open full-size shop screenshot ↗The signed challenges below are dated November 13, 2021.
See the signed November 2021 challenges ↓4:49–5:06 in the interview
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um all boys aren't blue and i read that and i'm like what this isn't a kids but what and i was horrified and i like posted it you know because i'm on the board of utah parents united and so i posted that i'm like yeah that shouldn't be happening my goal is that people are aware and and have a solution that they can work towards so that
Open original at this passage5:19–8:05 in the interview
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so i posted that and then i went to this conference and um this lady i sat next to her and she's like do you know how to search for books and i thought no i don't know anything about it and she's like let me show you i'm like and i had paid for myself to go out to this conference i paid for my plane ticket my hotel and the whole time i went out there i'm like i don't think anything's gonna happen with this you know i hope something happens with this and that's where i met her she showed me how to search and she showed me her list and then somebody else showed me their list i'm like there are too many lists and i like i hate all the chaos of lots of things so i'm like trying to organize it so i'm like making sense and so then i published my list of this books that i had inherited from various places and they're like she wants this gone i don't even know anything about that book and it's like accusing me of all this stuff and then i told my principal on the sly i'm like hey did you know that your school has this book and i just sent him a little email i had no idea what book challenges were and he's like yeah we'll take care of it i'm like okay cool i'm used to being lied to and so i'm always kind of like hey i'm like wait a second and so then i sent my neighbor's kid over and i'm like hey see if you can check this book out i wonder if it's really gone and it wasn't and so he found out that the book was trying to be checked but immediately after that happened he emailed me and said oh i found out you have to do a book challenge i'm like okay uh and i went through and i put this list that i'd inherited through the thing and i found that these were in and they had some information on them so i'm like okay here you go and i didn't know there would be a challenge process and you know i was just kind of like learning as i went in hindsight actually when the first book challenge that i had that was at the top of my list i looked at it and i'm like i'm challenging this book and so this is embarrassing because and so i showed up to the book challenge and i prepared all of my information and i researched it and and i actually didn't challenge that the book be removed i asked that a sticker be placed on it that that gave information about transgender it's kind of like hey here's a book that kind of seems to promote it but if you read this kind of like a surgeon general's warning sure that a lot of kids who experience this grow out of it and and if you experience same-sex attraction that a lot of kids grow out of it and you don't have to worry about you know your identity you just get to be you or as some stuff i don't even know what it was but i i could give it to you later but i asked that they just put a little sticker on so kids didn't like feel this pressure to know what their sexual identity was
In January and February 2024, Ivory said parents including Stephens first brought school materials to him in 2021.
Ivory recalls the first contact · House hearing · January 23, 2024 · 17 seconds
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get to that place. I would like you to hear first from two of the parents that first brought this issue to my attention in 2021. And they've been working on this throughout. And I'd like you to hear briefly from them. And then I'll just
Full original · 4287.06–4304.02 secondsIvory recalls the first contact · Senate hearing · February 9, 2024 · 17 seconds
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I have Brooke Stevens as one of the mothers that came to me originally in 2021 with materials in their schools that I frankly didn't believe when they told me what it was until they showed me a binder of the materials and the things that are there.
Full original · 4154.38–4171.02 secondsUtah Parents United’s articles name Brooke Stephens, Nichole Mason and Lyle Mason as directors and describe parental advocacy as its purpose. Stephens signed as incorporator on March 12; the filing is dated March 15.
Why this matters: UPU’s work reached beyond individual schools. The group directed parents to LaVerna in the Library to organize book reviews. In February 2022, Stephens helped Rep. Ken Ivory present HB374, Utah’s school-materials bill.
Later context: The Southern Poverty Law Center included UPU in its 2024 list of antigovernment groups. That report was released May 22, 2025.
One day later, Governor Spencer Cox signed HB38, School Technology Amendments, sponsored by Representative Travis Seegmiller with Senator Todd Weiler as Senate sponsor. It took effect May 5, 2021.
The Utah Education and Telehealth Network (UETN) buys online resources for schools. HB38 required resources it bought or licensed for public-school students to block obscene or pornographic material.
UETN had to notify providers of problems and could hold back future payments. Providers had 90 days after notice to confirm they met the rules. Missing that deadline would break the contract. UETN also had to report failures each year.
The earlier draft: On November 18, 2020, Representative Travis Seegmiller presented School Technology Amendments to the Judiciary Interim Committee. Nicholeen Peck provided more information. The committee voted 13–1 to recommend the draft, before the 2021 bill became law.
This law concerns digital resources purchased or licensed through UETN. It is separate from HB374, signed the following year, which set rules for sensitive materials in school classrooms and libraries. See the HB374 entry.
Empowered Parents is a Utah education nonprofit. It helps parents choose a school and find learning resources. Its website also offers parent classes and help with homeschooling.
The August 19 filing for Parents Empowered in Education Resources and Support adds Brooke Stephens as a director. The group later became Empowered Parents.
Why it matters: Stephens later signed as its president. The group’s later website sent parents to StoryLabs’ learning portal and a calendar labeled 2024. That connects her nonprofit leadership to the app business introduced in 2018.
Minutes from the Utah State Board of Education (USBE) identify Stephens as a mother of four. She spoke against its “Understanding Gender Identity to Best Support Students Guidance Document.”
Stephens made this school-policy statement before the library organizing documented later that year.
The amendment changes Parents Empowered in Education Resources and Support to Empowered Parents. It records October 26 as the amendment’s adoption date.
Later filings use “Empowered Parents,” recording changes in directors and officers under that name.
Utah Parents United’s (UPU) October 27 post describes new chapters and tools for researching school-library books. It recruits district review teams and republishes a Washington County parent’s removal request with book locations and reviews.
Stephens uploads “How to find books in Utah Public School District Libraries,” a 1-minute-52-second tutorial.
The Working List of Potentially Obscene Books To Review tracks titles, sources, school locations and LaVerna/Mary posts. November 12, 2021 entries name No Left Turn in Education, Protect Student Health Georgia and Mary in the Library Indiana as sources.
The worksheet credits organizations and contributors. It is a working list, separate from official district or state records of challenges and removals.
On November 13, 2021, Brooke Stephens signed requests to remove nine books from Legacy Junior High. Each form asked whether she had examined the whole book. She answered “No” on all nine.
Stephens signed nine school-level challenge forms dated November 13 for Drama, This One Summer, Monday’s Not Coming, George, Eleanor and Park, The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, Crank, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, and Looking for Alaska.
All nine answer “No” to “Have you examined this material in its entirety?” The forms say “I’ve been working with teams of people to review literature in public schools” and request removal from the media center.
Republican delegates selected Ken Ivory to fill the House District 47 vacancy left by Steve Christiansen’s resignation.
Ivory defeated former representative Bruce Cutler 40–19; 59 delegates cast ballots.
Party delegates filled the legislative vacancy. The Salt Lake Tribune reported that the district had more than 16,000 registered voters and that Ivory would be sworn in later that week.
KUTV reported on a UPU training and recruitment video, an hour and 18 minutes long, that includes a list of hundreds of books the group says are inappropriate. In it, Stephens, UPU’s curriculum director, tells parents, “We’re going after the ones where we can get the police on it,” and says UPU will call police and make police reports.
KUTV reports that UPU also suggests lawsuits against schools and pressure on principals and librarians to pull books. Ben Horsley of Granite School District said the district reviews every complaint and told parents, “Please don’t call police.”
KUER described Stephens as a Davis School District parent and Utah Parents United member leading a Facebook group to identify school-library books parents considered inappropriate. She said her goal was to remove material she considered explicit pornography.
Concerns grow over efforts to remove books from Utah schoolsRead article ↗Article image: demaerre / iStockphoto, via KUER
Stephens uploads “Book Spreadsheet Introduction,” a 2-minute-47-second tutorial.
This video introduces the spreadsheet used in Stephens’ later catalog-search tutorial. Together, they show how she matched titles to district holdings.
An archived Utah Parents United page directs readers to join the LaVerna in the Library Facebook group, search school-library catalogs, and coordinate book-review efforts with other parents.
In her February 25, 2022 testimony, Brooke Stephens said she created a book list to organize the review process and created the LaVerna Facebook page.
Utah Parents United (UPU) published a letter from 30 Murray parents listing more than 100 books. They asked administrators to remove books first, then accept formal challenges for those left.
The earliest homepage capture in the saved archive index reads “Stop Utah Porn in K-12 Public School Libraries” and directs readers to Utah Parents United and LaVerna in the Library.
Stephens uploads “How to Make Public Comment in Utah Legislative Meetings,” a 1-minute-17-second tutorial.
Utah Parents United (UPU) promoted HB135 and urged parents to contact lawmakers about required verbal public comment. Its article criticized Davis School District’s comment-time limits.
Do Parents Have the Right to Give Verbal Public Comment at School Board Meetings? HB135Read article ↗Article image: Utah Parents United
The Utah State Board of Education (USBE) approved its School Libraries rule, R277-628, Draft 3. Board member Natalie Cline voted against it. The April 15 Utah State Bulletin later published the proposed rule. It set minimum standards for how districts choose library books and handle requests to review them.
R277-628 set district procedures for selecting and reviewing library books. HB374 later added a separate state-law standard for sensitive materials; the signed bill is here.
The Davis County Sheriff’s Office recorded Stephens’ complaint as incident D22-01690. It identifies her with LaVerna in the Library and says she cited House Bill 374 while seeking a criminal investigation of Davis School District.
The deputy selected passages from her documents without reading each whole book. He said some notes lacked page numbers or appeared to be opinion and would be omitted or marked unverified. The report lists a May 5 closure.
HB374 (2022): Sensitive Materials in Schools. The law created a state-law standard for classroom and library materials. It banned material defined as pornographic or indecent under Utah law and required state guidance, training and parent participation in local decisions. Signed March 24, 2022; effective May 4, 2022.
UPU urged a yes vote on HB374, named Ivory, linked the bill and excerpt site, and asked supporters to attend committee. The UPU post advertised February 24; the official hearing was February 25.
Image from UPU’s February 22, 2022 call to action.
House Education minutes say Ivory presented the bill with superintendent Larry Bergeson and Brooke Stephens of Utah Parents United (UPU). They gave out handouts and answered questions.
UPU president Nichole Mason also supported it. The committee adopted the second substitute 13–0, then recommended the bill 11–2.
Stephens’ HB374 testimony · 153 seconds
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My name is Brooke Stevens. If you speak, Brett, and I'm going to reset the timer for two minutes and have you start. Last fall, I was introduced to the novel All Boys Aren't Blue. I was horrified by the multiple descriptions of sodomy between 10- and 11-year-old boy cousins. I created a book list to systematize the review process and created the Laverne in the Library Facebook page. Bringing awareness is critical because there is no rating system for books. Some say, just don't check out the books. But how can students know which ones not to check out? Children can open up a book and find something that assaults them, such as images of a woman holding down another woman while she is raped, or images of a woman's bloody vagina and her son asking her other son what he had done to mom. These books I'm presenting you today would be rated NC-17 and violate obscenity, pornography, and harmful to minors' laws. The difficulty of sharing the content in these books proves the obscenity. I was put in Facebook jail. The news station had to blur the images. I was chided for not warning someone to not open the website when at work. He almost lost his job and called rude for sending it as evidence. Those who may not have witnessed firsthand the graphic nature of these images and text tend to mislabel our efforts. These pornographic books are sold on Amazon and available at public libraries. To call this a ban is like calling it prohibition to not serve alcohol in a school cafeteria. I have been using the district's media challenge process. Four books have been reviewed. None have been removed. Many parents across the state tell the same story. They're behind me if they have time for public comment. Some have even been denied an appeal because the notification letter was sent after the 10-day window. I won't read the excerpt from the book that my junior high chose to keep because it's obscene, but I emailed it to you. The media challenge process involves showing up for five minutes in front of a committee of eight educators and one other parent. Then the parent is excused while they discuss the literary value. Other than an email with their decision, I am not privy to any explanation or discussion of literary value. The item protecting schools from criminal prosecution. I have heard that Playboy magazine has some interesting and well-written articles. I have to wonder if these articles are literary enough to excuse the porn. I have one more sentence. Because we have no rating system to forewarn children to make wise decisions. Because the media challenge process doesn't work or hasn't worked. And because pornography is against the law, I urge you to support HB 374. Thank you very much, Ms. Stevens. Now we're back to Representative Ivory. Can you?
Full original · 510.64–663.22 seconds
The fifth-substitute fiscal note estimated a one-time $600 State Board cost in FY2023 for the required report. The board said it could absorb that cost. The note estimated no direct, measurable local government costs.
A fiscal note estimates costs. It does not show what was spent.
Official fiscal estimate. Select the page to read the full note.
In “Corinne Explains the UPU Voting Tracker,” UPU walks through the 2022 bills on its voting tracker. Of what it calls “the pornography in school bill,” UPU says it worked on that bill with Representative Ken Ivory “from start to finish” and calls Brooke Stephens “instrumental.”
Governor Spencer Cox signed Ivory’s Sensitive Materials in Schools bill. It prohibited materials meeting the state’s definition of sensitive material in public schools and took effect May 4, 2022.
The registry’s saved RDAP response dates the current RatedBooks.org domain registration to March 24, 2022, at 7:13:22 a.m. MDT.
The registration dates the current domain without identifying its operator. Later tutorials show RatedBooks as a searchable source of ratings and school locations.
Nineteen forms bear Stephens’ name, signature and the March 30 date. Each answers “No” to examining the material in its entirety, states “I’m helping get rid of porn in schools,” supplies a shortened web link and requests removal from the media center.
The set covers eighteen distinct titles; A Court of Mist and Fury appears twice. Other challenged titles include Sold, The Truth About Alice, Crank, Damsel, The 57 Bus, Impulse, Shine, Me and Earl and the Dying Girl, Beyond Magenta, The Perks of Being a Wallflower, The Bluest Eye, Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up With Me, A Court of Silver Flames, Red Hood, The Haters, Eleanor & Park, and Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging.
The forms point back into the review system she was building. The Truth About Alice form (page 2) supplies a TinyURL that a preserved August 2026 redirect check connects to a PDF on the same Wix site used by Stop Utah Porn and RatedBooks. The Sold form (page 1) links to a Google Drive report also listed in RatedBooks’ school-holdings sheet.
The Truth About Alice: tinyurl.com/2p9ft3ae → c27c03a5-5acb-4d03-a2a0-b279f0003e03.filesusr.com/ugd/413ae8_a7db834474d347e89db14483f9563fe4.pdf. Sold: tinyurl.com/2jxuxsyj → Google Drive file 1fUvy6BAj61ib7mu33DQSXedQbv7HJP6s. Redirects were preserved August 5, 2026.
The March 30 filing lists Brooke Stephens as a Director under information removed or updated.
This filing updates the organization’s official roster. A July filing later lists Stephens again; see the July entry.
Stephens uploads “Adding spreadsheet to Google My Maps.” The preserved video description links a Google Sheets template and a custom RatedBooks school or district homepage product on StoryLabs.
Wilbur urges parents to compare the two policies · 47 seconds
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Parents, please pay attention tomorrow. The Law and Licensing Committee will have to make a choice between competing model policies on library materials. One policy will do little to nothing to, nothing to protect your kids from destructive pornographic materials. The other policy, which will be put forth by member Cline, not only honors and upholds state law, but more importantly, it safeguards your kids’ emotional and psychological safety. Don’t take my word for it. You need to read the two versions for yourself side by side. The preserved May 4, 2022 Draft 2 PDF is dated on its face May 4; its metadata lists “MD Wilbur” as the author and records the PDF’s creation on May 5. That is the earliest located appearance of those initials in a Cline policy document. The metadata identifies the account recorded in the file, not by itself who wrote or approved the draft. Please, if board members truly want to protect kids, the choice of the policy which they vote for should be objectively obvious. Thank you for your time this morning.
Original recording · passage near 41:04 ↗State board member Natalie Cline’s May 4 Draft 2 would block access to every copy of a challenged book in every school in the district until the complaint was resolved.
The draft also called for checking existing materials against a Sensitive Materials Rubric and making review records public. It excluded students from hearings and review committees.
One day later, Monica Wilbur backed Cline’s policy in public comment and urged parents to compare the competing drafts. The May 5 board minutes also record her criticism of the state lawyer’s HB374 memo.
At the May 6 USBE committee meeting, Ivory urged the board to follow his reading of HB374. Near 25:15, he warned that lawmakers would make the law more specific if the board would not work with them to keep the materials out of schools. Stephens spoke after him.
Ivory’s warning to the board · 30 seconds
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We hope that you will abide the legislative intent, you will abide the statement of the legislature and the governor that pornography is a public health crisis, and that you work with us to make sure that these materials are not in Utah schools, because there is a public outcry, as Mr. Woodruff mentioned. And if, if you won’t work with the legislature to make sure these materials are not in schools, then we’ll simply have to get more prescriptive at the legislative level. So I encourage you to honor the legislative intent of House Bill 374. Thank you.
Original recording · passage near 24:56 ↗Cari Bartholomew introduced Stephens as LaVerna in the Library. Stephens appeared under the display name “Brooke Stephens - Storylabs Spanish” and identified herself as a Utah Parents United board member.
Stephens said a woman at a conference shared a book list and taught her to search school catalogs. She combined lists, published her own and asked a principal about a book at the school.
She also described asking for a sticker instead of removal. She wanted a warning about gender identity and same-sex attraction, and compared it to a surgeon general’s warning.
Shared lists, a book challenge, and the sticker request · 5:19–8:05
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so i posted that and then i went to this conference and um this lady i sat next to her and she's like do you know how to search for books and i thought no i don't know anything about it and she's like let me show you i'm like and i had paid for myself to go out to this conference i paid for my plane ticket my hotel and the whole time i went out there i'm like i don't think anything's gonna happen with this you know i hope something happens with this and that's where i met her she showed me how to search and she showed me her list and then somebody else showed me their list i'm like there are too many lists and i like i hate all the chaos of lots of things so i'm like trying to organize it so i'm like making sense and so then i published my list of this books that i had inherited from various places and they're like she wants this gone i don't even know anything about that book and it's like accusing me of all this stuff and then i told my principal on the sly i'm like hey did you know that your school has this book and i just sent him a little email i had no idea what book challenges were and he's like yeah we'll take care of it i'm like okay cool i'm used to being lied to and so i'm always kind of like hey i'm like wait a second and so then i sent my neighbor's kid over and i'm like hey see if you can check this book out i wonder if it's really gone and it wasn't and so he found out that the book was trying to be checked but immediately after that happened he emailed me and said oh i found out you have to do a book challenge i'm like okay uh and i went through and i put this list that i'd inherited through the thing and i found that these were in and they had some information on them so i'm like okay here you go and i didn't know there would be a challenge process and you know i was just kind of like learning as i went in hindsight actually when the first book challenge that i had that was at the top of my list i looked at it and i'm like i'm challenging this book and so this is embarrassing because and so i showed up to the book challenge and i prepared all of my information and i researched it and and i actually didn't challenge that the book be removed i asked that a sticker be placed on it that that gave information about transgender it's kind of like hey here's a book that kind of seems to promote it but if you read this kind of like a surgeon general's warning sure that a lot of kids who experience this grow out of it and and if you experience same-sex attraction that a lot of kids grow out of it and you don't have to worry about you know your identity you just get to be you or as some stuff i don't even know what it was but i i could give it to you later but i asked that they just put a little sticker on so kids didn't like feel this pressure to know what their sexual identity was
Open original at this passageStephens’ tutorial opens the RatedBooks spreadsheet and searches Follett Destiny by district, starting with five-rated titles. She maps school locations in Google My Maps, then shows how to share the map and information with a principal.
Some catalogs require a separate search for each school. She demonstrates Granite and Alpine searches; Alpine uses a different catalog system.
Catalog-search tutorial · opening 2 minutes 25 seconds
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align:start position:0% in your school you want to go to go follow it go f-o-l-l-e-t-t dot com forward slash a-a-s-p forward slash ui forward slash pick forward slash pick okay sometimes if you look something up it will automatically appear here and i just do that little thing and make it go away i don't usually choose the location i'll just start typing in um the school and then i'll see it pop up and click on it i i usually always do the school here but i know i want to search district not every school will let you search the whole district so you will have to do it one by one once you get here then you're going to go to the back office you're going to click on catalog and then down in location this button may not appear again you're going to click the whole school district okay so now we need the schools to search so you're going to go to i mean the books to search ratedbooks.org align:start position:0% oh they're ratted books okay ratedbooks.org and then to get the list it's in search and you're going to open up this spreadsheet and this is just gives you more information in case you um don't know the author that i'm looking for okay so now you're gonna get a template to search this for this is the system i use because i like the end result the best and it's the ability to you know have it listed by school okay in order to get this list you go to the maps button of ratedbooks.org and you click on the template right here this will be the video i'm making right now so i'm opening the template align:start position:0% and we are going to start searching for these books so oops nope this is the template you need to make your own copy so i'm just gonna put granite school district you put the name of it that you want i think it's easier to go by school district okay now let's find triangles hopkins and we're gonna oops i'm just gonna show
Straight Talk with Kim & Carolyn episode 26 discusses the Attorney General’s school-library opinion with Cari Bartholomew and Ivory.
On May 12, Utah Parents United promoted the episode, called Bartholomew a UPU adviser and said Ivory was working with UPU on school-library content. View UPU’s post.
Hosts introduce Cari Bartholomew · 67 seconds
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Right, Carrie Bartholomew, who has some experiences that I think can help inform the discussion around a lot of issues that are going on in the state right now. And, you know, Kim and I have talked a lot, as I bring you in, Carrie, I want to make this point. Kim and I have talked a lot over the years about, I find it kind of funny and amusing that some people will choose to be the voice of women and present themselves as the voice of women, as though all women think the same way, have had the same experiences and are the same politically, which I think is a little bit insulting. And Carrie has had some of these same experiences, I think she would say, with regard to, I don't know, womanhood, I don't know, but race, certainly. And so, Carrie, we are so thrilled to have you on our show tonight. We'd love for you to tell us a little bit, just starting off, about your background and what has brought you into the political scene in Utah. Why do many of us know who you are? Yes, I moved here from Washington State a year ago to get away from all of the woke that
Full original · 53–120 secondsIvory describes parents bringing materials · 69 seconds
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We have Representative Ken Ivory who ran the legislation because why can Representative Ivory, what were you finding on bookshelves in schools? In Utah. In Utah. Yeah, I didn't find anything myself. I had a bunch of moms and dads come to me and they started showing me what they're finding and what their kids were bringing home from Utah schools. And I mean, it was just flat out alarming. I mean, you I've learned in this discussion that reserve, please, everyone that's listening or watching, reserve judgment until you've actually gone and looked at some of the materials. You can go to stoputahporn.com. You can go to Laverna in the library Facebook page. And you have to, like Carolyn was saying, you have to look and see, not that I want to distribute or promote pornography, but you really cannot believe what is in schools that a lot of these librarians and school officials are apologizing
Full original · 1211–1280 secondsThe saved site links a rating system, book lists, district maps, and challenge forms. It tells readers to submit one challenge form per book to the principal.
Utah Parents United (UPU) shared a video introducing Stephens as LaVerna in the Library’s creator. Its caption says she asked Tim Ballard of Operation Underground Railroad how to show people pornography’s harms to children.
The caption gives Ballard’s answer as “Show them the Science” and presents his response as a claim about pornography and trafficking.
The preserved Utah HEART product page opens with “USBE approved” and offers a year’s access for a teacher and students through StoryLabs’ online platform. The description also cites iKeepSafe student-privacy certification.
USBE later rejected HEART as instructional material. Check the claim against the review.
Cline moved to adopt her Draft 3.5. Matt Hymas, seconded by Carol Lear, offered a substitute motion to use the Merged Master Draft 1 instead. That vote passed 11–3, with Cline, Jennie Earl and Scott Hutchings opposed.
The Board then debated amendments and the minutes record approval of the merged text. The collective draft credited Molly Hart, Carol Lear, Matt Hymas and Cindy Davis.
June 30 minutes, PDF pages 3–6: the 11–3 vote is the switch to the merged draft. Later approval motions and amendments follow. One final roll-call list puts Cline among both supporters and opponents, so that list cannot supply a reliable final tally.
The July 3 saved RatedBooks page uses No Left Turn in Education’s name and links to its homepage, a RatedBooks search and recommended books.
Its menu offers ratings, maps, stickers and national teams. The page shows rating tools offered under another organization’s name.
The preserved Reviews page says “We generally add 3-5 new titles per week” and describes a searchable database plus a working spreadsheet with reports, publishers, authors and ratings that anyone may access, copy and use. It says some reviewed books receive a 0/5 rating.
The saved homepage uses the Rated Books name and ratedbooks.org address. It links to reports, school searches and challenge instructions. January and July captures share the same Wix site identifier.
Utah Parents United (UPU) asked whether passages in 12 books met HB374’s sensitive-material definition. It linked a Google Form for readers’ opinions.
July 18, 2022 post; screenshot supplied October 21, 2026.
The July 21 change filing lists Brooke Stephens as an updated director of Empowered Parents.
The July filing follows a March filing removing Stephens as director. Together, they record changes in the group’s board roster.
The Board approved the Library Materials Model Policy, Merged Master Draft dated June 30, as amended. Member Cline opposed. The minutes record a series of amendments before the final vote.
Utah Parents United’s (UPU) model-policy video names Ivory as HB374’s sponsor. It introduces Stephens as UPU’s education director and LaVerna in the Library’s creator.
The presenter directs viewers to ratedbooks.org, explains that a rubric was used to rate the books, and says viewers can use those ratings to challenge them.
The filing lists Brooke Stephens as president and Lindsay Hull as treasurer. Stephens signs the August 4 filing.
The instructional-materials report lists HEART as “Reviewed–Not Recommended” and “Rejected,” and recommends upholding the denial and removing it as a teacher resource. Reviewers cite conflicts with Utah standards and law, incomplete standards coverage, and incorrect or biased information. The next entry rejects the 1776 Unites appeal, citing weak standards alignment and a collection of resources rather than a cohesive text.
Utah Parents United (UPU) said Alpine School District appeared to be backing away from removals. UPU described the books as pornographic under the law.
The full State Board adopted the 2022 Instructional Materials Review Report, with Natalie Cline and Jennie Earl opposed. It included the recommendation to uphold HEART’s denial and reject 1776 Unites.
PEN America reports that Alpine announced the removal of 52 titles in July after HB374, then kept the books with restrictions following public pushback.
The preserved LaVerna page sends readers to RatedBooks reports and book-location maps. It offers Utah district pages free and links out-of-state users to a $35 StoryLabs product.
Natalie Cline told Alpine’s board she represented district constituents. She called its proposed library policy unclear and argued that it allowed material she considered pornographic.
The preserved recording captures her public comment. A September 28 Daily Herald report also describes her appearance and the district board’s policy vote.
Cline criticizes the policy · September 27, 2022
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I'm here to represent them I have had countless constituents and exasperated parents and teachers who have contacted me with serious concerns about the obscene books and other materials in their children's schools the bottom line is that alpineus a proposed Library materials policy is full of loopholes subjectivity strategic ambiguity all creating contradictory guidance that only confuses those that are trying to do the right thing height of intelligence is being being able to make something that's so clear and so simple that it can't be misunderstood if I were to ask each board member here what what parts of your policy meant and how it should be interpreted and applied I would probably get seven different answers the proposed policy ignores clear aspects of the law while elevating academic inquiry and an agenda of inclusivity above the law and allowing pornographic content to remain in the
Open the full preserved-excerpt source ↗Ivory’s Deseret News opinion directs parents to RatedBooks to inspect school holdings and content.
Ivory asked readers to judge whether books rated “4s and 5s” in their children’s schools violated the sensitive-materials standard he described. He linked RatedBooks while defending HB374.
2022–2023
The ratings moved from parent tools into public hearings. The next records show lawmakers naming the site and Stephens helping present new bills.
During the HB374 update, Ivory introduced Stephens and directed listeners to ratedbooks.org. The minutes identify her as a Utah Parents United (UPU) speaker.
The deck also shows RatedBooks’ homepage, book-location maps and ratings spreadsheet. It quotes a parent’s request to remove Orem High books and links the list used in that request. Other slides show the PDF links on RatedBooks’ Davis School District page and a one-page “Slicksheets” list of rated titles.
USBE representatives also testified. The saved transcript says board rules required districts and charter schools to publish book-selection criteria. The model policy covered both adding books and reviewing challenges.
Ivory introduces Stephens and RatedBooks · 25 seconds
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She is a mom who then started her own website to put the books up and the material up. It's called ratedbooks.org. If you want to know what books are in your school and what's in the books in your school, you can go to the website, ratedbooks.org, that a mom with other moms put together to try to be heard about the material that's in their schools.
Full original · 7.5–32.8 secondsUtah Parents United (UPU) published its reading of the 2022 curriculum audit. It urged hotline reports, participation in curriculum review and contact with lawmakers about teacher training.
Apple’s saved listing dates Amplify USA’s release to October 25, 2022 and names Aaron Stephens as seller.
UPU thanked Davis School District for removing 21 books. Its post supplied ratings, report links and slicksheet links for named titles.
Davis School District received a request to review the King James Version of the Bible for inclusion in school libraries.
The request put the Bible through Davis’s library review process. Later entries follow the grade limits and appeal.
Family Watch International reported on a Protect Child Health Coalition conference in Dallas. It said Brooke Stephens presented RatedBooks.org and BookLooks.org as parent tools and cited Utah’s HB374. The report also covered research databases and Texas legislative goals.
A February 21 companion article links the detailed report and identifies Family Watch International as the coalition’s facilitator.
Later context: These are separate SPLC entries for different groups. Its 2024 “Antigovernment” list includes Utah Parents United. The SPLC profile of Family Watch International labels that group a hate group in the “anti-LGBTQ” category. The list was released May 22, 2025.
Ivory’s introduced HB464 carried estimated state costs of $398,400 a year in FY2024 and FY2025. The fiscal note included up to $250,000 for Risk Management because the bill allowed lawsuits and attorney fees, up to $75,000 for possible State Board fines, and $73,400 a year for training, compliance and reviews.
District review costs were unknown. HB464 did not pass. These are cost estimates, not recorded spending.
Official fiscal estimate. Select the page to read the full note.
HB464 (2023): School Materials Amendments. Ivory’s proposal would have required a state rating system for school materials. Its first substitute also required a review when a parent reported prohibited material. Public votes would explain decisions to keep or restore challenged material. It did not become law. On March 3, 2023, it went into the file for bills not passed.
House Education minutes record Ivory presenting HB464 with Jennie Earl, Andrea Ni and Stephens of Utah Parents United (UPU). It proposed state ratings and book-purchasing rules but did not pass.
The minutes also list Carrie Bartholomew, described as a mother, speaking in favor. The first substitute was adopted 12–0 and advanced from committee 7–6.
HB464 discussion of book-rating systems · 77 seconds
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public school libraries. Where are these books coming from? I guess in my mind when I look at this I think how did they get here? Where are they coming from? Someone's providing them and they're not just providing them in one area. It's not just Utah being pushed back. It's around the nation. So there have been systems and rating things put in place and I'll share just three of them that are out there. Those are not necessarily the ones we have to use but I do think there is value in saying to vendors this is where Utah's line is. These are the things that we don't take into our public libraries. They don't have to use our rating system but they surely know where Utah stands and they need to understand where that line is. Book Looks has one. It's a very simple zero to five. Some of these things are out at certain ages. It goes further than just the sexualized content. It also has language and violence. Things like that build into it. Common sense media has, they have also similar type of a thing and also rated books has just a breakdown. So I guess my point in saying this is that we do have, there are some resources out there that we can reference in looking at how to
Full original · 1362–1439 secondsNicholeen Peck supports the rating system · 56 seconds
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Thank you. My name is Nicolene Peck. I'm president of the Worldwide Organization for Women, and we are in support of this bill. We especially appreciate the rating system that has been put in here. I think it gives a great message to vendors who are just giving stuff to the schools without schools soliciting, like asking for the books. They're just delivering them. We also love that this is going to decrease the workload on districts all around the state. It's going to make it easier, which is great. A little bit of context for the library. A dear friend of mine, her daughter is a librarian down in southern Utah at a school, and the vendors like Fullett will deliver these books that have not been asked for. She'll see them. Some of them are so bad she'll hide them in her desk or somewhere, and she's like, no child is going to see this book because they know it's bad. They don't know what to do about it and how to get it.
Full original · 3162–3218 secondsDuring the presentation, Jennie Earl named BookLooks, Common Sense Media and RatedBooks as examples of rating resources.
Rep. Melissa Ballard’s sixth substitute of HB138 carried an estimated $92,500 annual State Board review cost from FY2024. The fiscal note estimated no direct, measurable local costs. The bill did not pass.
A fiscal note estimates costs. It does not show what was spent.
Official fiscal estimate. Select the page to read the full note.
The board approved consent items 1–10, including the appeal committee’s recommendations. The adopted recommendations remove The Bluest Eye, All Boys Aren’t Blue, The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, and Red, White & Royal Blue, and retain The Clockwork Princess.
Mar 7, 2023: consent items 1 through 10 Mar 7, 2023 · 35 seconds
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consent items board are there any items that were requested to remove from consent if not we're ready for a motion on the consent items I move that we accept consent items one through ten I second that motion thank you we have a motion for mr. Robinson a second from miss Hogan on consent items one through ten all in favor of that motion please say aye aye aye any opposed with a name okay that one passes unanimously
Utah Parents United (UPU) said it had no role in the Bible challenge. It described its reading of HB374’s bright-line categories and its preferred library standard.
The Utah Library Association’s (ULA) journal said HB464 would have required a system like ratedbooks.org. It credited Utah Cultural Alliance lobbying and support from Let Utah Read, PEN America and the ACLU of Utah in opposing the bills.
The Davis School District map labels a layer “4/17/23 - DSD Books needing to be challenged.” Its legend distinguishes books rated 5 and 4 from books rated 4 and 3, and its school markers list titles and links.
The board approved consent items 1–10, including the appeal recommendations. Monday’s Not Coming was retained in junior high and high school, reversing the initial committee’s removal decision. Thirteen Reasons Why and Sold were retained in high school.
Apr 18, 2023: consent items 1 through 10 Apr 18, 2023 · 48 seconds
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the first group is consent items board before we open that for a vote are there any items that you'd like move from the consent agenda to a business item okay with that we're ready for a motion on the consent items 1 through 9 10 what's that there are 10 oh you're right there's a more recent version mine says nine case so it's consent items 1 through 10 thank you I move we approve consent items 1 through 10 I'll second that so we have a motion from mr. Robison a second from mr. art to approve consent items 1 through 10 all in favor of that motion say aye aye aye any opposed that's unanimous we'll move
Utah Parents United’s (UPU) video said Ivory and Mayor Trent Staggs testified at a Jordan board meeting. It credited its education director, LaVerna’s founder, with gathering the materials.
Davis limited the King James Bible to high school libraries after finding no bright-line violation of the sexual-content test. A separate age-appropriateness review led to its removal from elementary and junior high libraries.
Davis received appeals of the Bible’s high-school-only status. Under its policy, three board members would reconsider the decision and recommend an outcome to the full board.
An app-cache copy of Ivory’s House newsletter says he has met with Jordan board members over HB374 and directs readers to RatedBooks and BookLooks.
The Bible appeal was moved out of consent for discussion. Brigit Gerrard moved to reinstate the King James Bible at all levels of Davis school libraries; John Robison seconded, and all seven board members voted in favor.
The appeal committee found no bright-line violation. It concluded that the Bible’s serious value for minors outweighed its violent or vulgar content. Logan Toone told the board that eight copies removed from elementary and junior high libraries would be restored.
Jun 20, 2023: item 2 pulled from the consent items Jun 20, 2023 · 46 seconds
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move now to our consent items board members are there any items that you'd like to move from consent to a business item president Mumford I would like to move item number two to a business item please thank you so I'm gonna move item number two to the top of our business items and that leaves the board minutes as a consent item we need a motion to approve those minutes I'll move that we approve the minutes I'll second so we have a motion from mr. Rd and a second from miss price to approve the minutes any discussion or questions all in favor please say aye aye that's unanimous we'll move forward now to our business items and the board appeal committee recommendations
Jun 20, 2023: the vote on the Bible appeal Jun 20, 2023 · 22 seconds
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If not, I think we're ready for a vote. We had a motion by Miss Gerard and a second by Mr. Robison all in favor in them of the motion to approve the board appeal committee recommendation to reinstate the Bible in all DSD media centers. Please say aye, aye That's unanimous by the board. Thank you. Dr. To
A KSL investigation reported that Granite School District had received 94 book challenges, with 26 books removed and 23 restricted, according to Granite School District spokesman Ben Horsley (now superintendent). KSL reported that the challenges came from six people, including Horsley himself. “The overwhelming majority of the content has come from one parent who’s done a lot of research,” Horsley said.
Stephens shared the findings on Facebook the same day under a message signed “Representative Ken Ivory”: “Hurray for Ben Horsley, Garrick Peterson, and Washington School District!!!! If only my own Jordan School District, and all other school district in Utah would take this responsibility so seriously!!!”
Bruce Friedman told Cari Bartholomew that local activists asked him to read book passages at a school-board meeting because others were reluctant to be the face of the effort. He said he agreed and brought his “thick skin” from New York.
He described collecting flagged-title lists from around the country, named BookLooks and RatedBooks, and asked others to send him their lists. He said he turned supplied excerpts into local challenges under his own name and uploaded reports for others to reuse. He reported a master list of more than 4,000 titles and 404 challenges.
His later written instructions: Friedman’s August 5, 2026 list says its links can help readers challenge a book “even if you’ve never read the book yourself.” He also writes that No Left Turn in Education does not endorse his list or its mission.
Activists asked him to read · 2:09–2:35
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standard in June of last year some Associates local people activists they asked me to read the pornographic content of a couple of books at a school board meeting to help bring attention to it everyone in this crowd was too shy or had other reasons for resisting being the face of that effort I came from New York I brought my thick skin with me
Open original at this passagePooling lists and reusing reports · 4:24–6:55
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now is people all over the nation are reading these terrible books I have a list I'll share the website with you later of over 4 000 titles the list is comprised not a books that I know are bad but books that somewhere somebody in America challenge them or flag them for concerning content doesn't necessarily mean that they have to be removed from all the schools it does mean that if we're going to attack this problem those are the ones we should read first yeah so the problem is there are groups everywhere you're familiar with many of them you have book looks and rated books and a number of localized State and County groups throughout the nation everybody has a little list of books that concern them I'm sure by now most of your listeners have heard of genderqueer that particular graphic novel which is formed I recognized that there were 200 or more individual reports on just how bad that book is meanwhile 199 of those people could have read another book and helped fix the problem on a bigger level so I took on the role of Master of Ceremonies I'm the MC for all the list people if you have a list send it to me I will absorb it into my list I'm going to tell you now and I'll remind you later my email address is Bruce b-r-u-c-e dot Friedman f-r-i-e-d like fried man had no left turn dot u s stop with your little lists make it my problem I've already handled everyone I could find including those provided by our intellectual opponents pen America and the American Library Association they keep pretty good records I've absorbed them when there's a title that ala is screaming that oh my God people are challenging this club it goes on my list we'll figure out whether it was worthy of a challenge later I will get copies of the relevant icky pages and I will convert that into a proper Challenge and submit it in my name locally and then upload it to my list which goes on the internet I'll share that later and then nationally no one else has to read that horrible book again that has resulted in so far the acknowledgment of 404 challenges I'll be delivering about 50 more tomorrow at the next board meeting they school district has no money this
Open original at this passageIn a Radical Center interview published July 5, Stephens said she stayed at a national-conference presentation to charge her computer. A woman beside her shared a book list and showed her how to search her child’s school catalog.
She said she used the list to search schools after returning home, and placed this experience before the rating system.
Her conference account · 3:26–4:26 in the interview
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explicit Books Okay and um and so found this was kind of shocked and I didn't think it was in my kids school and then I went to a national conference and accidentally I had to charge my computer and so I stayed for a presentation I wasn't planning on staying for and you know those little serendipitous things that we think are coincidental that really are meant to kind of shape our path just because I had to charge my computer I got this whole presentation and then I ended up sitting next to a woman who showed me how to search my child's school and she gave me a list of all of these books and I went in and I when I got home I began to take this list and search the schools and every time my stomach would drop when I would see it I'm like this is here and these this wasn't even the worst books these were books this was before we had the rating system this was before we had these I think we were close to 500 books that are rated now with this rating system okay and I I was
Open original interview at 3:26Through consent items 1–8, the board approved removing The Lovely Bones, Deogratias, A Tale of Rwanda, and Lawn Boy. The appeal changed The Lovely Bones from high-school access to removal.
Jul 18, 2023: consent items 1 through 8 Jul 18, 2023 · 34 seconds
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Great. Next, we have our consent items. Board, are there any items you'd like to remove from the consent agenda to a regular business item? Seeing none, we'll take a motion to approve consent items 1 through 8. I move we accept the consent items 1 through 8. I'll second that motion. So we have a motion from Mr. Lamb and a second from Ms. Price. All in favor of accepting consent items 1 through 8, please say aye. Okay, next we'll open our first business
In an Ethnic Studies interview, Stephens described asking ChatGPT about book content, then searching a PDF for quotes and page numbers. She directed viewers to RatedBooks and BookLooks.
Stephens describes ChatGPT and PDF keyword searches
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show yeah I'm not sure that this is done here but I also and this is very controversial people don't like this some people don't like this idea but I'll ask chat gbt like if these books has uh what type of content it has and then I'll go get the PDF and then I'll keyword search to find the exact quotes and page numbers so if parents aren't aware of what's in books I mean read it that's the first thing right but if you don't have time booklooks.org and ratedbooks.org they have reviews and they and they do have commentary on that racist uh the racist component of the books as well as the sexual nature and gender ideology is reported on so this is another book that doesn't like if I'm just looking at the cover I
Through consent items 1–4, the board approved removing The Poet X and Me and Earl and the Dying Girl. The first committee had kept The Poet X in high school and also kept Me and Earl and the Dying Girl.
Oct 3, 2023: consent items 1 through 4 Oct 3, 2023 · 55 seconds
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to proceed on our agenda to consent items are there any items that a board member would like to move off of consent to a business item seeing none we're ready for a motion to approve consent items 1 through 6 oh sorry yeah or just a question before we proceed well like so if they if I want a discussion move it to a bit yeah so 5 and 6 the additional one-time compensation and super con superintendent contract those are the two okay sounds good so we need a motion to approve consent items 1 through 4 I move that we approve the consent items 1 through 4 I'll second that so we've got a motion from miss Hogan and a second from mr. R to approve consent items 1 through 4 all in favor please say aye aye aye aye that's unanimous board
The Education Interim Committee discussed draft 2024FL-0657/005, dated October 10, and directed its chairs to gather member feedback and staff to prepare a bill for November. The motion passed 16–0, with four absent.
That draft and the attached “Pending Items” document had no audit proposal from the Office of the Legislative Auditor General (OLAG). The audit requirement appeared in the November 15 draft.
The board approved the appeal recommendations through consent items 1–6. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, Looking for Alaska, and The Perks of Being a Wallflower were removed.
Crank and The Handmaid’s Tale were retained in high school with parental permission required. The Kite Runner was retained in high school, narrowing its initial junior-high-and-high-school designation.
Nov 14, 2023: consent items 1 through 6 Nov 14, 2023 · 54 seconds
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So if there's no objections to items 1 through 6, we'll take a motion to approve the consent items. I'll move that we approve the consent items 1 through 6 with the small change. I'll second that. So we have a motion from Ms. Gerard and a second from Ms. Price to approve consent items 1 through 6, noting a clerical change to the minutes as noted by Ms. Powell. Any discussion? I just want to clarify for Ms. Powell over there. The other Ms. Powell. It was the October 3rd meeting under board reports. Did you get what I said? It should say legislative priorities, not religious leader. I'm sure it was just a. Thank you. Okay, all in favor, please say aye. Aye. Thank you.
Education Interim minutes record Ivory clarifying the proposal and Stephens of UPU speaking in favor. On the recording she identifies herself as founder of RatedBooks.
Stephens identifies RatedBooks · 50 seconds
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So, on the right, please state your name for the, and tell us who you represent. Brooke, you can go first. Okay. Hi, my name is Brooke Stevens. I am with Utah Parents United. I'm also the founder of ratedbooks.org, the founder of Laverne and the Library, and the founder of Mary and the Library USA. I've been fighting this for over two years. Last week, I went to a conference where someone was reading the content aloud. And I thought it wouldn't affect me. And it did. I had to leave. And I went in my room, and I cried, and I came back, and I tried to take it again, and I had to leave. So, while we're talking about all these little things, we're not talking about how it affects, how it damages the soul. And so, if you have a question.
Full original · 2755–2805 secondsMike Curtis presented the November draft’s added OLAG provision: compliance audits on a rolling basis over four years. The clause was absent from the October draft.
The committee recommended the amended draft, 10–4, with six absent. HB29’s saved 2024 record identifies Education Interim as the recommending committee.
Curtis explains the added OLAG audit clause
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with this statute. And then there's also the addition of, it's down on line 197 in the draft, is it requires the Office of the Legislative Auditor General to engage in audits, specifically regarding the sensitive material statute. So we know that the auditor's already working through public education audits. this would require audits for compliance with this statute on a rolling basis over the next four years from when the bill would go into effect. And finally, the bill also provides an indemnification provision for LEAs, so the state would indemnify LEAs for any claims or damages arising out of compliance with this section. And with that, Mr. Chair, I'd be open to any questions.
Open original recording at this passageUtah Parents United used Amplify to ask readers to email their State Board member in support of repealing R277-328. UPU argued that the educational-equity rule allowed a Critical Race Theory viewpoint.
UPU’s January Empowered Parents Classes page links an “Introduction to HEART Sex Ed” recording. A separate class resource sheet directs participants to StoryLabs with a class code and lists Brooke as the contact for questions. The resource sheet itself is undated.
In the West Jordan Information and Political Discussions 2 Facebook group, a January 14, 2024 post asked about the book bill Ivory was sponsoring. Ivory replied with a question: “I am curious to know what any/each of you believe is the correct age appropriate limit for materials for K-12 school children in Utah?”
When the post’s author asked whether the Bible should be banned, Ivory called the comparison “so fundamentally unserious” and wrote: “Please look at any of the books rated 4 or 5 on rated books.org and show the moral and factual equivalence to the Bible.”
Pavement Education Project filed North Carolina nonprofit articles naming Janet Peterson as incorporator and registered agent, and Jim Walsh, Colleen Miller and John Balog as officers. It would have no members.
Why it belongs here: Pavement later appears alongside Brooke Stephens’ RatedBooks on the rating scale. The October 2025 version credits “Pavement Education Project with RatedBooks.org.” This filing dates the nonprofit’s formation; the later scale documents the connection to her platform. See the jointly credited rating scale ↓
The earlier state-rating bill failed. HB29 took a different route: local removals could trigger removal across Utah. Stephens again helped Ivory present it.
HB29 (2024): Sensitive Material Review Amendments. Ivory’s law set two review standards: “objective” and “subjective” sensitive material. A statewide removal could follow objective findings by three school districts, or two districts and five charter schools. The state board could overturn the statewide removal in specified cases. Cox signed the law March 18, 2024. It took effect July 1.
The law also required Office of the Legislative Auditor General compliance audits of districts, with priorities set by the Audit Subcommittee. Audits were due before November 2028, with yearly reports to Education Interim.
Brooke Stephens appears alongside Ken Ivory and Gloria Vindas in the official record of HB29’s presentation. The minutes identify Stephens with Utah Parents United. In the recording, she tells the committee: “My website is RatedBooks.org.”
Stephens identifies her website · 22 seconds
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years my website is ratedbooks.org and you can find links to school district policies book reports and Utah book locations it's been nearly two years since the sensitive materials law was passed yet there are 98 explicit book titles rated 4 and 5 which is NC 17 or above currently in Utah schools and
Full original · 2.2–24.5 secondsStephens’ LaVerna post thanks Ivory and Vindas for HB29’s committee progress; Ivory replies thanking Stephens and others for their advocacy.
Stephens singled out Ivory’s question, “How many people does it take to report a crime?” as her favorite part of the hearing. She described the bill as requiring three districts to identify the material before statewide removal.
Her posted testimony claimed 98 titles rated 4 or 5, with at least 1,190 copies in Utah schools. She said the spreadsheet covered 19 of 42 districts because some catalogs blocked district-wide searches.
Ivory’s reply thanked Stephens, Vindas and others for fighting “relentlessly, tenaciously.”
Senate Education minutes list Brooke Stevens as a citizen assisting Ivory. The minutes use that spelling for Brooke Stephens.
Stephens describes Utah locations · 16 seconds
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So I thought if people would just see it, that they would remove it. And so I've put a lot of effort into showing what it is and documenting which schools have removed it. So if you go to Utah Rated Books, Utah Locations, there's a spreadsheet I also emailed it to you.
Full original · 0–15.5 secondsHB29’s second-substitute fiscal note estimated $10,000 in annual State Board review costs from FY2025, which the board could absorb. Risk Management estimated up to $100,000 per occurrence if the state covered lawsuits against people enforcing the law. District review costs were unknown.
A fiscal note estimates costs. It does not show what was spent.
Official fiscal estimate. Select the page to read the full note.
Ivory’s opinion defends parents who built RatedBooks; a same-day open letter by Stephens and Vindas promotes the resource and includes Ken and Becky Ivory in its signatory list.
Six groups urged Governor Cox to sign HB29, opposing the Utah Education Association’s (UEA) veto request. Their letter cited 34 titles removed by three or more districts and the February22 Stephens–Vindas open letter.
Cox signed Ivory’s Sensitive Material Review Amendments. Final objective-sensitive-material findings by at least three school districts, or two districts and five charter schools, trigger statewide removal. The State Board can vote to end that requirement through its review process.
The law took effect July 1, 2024. It also required district compliance audits, subject to Audit Subcommittee prioritization, with completion before November 2028.
The board approved consent items 1–6, including recommendations to remove I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, Bodies Are Cool, and The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian. The initial committee had retained the latter two books.
Mar 19, 2024: consent items 1 through 6 Mar 19, 2024 · 32 seconds
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Next up we're gonna move to our consent items board. Are there any requests to move a consent item to business? Seeing none. I'll take a motion to approve consent items 1 through 6 I'll move that we approve consent items 1 through 6 second Thank you. So we have a motion from mr. Ard a second from miss Powell all in favor of that motion to consent on items 1 through 6 please say aye aye thank you that's unanimous we'll move
In the Protect Ohio Children webinar, Stephens says Ken Ivory wrote a 12-page Pico analysis. RatedBooks links a document titled Pico Analysis.
Host Diane Stover introduced Stephens as a new national Protect Child Health Coalition (PCHC) co-chair. She said Protect Ohio Children had promoted the site for several years. Stephens described a Michigan volunteer copying BookLooks ratings into RatedBooks and adding content categories.
Stephens credits Ivory’s Pico analysis · 28 seconds
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thing and did a 12-page analysis. So Representative Ivory, Ken Ivory, wrote this 12-page analysis. I'm going to make you seasick really fast just so you kind of get an idea of what it is. But one of the main things that we want to do is to say, you know, it's summarized right over here. Let's see. It is in, that's Michigan's
Full original · 1207–1235 secondsDiane Stover introduces Stephens as PCHC co-chair · 0:16–0:46
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Ohio children Coalition and co-chair of the national protect child health Coalition today we are so so so excited to have my colleague and new co-chair of pchc Brooke Stevens with us Brooke is with Utah parents United and she's the founder of rated books our organization has been advertising her website in Ohio for several years now and I know it's also being used in many many states Across the Nation Brooke is going to share her background with us and share
Open original at this passageStephens describes BookLooks ratings and the Michigan volunteer · 7:02–9:08
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for legislators when I was trying to get it pasted I didn't pay anything for it and um it just looked pretty dumb I threw images up on there um we became more sophisticated as they said hey well we need ratings because you're giving us some really bad ones some meteor ochre ones so um book looks from Florida is the one who supplies all of our ratings I'm going to show you um her page booklook s.org and show you what what you're going to want to do when you come here so she has new content you're going to want to sign up for her um for her newsletter she'll say these are all the new ones that I just released and the way she has it arranged is um alphabetically so you see the letters right here you go in and you'll see all of them here now she wants to be information she doesn't want to do activist work so that's why we have rated books because I want to help people get it out and I'm so grateful for all the work that book looks has done um ours you can see the browse book section and you can also keyword search it so here's the keyword search Looking for Alaska is the first the reason we got the law passed in the first place because I had the excerpt to show the state superintendent as as she was walking in and I said this book was just retained in my daughter's junior high school so um you can keyword search and find it here sometimes I've taken um things out we have a wonderful volunteer in uh Michigan who keeps this updated with everything from booklook so as soon as bookl looks comes out with something our volunteer in Michigan she um she puts it on our website and the one thing that she does that's I absolutely love this has taken so much time is she does um a Content rating so
Open original at this passageA member asked who orders school books, whether state or local contracts cover them, and how refunds and automatic shipments work. Another participant offered to explain library selection and contracts.
Who orders the books?
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So I have a lot more homework to do myself, but who orders the books that we get? What contracts are we in at a state level or local LEA level with publishers or distributors? Do they ever do refunds? Where do we match up the money? Like if you get stuff that you don't, you know, we got those books, we send them back and they reimburse us because we paid them. I don't know if that's how that works, but those dynamics like who orders the books? Are we on an automatic shipment of these are the books that are under this entity that says send that out to all the, you know, all the schools nationwide? And why? And if it's getting to the point where laws are in place now that it's like there's a group of percentage of your books that are falling in conflict with the law that we just how do we mitigate that from the beginning? Instead of having to do something like this, the back end, like it's putting a bandaid on a hemorrhage type approach. So I don't know. It just seems like there's a higher level.
Offer to explain selection and contracts
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all of those things exist though i was gonna say i probably don't want to take the time now but i don't know to like share with you like like how librarians operate how schools operate with selecting materials and how they contract yeah and how the contracts work and how all of that i'd be happy to publish contract with authors and if authors have you know like to delve off into that field that's their right but like as as our entity we have to protect yeah and i don't generally contract with authors like i haven't heard of an lea i don't know how i would love to like meet with you and kind of share
Vice Chair Emily Green asked who manages purchases and whether outside groups or vendors supply book lists. A district librarian described local choices. Staff offered help from the purchasing director and librarians, which Green welcomed.
Green asks who selects purchases
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Like we, you know, a business has a purchasing department and what they do is they go in and they look at their inventory needs and they, they make their, their, um, their purchases that they send out when that is received and you have your receiving department, they scan it that they got it from the delivery man, then they, they scan that inventory and they go stop the shelves. So I would assume that there is that there's that level that exists there. There is somebody that is creating an order for the inventory that's coming to the schools as it relates specifically to library books and, and materials. And I guess this does fall into other books that are being ordered, but as far as the librarians go, um, who is the, who is the purchasing department? Who's the purchasing manager that looks at what inventory needs to be ordered and goes in and selects, we need 30 books of this. We need seven books of that. We need this. If that doesn't come organically from an order form from a librarian, is that list procured from an outside organization or vendor. Okay.
A district librarian describes local practice
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A big box of books, and that was rare I would say in 5 years in that library, I probably got 2 boxes of books from them. There's no procurement like I maybe this never happened to me, and as a district librarian I never had any of my libraries that I knew of that were getting like boxes of books sent to them from vendors or publishers.
Staff offer procurement information
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A little bit. And I was gonna say, Vice Chair Green, if you would like more like further information on that question, we can get some before the next meeting we can get with Adam Hurd as well about procurement or even with the librarians. Okay, yeah, that would be great. I think it's, yeah, that would be very helpful.
The May 2 Board packet included R277-628 Draft 3, dated April 22. Lines 62–64 proposed review-committee conflict-of-interest rules naming book purchasers and challengers as examples.
Bring the ratings into the decision
The ratings were promoted as a way to check school collections. Later pricing pages offered paid access, list matching and links inside library systems.
During public comment, Brooke Stephens directs the Board to the RatedBooks homepage. Later in the same public-comment period, Darby Holmes says they learned about RatedBooks through a Utah Coalition Against Pornography conference the previous May.
The final motion approved R277-628, Sensitive Materials, Draft 5 as amended, on third and final reading. The recording announces a unanimous vote. Earlier, members approved language requiring three or more board members to request review of a statewide removal.
The June 11 “as passed” Word copy retained the one-member wording and omitted several adopted amendments. The saved audio and the exported rule therefore differ.
The state’s saved removal list records August 2, 2024 as the statewide threshold date for A Court of Thorns and Roses (Court of Thorns and Roses #1); A Court of Frost and Starlight (Court of Thorns and Roses #3.1); A Court Of Mist And Fury (Court of Thorns and Roses #2); A Court Of Silver Flames (Court of Thorns and Roses #4); What Girls Are Made Of; A Court Of Wings And Ruin (Court of Thorns and Roses #3); Milk and Honey; Forever; Tilt; Fallout (Crank, Book 3); Oryx and Crake; Blankets; Empire of Storms (Throne of Glass #5). These titles met the threshold for removal from student access across Utah public schools.
Under HB29, qualifying local objective-material determinations can trigger statewide removal. This is the first threshold date on the saved state list; the listed titles then became unavailable to students across Utah public schools unless the State Board reversed the requirement.
PEN America explained HB29’s statewide removal process, named Ken Ivory as its author and discussed disposal of removed books.
The Utah Library Association’s (ULA) September issue explained HB29 and offered advice on attending meetings and contacting lawmakers.
Utah Parents United (UPU) celebrated the 13-title statewide list, thanked Ken Ivory and Todd Weiler for HB29 and HB374, and directed parents to RatedBooks.
Utah’s articles of incorporation record Hope of Utah’s effective date as October 14, 2024, with Jamie Renda as incorporator and registered agent. The filing is numbered 241014029522B, for entity 14505669-0140.
In a February 2026 video, Brooke Stephens later described RatedBooks as a Hope of Utah partner. That account appears below.
Selected fields from the preserved state articles: “Filed On October 14, 2024”; “Entity ID 14505669-0140”; “Effective Date: October 14, 2024”; “Title: Incorporator”; “Name: Jamie Renda.” Filing number: 241014029522B.
Moms for America named its Utah team: Robin Young, state liaison; Cari Bartholomew, state director; Brooke Stephens, civic engagement director; Ana Benson, Hispanic outreach director; and Peggy Hanton, administrator. It advertised an October24 summit on school-board involvement, with Gayle Ruzicka and Kelly Kohls among the speakers.
An earlier Utah Parents United filing names Stephens as a director. This Moms for America announcement does not explain whether the two groups had a formal link.
Image from the October 23, 2024 press release.
The state’s saved removal list records November 7, 2024 as the statewide threshold date for Living Dead Girl. The districts listed in the October 7, 2026 saved copy are Davis, Tooele, Washington.
2024–2025
HB29 had called for audits. Legislators then ordered a review of school book-removal procedures. After the first report, they approved a second review focused on books.
Speaker Mike Schultz’s recorded motion included a performance audit of the process used to remove books in public schools, alongside audits of police/prosecutors, Medicaid oversight and alcohol services.
The saved minutes list the other three audits and a 6–0 vote, but omit the school-book audit. The recording’s transcript places it inside the original motion. The saved PDF is labeled draft minutes.
Schultz’s audit motion and the vote · 59 seconds
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- Careful what you ask for, Dr. Minchin. Mr. President, I move that we prioritize the following audits and give the flexibility of the Auditor General to begin the audit as staff expertise and resources become available. A performance audit of the efficiency and effectiveness of the police departments and district attorney's offices in the state. The audit should specifically include the Salt Lake City Police Department and the Salt Lake County District Attorney's Office. A performance audit of the process used to remove books in public schools. A systematic audit of the Office of the Inspector General Medicaid Services and a systematic audit of the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Services. - Looks like you may have gotten your wish. So we have a motion. We have discussion to the motion. Say no discussion. All in favor say aye. - Aye. - Any opposed? also passes unanimously.
Full original · 47–106 seconds
Two Amplify notices from Moms for America Utah ask supporters to thank their House representative or senator for a vote to audit school sensitive-material removals. The notices link the committee recording and the Utah school-location spreadsheet.
The amendment lists Stephens as inactive in both president and director roles. It lists Corinne Johnson, Korrin Dickson and Lindsay Hull as active directors.
KUER analyzed a State Board of Education list it obtained through a records request. The list had 163 reports of objective sensitive material from nine districts, covering 102 titles. Davis made 77 of the reports and Washington County made 51.
KUER reported that those two districts had reported all 14 titles already removed statewide, and that 25 more titles had reports from two districts each.
StoryLabs also offered language-learning tools. Two New York school records name Brooke Stephens as the vendor’s signer. These are privacy agreements. Neither lists a price or payment.
Brooke Stephens signs StoryLabs’ student-data forms for East Hampton Union Free School District. The form fields name S&S Apps and “Latin All Access Pisoverse & Olimpi.” They select direct vendor pricing and a license for each teacher or classroom.
Stephens’ signatures on pages 7 and 9 are dated May 29. The district’s listing gives an approval period of July 1, 2025 through June 30, 2027.
Read East Hampton’s signed forms ↗Shenendehowa Central School District signs onto StoryLabs’ privacy terms. The form names Brooke Stephens as StoryLabs’ co-founder. Her signature is carried over from the earlier agreement; the new district signature is dated August 1, 2025.
The form covers privacy protections. It says the provider’s signature does not necessarily bind it on price or the service schedule.
Read Shenendehowa’s signed form ↗Michelle Barber moved the appeal recommendation out of the consent vote for separate consideration. The board unanimously delayed it until February so more information could be posted on the district website.
The pending recommendations were to remove Breathless, How Beautiful the Ordinary, Lighter Than My Shadow, Lucky, and The Almost Moon.
Jan 21, 2025: item 8 pulled from the consent items Jan 21, 2025 · 77 seconds
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we're to the portion of our meeting uh to the consent items and uh hopefully you've had plenty of time to look at those consent items are there any items that anyone would like to move off of consent on to a business item uh president drard yes i'd like to remove item eight sensitive materials appeal committee recommendation okay um we will move that to a business side do we have to vote on that mr lovell we don't do it it's just a request of a board member i believe i think you would just vote to approve everything else besides that one yeah but we don't have to vote to move it so okay um anything else um do we have a motion to uh approve the consent items um except for number eight the sensitive materials appeal committee recommendation i move to approve consent items one through seven i'll second that okay so we had a motion by ms powell and a second by ms price to approve the consent items um except for an abrate thank you all in favor aye aye aye aye any opposed
Jan 21, 2025: the appeals recommendation is tabled Jan 21, 2025 · 31 seconds
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Okay, so we have the motion on the floor to table the sensitive materials appeals. Recommendation until February and until after some more information will be added on to the website. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Thank you. One opposed. Oh, no. Sorry. Was that? No. Okay. Okay. Unanimous. Okay.
The state’s saved removal list records January 21, 2025 as the statewide threshold date for Damsel. The districts listed in the October 7, 2026 saved copy are Davis, Park City, Washington.
The state’s saved removal list records January 28, 2025 as the statewide threshold date for Like a Love Story. The districts listed in the October 7, 2026 saved copy are Davis, Jordan, Washington.
The board approved consent items 1–6, including the appeal recommendation. Breathless, How Beautiful the Ordinary, Lighter Than My Shadow, Lucky, Storm and Fury, and The Almost Moon were removed under the objective-sensitive-material criteria.
After Drama passed the objective test, the appeal committee directed a subjective review before any further appeal. Five of the six removal titles had been delayed on January 21.
Feb 4, 2025: consent items 1 through 6 Feb 4, 2025 · 39 seconds
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okay now consent items okay is there is there any piece of the consent item any number that you want to move to business item if not I will entertain a motion I move that we approve consent items one through six second okay we have a motion by miss Hogan and a second by miss Powell to approve the consent items one through six all in favor aye aye any opposed okay that passes
In Time to Speak Up, Stephens showed how to find books by district on RatedBooks. She pointed to Water for Elephants in school catalogs and urged concerned viewers to file challenges.
The video description states the plan: highlight one book at a time with a video, then ask parents in those districts to file challenges.
Stephens urges Water for Elephants challenges
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it sucking it for God's sake as of February 2025 Water for Elephants remains accessible to miners at South Jordan Middle School where students range from 11 to 14 years old as well as in several high schools across the state serving students aged 14 to 18 thankfully many communities have contested this book and have been successful in getting it removed from their schools however Bingham High School in the Jordan School District chose to keep this content in their schools despite being strongly contested so who exactly is overseeing the retention of content for children that includes a graphic scene about a prostitute sucking her own tit and giving [ __ ] to a young boy Librarians elas and school boards paid with taxpayers dollars are turning a blind eye or in some cases even promoting this content in schools do you know what's going on in your school district visit rated books.org search your school district and if you are concerned submit a book challenge you can also write Mary in the library USA gmail.com for help it's time to hold accountable those
The fiscal note for the second substitute of HB473, School Digital Materials Amendments, sponsored by Rep. Nicholeen Peck, estimated no state expenditures and no direct, measurable costs for local governments in FY2025 through FY2027. HB473 did not pass.
A fiscal note estimates costs. It does not show what was spent.
Official fiscal estimate. Select the page to read the full note.
The state’s saved removal list records March 6, 2025 as the statewide threshold date for Tricks (Tricks, Book 1). The districts listed in the October 7, 2026 saved copy are Davis, Tooele, Washington.
In a preserved LaVerna post, Stephens thanks BookLooks for its work and reviews “freely given.” She says RatedBooks will continue linking to all BookLooks reports and organizing and providing book reviews. The post shares BookLooks’ notice announcing a March 23 closure.
What the later index shows: In the saved July 14, 2026 index, 802 of 1,209 entries were labeled “BookLooks.” That is about two out of three.
The index also claims ownership of its tags, ratings and methods. Its notice requires written permission to copy, scrape or sell them.
The saved index has 1,209 data rows, including 802 labeled “BookLooks” in the Date Added column. A separate July 16 file has 1,103 rows. The files are different snapshots.
Kristen Hogan moved the appeal item out of consent, then moved to uphold the objective committee’s retention of Drama and its removal of Twisted and The Hate U Give. That motion failed 3–4.
Emily Price’s motion to adopt the appeal committee’s recommendations passed 4–3. Drama was retained. Twisted and The Hate U Give advanced for subjective review after the appeal committee found they did not contain objective sensitive material.
Mar 18, 2025: the first motion fails, 3 to 4 Mar 18, 2025 · 42 seconds
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Okay, we have a motion and a second on the floor. I'm not going to read the motion again, but all in favor, say aye. Aye. All opposed to the motion? No. Okay, so help me vote. Raise your hand with the four to three. Okay, four for the motion? No, I get some motion. You probably want to. Okay, let's do a raise of hand. All those in favor of the motion? So there's one, two, three. All those against the motion, the other four. Okay, that motion fails.
Mar 18, 2025: the appeals recommendation is approved, 4 to 3 Mar 18, 2025 · 36 seconds
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okay so is there a motion on the other side I move we we approve the sensitive materials appeal committee recommendation item 7 in the consent items I'll second okay so all in favor of that motion to approve the original consent item say aye aye all opposed no opposed okay so the same vote so that motion passes the original motion on the consent agenda so okay
Stephens shared a BookLooks reports spreadsheet. Ivory asked which titles were in Utah K–12 schools; Stephens replied with the Utah 4s-and-5s spreadsheet.
BookLooks’ notice announces that it will cease operation and take its reports down on March 23. The operators say that, after prayer and reflection, their work there is complete and they have other callings.
The Utah Library Association (ULA) names itself, EveryLibrary, PEN America, ACLU and the League of Utah Writers as Let Utah Read’s founding partners. It reports two private Banned Together screenings in February 2025, an April book club with Legendarium and almost 8,000 opted-in supporters.
The state’s saved removal list records May 5, 2025 as the statewide threshold date for Water for Elephants. The districts listed in the October 7, 2026 saved copy are Cache, Davis, Tooele.
Two Julie Behling video excerpts show Cari Bartholomew describing her school-book advocacy and saying she started substitute teaching.
The publisher dates the interview to July 2024. The videos were uploaded May 8, 2025.
School-book advocacy · 12 seconds
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I speak up against the pornography in our schools. We know, again, that this is about breaking the minds of our children. This is about, I don't know if you've read Logan Lansing's book, but this is...
Original recording · source 0–12 seconds
Substitute-teaching account · 21 seconds
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the idea but then ended up not doing it and so it made me interested what books are they teaching in schools and then i started substituting and then i saw what was really going on so i saw gsa clubs um gay straight alliance is one thing and then they also call it the gender and sexualities club because so many of the
Original recording · source 219–240 seconds
Utah filed RatedBooks.org’s nonprofit articles at 10:09 a.m., entity 14574510-0140. The articles name Brooke Stephens as incorporator, registered agent and Director/President.
The first board named Amy Bruner as Secretary, Rene McCurdie as Vice President, and Kimberly Fletcher and Janet Peterson as members. This dates the nonprofit’s formation. The website and rating work began earlier.
The Southern Poverty Law Center released its annual Year in Hate & Extremism findings for 2024. Its “2024 General Antigovernment Groups” list includes Utah Parents United.
Office of the Legislative Auditor General (OLAG) Report 2025-11 reviewed challenge procedures and compliance. Its summary said districts and charter schools mostly followed the 2024 law and the removal process appeared largely to work.
The report called for more time to put policies in place, stronger book-selection rules and better staff communication. It did not assess individual books’ content.
The report said missing procedures appeared to explain communication failures, rather than deliberate oversight. A teacher also raised the cost of classroom sets later removed statewide.
FOX 13’s coverage of the presentation quoted auditor Morgan Hagey describing proactive policies as a way to prevent later removal problems. Leah Blevins added that a clear approval process could support librarians, so “these decisions aren’t all on them.”
FOX 13 reported Hagey’s concern about possibly non-educational database material, although auditors found nothing they could call sensitive. It quoted Corinne Johnson, identified as Utah Parents United’s President, saying schools followed policy but had more work ahead. Johnson credited Senate President Adams and Speaker Mike Schultz for the added focus on library content.
After the first audit presentation, Senate President Stuart Adams moved for a limited review of content flagged by parents and legislators to inform future policy changes. The motion passed 5–0, with one member absent.
Adams, Kirk Cullimore, Angela Romero, Mike Schultz and Casey Snider voted yes. Luz Escamilla was absent.
In a Utah Citizens for the Constitution Telegram post, Jen Brown wrote that the audit had examined the process rather than specific books: “That wasn't exactly what Rep Ivory was hoping for.”
Brown said Mike Schultz and Stuart Adams wanted the audit to continue so it could assess actual books. She reported that Ivory was pleased with that and wanted supporters to thank them.
Brown published this account on June 19 at 11:44 p.m. MDT (June 20 at 05:44 UTC).
As far as the audit goes, apparently they only audited the process but not the specific books. That wasn't exactly what Rep Ivory was hoping for, but yesterday when the audit was presented Mike Schultz and Stuart Adams were both very strong and said they want the audit to continue so they can assess the actual books. Rep Ivory was pleased with that and wants us to thank them. That would be a good talking point for next week.
Primary record of Brown’s statement; secondary account of Ivory’s reaction.
EveryLibrary counted 133 bills it considered harmful to libraries or readers in 33 states in January–July 2025. It also counted 76 bills intended to protect or expand services or readers’ rights.
In this preserved book-club excerpt, Cari Bartholomew contrasts books being available on a shelf with her view that banned books would be burned.
The source recording is titled “We are Back discussing Ethiopia to America.”
Cari Bartholomew discusses banning, shelves and burning
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nephew and um he was just like, "Oh, you know, I have a teacher who you would really love. She's really about helping us to really think and and she she was talking about banning books, but she was only giving one perspective, right? She was only saying these book banners are terrible human beings, but she wasn't saying what the books were that parents think are inappropriate for kids." And so I said, "Oh, I said,"Okay, I can see that, but if you go into my office, you'll see a whole bunch. I have a whole shelf of banned books, banned books, right? Like 1984, Fahrenheit, 451, etc." And I said, "But they're not banned because they're on my shelf. If books were really banned, they would be burnt." And I said, "And so let's let's decide both sides of that situation." So if you talk about fascism in America and you're saying that
Original recording · source 1865–1925 seconds
August 2025
Stephens sent officials a report on Bag of Bones. The emails show Ivory passing it to a Jordan board member and asking for a challenge.
Stephens identified herself as RatedBooks founder and sent officials a bright-line report with claimed school locations.
At 7:58 p.m., Stephens addressed USBE board members, legislators and Attorney General Derek Brown. She said the group reviewed around 20 or more books each month and that she spent about ten hours a week on this research.
Her claimed locations covered 13 schools in five districts: Grantsville Junior High, Tooele High and Clarke N. Johnsen Junior High; Copper Hills, West Jordan, Herriman and Riverton high schools; Cyprus, Granger and Kearns high schools; Jordan and Hillcrest high schools; and Central Davis Junior High.
She linked the report because she believed its text would cause the email to be blocked. She asked for someone to do the research full time.
Ivory replied at 10:11 p.m., just over two hours after Stephens’ message. His copied recipients included legislative leaders, USBE members and support@naag.org. He thanked her for the effort and asked whether the report covered only Bag of Bones.
In the LaVerna in the Library Facebook group, Stephens, the group’s admin, shared RatedBooks’ August 8 “5/5 Rating” for Bag of Bones and wrote: “This book is illegal in Utah. They still provide it to 12 year-old students, without any parental notification. We need teeth in our laws. Please challenge this book if it is in your district.” Her list included Cyprus, Granger and Kearns high schools in Granite.
Granite superintendent Ben Horsley replied: “I double checked and it was available in one of Granite school District high school. The other two schools had a different book with the same title. Regardless, I requested it be reviewed and it has been pulled from the shelf in Granite School District now.” Stephens thanked him, and Ivory thanked Stephens “for your diligent efforts to protect Utah’s school children!”
Granite’s board had appointed Horsley, its former spokesman, as superintendent on July 9, 2024.
At 12:12 p.m., Stephens said she had more titles but was still organizing them. She chose Bag of Bones because she considered it widespread across districts.
At 12:44 p.m., Ivory replied, “You so rock!!” and asked, “Have the auditors reached out to you yet for the new audit on content?” He closed with “The BEST is yet to come!!”
Stephens sent officials a report on Bag of Bones. The emails show Ivory passing it to Jordan board member Brian Barnett and asking him to submit a challenge; Stephens was BCC’d.
The subject was “Would you please review this for removal.” Ivory sent it to Barnett at 1:05 p.m., with Stephens BCC’d, about 21 minutes after his auditor question.
He named Copper Hills, West Jordan, Herriman and Riverton high schools, cited HB29 (2024) and Utah Code 53G-10-103(e), and linked the parents’ analysis. He asked Barnett to report back on how the matter was addressed.
Stephens replied at 1:47 p.m., about 42 minutes after Ivory’s referral: “Thank you, so much! If all the legislators did this then the law would function to protect kids.”
Barnett told Ivory he had verified two school locations and submitted the reconsideration form. Ivory forwarded that response to Stephens, who thanked him.
Barnett first replied at 11:09 p.m. on August 14 that he would gather data and submit a challenge once he verified the book was on the shelves. Ivory thanked him at 12:13 a.m. on August 15.
At 1:17 a.m. on August 16, Barnett reported verifying Copper Hills and West Jordan high school locations and submitting the Request for Reconsideration of Library Materials Form.
Ivory forwarded the update to Stephens at 2:50 p.m.: “FYI from our one and only really good school board member, Brian Barnett.” He added, “And my past and future opponent is perfectly okay with this...”
Stephens replied at 2:53 p.m.: “Wonderful! Thank you so much! He’s wonderful!”
Later Jordan records: the Bag of Bones reconsideration form, printed October 1, 2026, identifies the submitter’s eligibility as “JSD Board Member” and names CHHS and WJHS. It cites the same eleven pages as the shared report. The review notes reproduce that report’s text and contain three “Yes” objective ratings, one labeled “Parent Rating.”
Promotes a 15-week course priced at $100 or free to Moms for America members.
The offer places the course in Moms for America’s broader programming during the school-library campaign.
Tooele’s tracker dates its completed review of Stephen King’s Bag of Bones September 25, 2025 and lists “Remove” as the outcome. It says the committee found objective sensitive material. This local decision came before the February 13, 2026 statewide threshold.
A Davis committee voted 4–3 to remove Romeo and/or Juliet. Two members voted to remove it but said the book’s text did not break the rules. They cited content on a website instead.
The appeal decision also cited text printed in the book. Some initial votes relied on the website; the final decision gave a reason from the book too.
Why it matters: Families seeking another review need to know what drove the decision. Here, that means checking both the book and website.
Seven unnamed reviewers responded about 10 Things I Can See From Here on September 22–26. Five found “objective sensitive material” under the state test for certain sexual content. Two disagreed.
The district’s later summary says four of seven voted for removal, while its tally and vote list show five. The original responses support 5–2.
Why it matters: The mismatch matters because parents should be able to check the summary against the votes. Both counts show a majority for removal; the mismatch alone does not show a changed result.
Research note · checked October 23, 2026. The September 15 reviewer email and attachments are missing from these records. Member #3’s timestamped response gives no page numbers. We need the email and files to check what reviewers received.
Stephens sent USBE’s Audit & Fraud inbox a complaint about Davis libraries. She proposed required “Illegal book detection” training, one hour of monthly screening, publication of excerpt reports for parental opt-outs, and possible fines to fund a separate review entity.
She offered lists and reports through RatedBooks.org and suggested replacing librarians unwilling to undertake the work.
USBE assigned complaint H-4832 and referred it to library staff. Its reply said local districts have primary authority over book reviews.
USBE also pointed Stephens to OLAG’s Sensitive Materials Review form, the parent liaison, educator-misconduct complaint procedures and elected officials.
The saved “Comprehensive Content Based Rating Scale” identifies itself as Version 2.0, October 2025, and credits “Pavement Education Project with RatedBooks.org.” It grades content across multiple categories, including violence, language, sexuality, drugs and gender ideology.
PEN America records 6,870 book-ban instances across 23 states and 87 public-school districts during 2024–2025. Its report describes Utah’s statewide no-read-list mechanism.
RatedBooks’ October newsletter announces BookLens as a new resource. It says a barcode scan can bring up reports from BookLooks, RatedBooks and WeArethePeople2.
RatedBooks describes “Pending Final Report” as a work-in-progress label. It says volunteers still need to read the full book; after that, the orange “Pending” tag comes off. The site says all reports, with or without the tag, are triple-checked for accuracy in their content and rating. Page numbers can vary by format.
Brooke’s saved RatedBooks reports show the orange tag on some versions and off others. A saved list shows the tag on all five reports added June 12, 2026. It is absent from the 24 reports added July 14 and September 2. The saved files show the change, but not who changed each one.
Replying to Logan Toone and USBE Audit & Fraud, Stephens compared RatedBooks with movie ratings. She sought public lists and excerpts for parent opt-outs, mentioned an AI-review quote and suggested refunds from publishers and authors.
Davis’s October 2 reply said private labels and RatedBooks ratings were not legal sensitive-material decisions. It described the district’s plausibility check, objective review and subjective review.
State Superintendent Molly Hart’s response says draft Report 2025-28 makes no recommendations for USBE. It promises continued guidance, technical help and training for districts and charter schools reviewing collections.
The signed letter is preserved inside the final audit report, dated eight days before its October 14 release.
Report 2025-28 says auditors chose 20 titles from 186 RatedBooks titles rated 4–5 and added 2 because of legislative concern. An unnamed legislator supplied the list.
The seven sampled districts were Davis, Weber, Salt Lake City, Granite, Canyons, Alpine and Washington. Jordan was not in the sample. Auditors checked 42 libraries and made eight library visits; in one case, books had been removed from shelves but the online catalog had not been updated.
Because of legislative concern, auditors counted f-words, c-words and violence along with sexual conduct and nudity. A footnote says language and violence are outside the sensitive-material criteria.
Using its stated definitions, the report found sexual conduct in 21 of 22 selected books and nudity in 16. These figures describe that flagged sample, including two titles added because of legislative concern.
Auditors read each whole book and predicted most would meet the objective sensitive material test if challenged. Local review committees make those official decisions.
October–December 2025
The emails continued after the content audit came out. Stephens sent school lists. Ivory asked Jordan board members to act on the private ratings.
The message was sent at 12:38 p.m. from Stephens’ Gmail address to Ivory’s voteivory Gmail address. Its subject was “Books in Jordan School District.” It included a Google Sheet and a title-by-title list of ratings, report links and claimed school locations.
The list included Brave New World, The Glass Castle, Americanah, Eat, Pray, Love, The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, Kingdom of the Cursed and The Love Hypothesis. It placed Brave New World at high schools as well as Sunset Ridge and Copper Mountain junior highs.
The state’s saved removal list records October 23, 2025 as the statewide threshold date for Thirteen Reasons Why. The districts listed in the October 7, 2026 saved copy are Nebo, Tooele, Washington.
USBE reported 19 titles meeting the statewide removal threshold as of that date. Its Sensitive Instructional Materials report also described how the law and list were being put into use.
2025–2026
Bring the ratings into the decision
The ratings were promoted as a way to check school collections. Later pricing pages offered paid access, list matching and links inside library systems.
November 2025: paid index access · December 2025: subscriptions, list analysis and library integration · August 2026: institutional pricing
The November newsletter offered $50 lifetime access to the National Book Rating Index, described as nearly 17,000 titles. It expected $5 monthly pricing and a separate website by the end of 2025. It said BookLooks and RatedBooks reports and the spreadsheet would stay free.
Ivory attached the audit and October 15 lists, copied Stephens, and asked a Jordan board member to verify holdings, remove 4/5 rated titles and scrutinize 2/3 rated titles.
The thread began with Lisa Dean offering to discuss the Herriman High greenhouse after Ivory shared a KUTV story. Ivory’s response also raised the library audit and book removals.
He attached the audit and four PDF or spreadsheet files about Jordan holdings. Copied recipients were Stephens, Shawn Mathis, Gloria Vindas, Cade Bloomer, Megan Jay, Brent Maxwell and Brian Barnett.
Ivory asked for titles rated 4 or 5 to be removed and titles rated 2 or 3 to be scrutinized. He singled out Assassination Classroom, questioned its educational purpose and asked why catalog searching required going school by school.
Barnett replied at 5:38 p.m. that the problem affected districts using Follett Destiny. He called the workaround “a bit clunky” but said it worked.
His instructions were to select any school, open Catalog and Library Search, then choose Jordan School District in the Location menu. He explained that “local copies” meant the selected school and “off site copies” meant other schools.
OLAG’s Leah Blevins and Morgan Hagey presented the sensitive-materials process audit and the library-book review to the Education Interim Committee.
USBE Vice Chair Amanda Bollinger and Deputy Superintendent Elisse Newey explained removal procedures and answered the audits’ findings. The minutes name both speakers and reports.
Bollinger said the Board should examine how books enter libraries, including companies supplying books in bulk. She said librarians and volunteers may lack the capacity to read hundreds or thousands of books and called for holding suppliers accountable.
She then described discussions with Representative Ivory about newly available AI tools for screening books and said a local education agency in her area had been examining those tools.
Two-minute excerpt beginning at 25:20 in the meeting recording. Captions and transcript are automatic; check exact wording against the recording.
method before this book gets in the school? For that follow-up in October, we searched through 42 secondary schools' online school catalogs throughout seven different districts. We visited eight different school libraries to confirm that the books we found on their catalogs were actually in the schools, and then our team read in full 22 books that we did find that were considered to be questionable. I just want to jump in really quick and reiterate, when we read these books, we were reading them for this specific language in the statute of objective standards. We reviewed any book that came up in our random review, and we didn't look for literary merit or any of the potential factors outside of that statute. Thanks. Yep. And to that point, when we talk about sexual conduct and nudity, we were looking for the words that are specifically defined in statute, and you can see those on your screen, and we found 153 counts of those instances within the 22 books. And to be clear, those were not images. They were words that were typed on the page that described the acts. And there was same thing with nudity. It was words describing nudity. And then even though it's not in code, just to give a more robust review of the books, we did count F words and C words and domestic violence and found 800 counts of language and 112 counts of domestic violence in those 22 books. So that brings us to those relevant recommendations from the June audit, which is that what Leah said that the legislature could consider that could consider the policy question of having library book selection processes that are more sort of throughout the state so that everyone has sort of the same opportunity to choose books safely for students. And that goes for classroom libraries as well. And if you have any questions, we'll be happy to address them.
A House staffer proposed a December 8 meeting about the greenhouse and related materials; Stephens replied with availability, copying Ivory.
At 11:59 a.m., Cade Bloomer proposed the December 8 meeting and apologized for the delay. Stephens replied at 12:01 p.m. that she could meet that week or the week of December 15, but not December 8’s week.
The December newsletter invites readers to add book removals to the index and announces “NBRI Coming January 2026!”
NBRI means National Book Rating Index. The newsletter presents it as a planned January 2026 launch; later entries show the index’s membership, pricing and institutional offers.
Stephens posted a National Book Rating Index (NBRI) membership video; Ivory commented “Rockstar!!”
At a USBE study session, Green said she had contacted librarians about book purchases. She described ordering, shipping, receiving, inventory and cataloging, and questioned who was accountable between schools and suppliers.
Green describes her procurement inquiries
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and it's a problem. I've spent some time reaching out to librarians to understand the procurement process. Like what is it? What does it take to get a book? And if you stock your business shelves, you know that there are many, many, many levels that go into curating an order, picking that, shipping that, receiving that, inventorying that, cataloging that, placing it on the shelves, and then the process of that being used. So this is not like it's accidental. It's not like we are completely ignorant to, if we praise the specialists, you know, and our experts, then there is, there is a job that librarians are, have to undertake now. They need to understand the increase and desire, you know, for these industries to push these novels to the detriment of our children. And again, they have been unaccounted. There's no accountability to this happening. And we have seen, um, champions in the state of Utah that have taken great effort to create systems that allow us to see and to filter through novel upon novel upon novel upon novel of harmful to minors and pornographic materials.
Green questions supplier accountability
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It's time, it's time we take the next step. If the industry is, has open access, open season to the biggest market in our nation, which is public education and its libraries and millions of children, it is time that we do something about this. And I support this motion.
South Carolina’s York County Library Board approved its revised collection-development policy with one member opposed. The minutes record an objection that RatedBooks.org was the only review site listed.
The preserved policy says that reviews by RatedBooks.org will be considered alongside South Carolina Department of Education rulings and State Library guidance. A later RatedBooks homepage capture celebrates York County’s use of the site.
In the “Draft Legislation: School Materials Amendments” email thread, Stephens asked Tyler Keetch whether the draft would require schools to report books quietly removed for violating the bright-line rule, even without a formal parent challenge. Nicholeen P. Peck and Micah Wixom were copied.
Stephens sent “FYI from Texas” advice to the same legislative-drafting thread about including books with QR codes or links to websites in restrictions on material accessible to children. The relayed text cited Texas SB13 and claimed success using that provision to obtain removals.
The preserved pricing page lists individual access at $50 per year or $10 per month. Institutional tiers cost $399, $999 or $2,999 per year. Library Index Integration is advertised at $499 per year plus $5,000 for technical support. List analysis costs $100 for the first 1–10,000 books and $25 for each additional 10,000.
2026
The 2026 records follow new bills and efforts to bring rating tools into schools. HB197 changed as it moved through committees and did not become law.
The state’s saved removal list records January 5, 2026 as the statewide threshold date for Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West; Nineteen Minutes; The Perks of Being a Wallflower. These titles met the threshold for removal from student access across Utah public schools.
The Kurt Vonnegut Estate, authors Elana K. Arnold, Ellen Hopkins and Amy Reed, and two students filed a federal complaint against Utah Attorney General Derek Brown, USBE and state board members. Their counsel include the ACLU of Utah Foundation.
PEN America reports the addition of Wicked, Nineteen Minutes, and The Perks of Being a Wallflower, bringing Utah’s statewide list to 22 titles. It reports that the ACLU of Utah filed the authors-and-students lawsuit the previous day.
HB197 (2026): School Materials Amendments. Peck’s January proposal would require tools to identify sensitive material, new reporting and parent notices, digital-vendor limits, and a private right of action, meaning certain people could sue to enforce it. This was the draft available for Stephens’ January 12 email.
The bill changed later. The fourth substitute focused on access to materials already removed statewide, review of newly added materials, and digital-vendor restrictions. HB197 did not become law; it was filed March 6, 2026.
Stephens urged Republican legislators to support HB197, invoking her RatedBooks work and distribution of monthly flagged-book lists.
The subject reads “Reasons your should support HB 197.” The email went out at 10:23 a.m. and included four advocacy graphics plus October 2025 correspondence with Davis School District.
Stephens named four priorities: books about the founders, USBE distribution of lists for local review, schools reviewing their own collections and a private right of action for parents.
Stephens said Davis rejected links to her ratings because private citizens made them. She said only one USBE member reported sharing the monthly list with schools. She argued that one lawsuit could prompt other districts to act.
In a KUTV report on school-library oversight, Joy Peterson, Alpine School District’s lead librarian, said she does not believe additional state oversight is necessary: “We are trained to select books for kids. We’re experts in this.”
Ivory, who sponsored HB29, said audits and reviews are part of the Legislature’s job: “It’s our job to set and clarify, enforce, audit, and monitor the standards so that our performance continues to improve.”
Peterson and Ivory on state oversight · 42 seconds
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Reporter: Do you agree there needs to be oversight?
Peterson: I do not, but that’s just my opinion as a librarian. Like I said, we are trained to select books for kids. We are trained and we’re experts in this.
Reporter: Do you feel that the law or the audits send the wrong message to librarians in Utah?
Ivory: Yeah, no, not at all. We audit ourself and we monitor everything that we do to make sure that it’s meeting the appropriate standard for the proper role of government. And so it’s our job to set and clarify, enforce, audit, and monitor the standards so that our performance continues to improve.
Original KUTV report ↗In a KUTV morning follow-up, reporter Arielle Harrison summarized the Legislative Auditor General’s two-part audit. The first part found schools “are generally good at removal once a book is flagged,” but auditors said there was a lack of clear guidelines for choosing books before they reach library shelves.
Harrison said the 22 books “came from a list that a legislator had provided.” An auditor KUTV interviewed said, “It is not a random sample … they initially set the scope. We followed the scope.”
The constituent’s 7:24 p.m. message questioned Ivory’s television comparison involving To Kill a Mockingbird and Lady Chatterley’s Lover. Ivory replied at 9:29 p.m., copied Noah Lambson and BCC’d Stephens.
He called Lady Chatterley’s Lover “mild material” compared with many RatedBooks 4/5 titles and asked the constituent to clarify the concern.
Stephens sent Lady Chatterley’s Lover screenshots. Ivory wished they had them at a KSL editorial-board meeting; Stephens offered to make a formal report.
Stephens responded at 9:48 p.m., about 18 minutes after Ivory’s constituent reply. She attached eight screenshots and wrote that the 1928 book “does not look tame.”
At 7:54 a.m. the next morning, Ivory wished they had been able to ask the head editor to read the excerpts aloud at the KSL editorial-board meeting. He said the editor would have “gone totally red in the face” and compared the imagined reaction to Romero in committee.
At 8:44 a.m., Stephens replied, “I don’t remember that but we could still send it to him. Shall I make a formal report?”
The January 16 pricing capture still lists institutional access at $399, $999 and $2,999 annually, library integration at $499 annually plus $5,000 support, and paid list analysis.
These saved prices show the vendor’s offers. They do not document a school or library purchase.
Stephens said she would send Utah legislators NBRI access; Ivory praised the removal goal.
Stephens said the National Book Rating Index cataloged removals nationwide and linked proof. The post shared Representative Kristen Chevrier’s argument about Utah’s removal numbers.
Ivory commented: “Sounds like a worthy goal to protect Utah children from more vulgar and pornographic books in public schools than any other state!!”
In its first update of the 2026 session, the Utah Cultural Alliance said HB197 “includes provisions requiring AI-assisted review of books and new screening processes that could significantly slow or halt book acquisition in schools and libraries.”
Pickens County Library System’s revised policy lists the National Book Rating Index, Booklist, Library Journal, Publishers Weekly, Kirkus Reviews and School Library Journal as possible age-appropriateness sources.
On September 11, 2025, trustees undid an earlier vote to move ten books from a list submitted by state senator Rex Rice. A motion to suspend the rules failed. A separate vote to move the books also failed, 3–3 with one abstention. The minutes said the books would stay in their original location.
The February 12, 2026 policy defines “young adult” as ages 18–25 and places that section in the adult area. By March 19, staff reported that the ten books had been moved.
A later public chart lists the books as moved to the adult section. It drops the old chart’s explanation that the first vote was invalid and the later motion failed.
The board approved consent items 1–6, including removal recommendations for 10 Things I Can See From Here, A Spark of Light, Bronxwood, Kendra, and Romeo and/or Juliet: A Chooseable-Path Adventure.
For Romeo and/or Juliet, the later appeal decision also cited a passage printed in the book and said that passage independently met the objective-sensitive-material criteria.
Feb 3, 2026: consent items 1 through 6 Feb 3, 2026 · 50 seconds
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Okay, we have our consent agenda items one through six Is there anything on the consent agenda that anyone would like move to a business item? If not, I will hear a motion on our consent items one through six. I Move to accept consent items one through six Thank you Okay, we have a motion from Ms. Hogan and the second was from Ms. Powell to approve consent items one through six any other discussion? Okay, all in favor of approving consent items one through six say aye aye any opposed Okay, that motion passes Thank you
In a short profile on Hope of Utah’s channel, Brooke Stephens identifies herself as RatedBooks’ founder, describes the National Book Rating Index and its review sources, and says RatedBooks is a “proud partner with Hope of Utah.”
Brooke Stephens describes RatedBooks and its Hope of Utah partnership
Hi, I’m Brooke Stephens, founder of RatedBooks.org. […] RatedBooks.org is a proud partner with Hope of Utah.
After its Cultural Industry Advocacy Day, the Utah Cultural Alliance reported that advocates raised the same priorities “in every meeting” with lawmakers, including “VOTE NO on HB197” and “VOTE YES on SB253,” Sen. Mike McKell’s Library Materials Amendments.
The second substitute of HB197 would have required the State Board of Education to “qualify one established book reviewer” that districts could use, at no cost to the board or districts, to screen materials “using technology, including artificial intelligence assisted analysis, or other methods.”
The third substitute, dated February 9, removed that provision. It kept a requirement that each district adopt a selection policy covering “artificial intelligence tools the state board provides.”
Legislature bill data shows the fiscal note for Sen. Mike McKell’s SB253, Library Materials Amendments, was sent to the sponsor on February 9. The bill history records no public release, and a State Board of Education comparison of 2026 bills lists the note as never released. SB253 did not pass.
The fiscal note for Ivory’s introduced HB517, Sensitive Materials, estimated no state expenditures and no direct, measurable costs for local governments in FY2026 through FY2028. HB517 did not pass.
A fiscal note estimates costs. It does not show what was spent.
Official fiscal estimate. Select the page to read the full note.
The third substitute required each district to screen new materials, adopt a selection policy that covered “artificial intelligence tools the state board provides,” and put filters on devices and services students use for digital materials.
The fourth substitute, dated February 12, removed that section. In its place, each district would “review each instructional material the LEA adds to the LEA’s collection of instructional materials before making the instructional material available for student use.”
Utah’s saved list dates the Bag of Bones statewide threshold February 13, 2026. It names Davis, Granite, Jordan and Tooele as removing districts.
Why it matters: The threshold extended the removal requirement beyond those four districts to public schools statewide.
| Title | Bag of Bones |
|---|---|
| Author | Stephen King |
| Districts listed | Davis, Granite, Jordan, Tooele |
| Date threshold met | February 13, 2026 |
The fiscal note for the fourth substitute of Rep. Nicholeen Peck’s HB197 estimated no state expenditures and no direct, measurable costs for local governments in FY2026 through FY2028.
A fiscal note estimates costs. It does not show what was spent.
Official fiscal estimate. Select the page to read the full note.
Davis School District told The Salt Lake Tribune that Stephens “was one of three volunteers who were helping the school librarian catalog a large number of books” at an elementary school. The district confirmed she had access to its library system to enter “titles, authors, ISBN numbers, and the like” for newly purchased books, and said, “There was no breach of student records.”
The February 20 date and a duration of about 90 minutes come from a parent’s notes of a call with an assistant superintendent. The district did not answer the Tribune’s questions about that call.
The district’s library supervisor told library staff, “Please remember that we don’t upload rating systems into Follett, nor do we have parents come in and help us with the software or the catalog.” Parents, she wrote, “shouldn’t have administrator access to the catalog, which may have student information associated with it.”
The Tribune reported that the notice followed the volunteer visit and a request from Stephens. According to the parent who later filed a complaint, Stephens had offered to show district librarians how to integrate ratedbooks.org into the Follett software.
Stephens asked for help challenging 28 Davis titles. Ivory requested a similar Jordan School District list; she agreed and began a reply about roughly 100 probable bright-line violations.
The state’s saved removal list records March 2, 2026 as the statewide threshold date for Breathless; The Carnival at Bray; The Handmaid's Tale: The Graphic Novel; Red Hood. These titles met the threshold for removal from student access across Utah public schools.
The board approved consent items 1–11, including the appeal recommendations to remove Body Talk, Rabbit and Robot, Rainbow Boys, Shadow of the Wind, Suicide Notes from Beautiful Girls, and The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo.
The initial objective committee votes ranged from 4–3 for Body Talk to 6–1 for Rabbit and Robot. The other four initial votes were 5–2. The appeal committee recommended removal for all six under the objective-sensitive-material criteria.
Mar 3, 2026: consent items 1 through 11 Mar 3, 2026 · 42 seconds
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um okay next board we have our consent agenda um items one through eleven is there um anything on our consent agenda that you would like to move to a business item no if not i will entertain a motion on our consent i move to approve consent items one through eleven okay miss price let's make the motion is there a second second okay we have a motion by mr price and a second by miss hoca to approve the consent items one through eleven any other discussion all in favor aye aye any opposed okay those have passed
The Legislature’s final history places HB197 in the “House file for bills not passed.” The proposal changed through four substitutes and never became law. The January lobbying messages above concern a proposal, not an enacted requirement.
A parent filed a complaint with the Utah State Board of Education about the library-system access. The board referred it to its Internal Audit Department, which replied that the board “may not govern, manage, or operate school districts, institutions, and programs, unless granted that authority by statute,” and directed the parent to Davis.
The state’s saved removal list records March 13, 2026 as the statewide threshold date for Looking for Alaska. The districts listed in the October 7, 2026 saved copy are Davis, Jordan, Tooele, Washington.
On LaVerna in the Library’s Facebook page, Brooke Stephens tells parents how to request school Follett inventory lists. She asks them to send lists for a new AI library-audit tool and says Davis provides them.
Why it matters: An inventory lists a school’s books. Stephens sought those lists for an AI review.
The April 2026 scale covers more than sex, violence and swearing. Its “Juvenile Advisory” tier rules out instruction, information or discussion about gender identity or sexual orientation. The same row allows diverse characters and incidental references.
The saved “0–5 Explicit Content Rating Scale” identifies itself as Version 2.1, April 2026, again credited to Pavement Education Project with RatedBooks.org.
Its Juvenile Advisory tier states that content must contain no instruction, information or discussion about gender identity or sexual orientation. The scale also retains categories covering violence, profanity, sexuality, drugs and ideological content.
The board approved consent items 2–6. Item 6 adopted the appeal committee’s recommendation to remove Fight Club. All seven board members voted in favor.
The initial subjective review committee had voted 7–0 to remove the book. The appeal committee weighed its content and literary, artistic, political or scientific value for minors and recommended removal as subjective sensitive material.
Apr 7, 2026: consent items 2 through 6 Apr 7, 2026 · 64 seconds
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We'll move to our consent items next so we have consent items 1 through 6 Is there any consent anything on the consent agenda that anyone would like to move Julie? Yeah, I would like to move the board minutes And it's I just need to make a small correction on my board report section in the minutes And I noticed this after the agenda was posted so I have to do this in a public board meeting Okay, we'll do that up. Well, we'll do that afterwards. We'll all and entertain a motion right now for consent Items 2 through 6. We'll do that first and then we'll go to the other one. Is there a motion for that I? Move that we approve consent items 2 through 6 Okay, I'll second second. Okay. There's been a motion by Miss Hogan to approve a gent consent items 2 through 6 Second by Miss price any more discussion Okay, all in favor to approve those say aye aye any opposed Okay, that motion passes for items two through six.
The state’s saved removal list records April 17, 2026 as the statewide threshold date for Life is Funny; The Haters; The Bluest Eye; People Kill People. These titles met the threshold for removal from student access across Utah public schools.
The April 17 capture of RatedBooks’ pricing page displays $50 annual and $10 monthly individual index access, each with a 30-day trial. It does not display the institutional, integration or list-analysis offers shown in the December and January captures.
The state’s saved removal list records April 27, 2026 as the statewide threshold date for A Stolen Life: A Memoir; A Clash of Kings. These titles met the threshold for removal from student access across Utah public schools.
The state’s disclosure results list Utah Parents United as the payee, Adams Leadership PAC as the payer, and “Donations” as the purpose. The May 4 entry records $10,000.
The entry does not say what UPU used the money for.
UETN’s eMedia policy covers its online library of teaching materials. Members of the public can ask for a review. Materials stay available during review and appeal, and UETN makes the final decision.
The saved complaint form asks whether the person read or listened to the whole item. It requires a primary home in Utah, but does not require the person to be a parent.
The form also names Utah’s Online School Library. The policy’s scope names only eMedia. Those are different sets of online resources.
Jennie Earl emailed USBE member Emily Green and Joann Brinton a link labeled “Updated Model Library Materials Policy Draft.docx.” The message was sent at 6:20 a.m. with the subject “suggested changes.”
Board members were sharing a draft. The linked document was a proposal, not adopted policy.
PEN America analyzes 3,743 unique titles from its 2024–2025 index using 37 variables, including genre, intended age level, and book content.
PEN America announces its Facts & Fiction report and describes a doubling of nonfiction censorship. The release mentions Utah’s addition of Jaycee Dugard’s memoir to the statewide list.
Joann Brinton describes Texas’s vendor-rating provisions and suggests a similar approach for Utah rather than adding work for librarians. Her description is a proposal to examine, not an adopted Utah requirement.
Earlier, library media specialist Davina Sauthoff said Utah law does not require librarians to read every book before shelving it. She described statewide training, intentional selection and checks as books arrive. Many challenges, she said, concern older collections.
Texas’s March 2026 rulemaking notice states that the vendor-rating provisions were enjoined and unenforceable while an appeal remained pending. That legal status is separate from Brinton’s description of the provision.
Texas vendor-rating proposal
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okay with removing the 30 days. I like that. I'm just looking at what some other states have done and Texas requires that vendors who sell to school libraries actually evaluate all materials and issue a rating of sexually explicit or sexually relevant. And if it's challenged and found that they rated it incorrectly, they send it back and require them to relook at it or face being barred from selling to Texas libraries. And so I wonder if we look at doing something like that instead of making more work on the librarians. That would be a legislative request, right? You're kind of leaning into a legislative request, which we can make as the board during the summer going into next year so that we're holding those that are providing the materials more accountable to what they're giving us for our students. And then
Earlier: Davina Sauthoff explains selection training and older collections · 1:55:30–1:57:10
Open original recording at this passage ↗
Green’s original motion
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last week or two weeks ago um just move that the standards and assessment committee direct staff to conduct a comprehensive review and audit again i don't know if that's appropriate here if this is what that word should be a public school library material selection and acquisition practices in utah including funding sources procurement procedures vendor and publisher relationships librarian qualifications and training collection development standards distribution influence and the role of professional organizations in shaping library policies and purchasing decisions and this is um i can speak to it real quick go ahead i i think that there is still um uh just that's that there's just still a little bit of a space that exists that i think we are almost at where we can fully um understand the relationship between our our school libraries and you know publishers and distribution centers and all of that um at large you know vendor procurement i said again it's like an order is is procured it's picked it's created it's shipped it's received it's inventoried and um i think that i just and the state of utah would really love to have an understanding of what what this is um so that we are we don't have to continue to be reactive to an industry um that has full access to you know a minority population
Amended timeline motion and vote
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Yes. Okay. Okay. So let me just read this out real quick. We're trying to hurry so we can get Sarah to her meeting. Moved to the Standards Assessment Committee direct staff to bring back a timeline for conducting a comprehensive review and audit of public school library materials selection and acquisition practices in Utah, including funding sources, procurement procedures, vendor and publisher relationships, librarian qualifications and training, collection development, standards, distributor influence and the role of professional organizations in shaping library policies and purchasing decisions. All those in favor? Aye. Aye. Aye. Okay. That passes unanimously.
Emily Green first sought a broad review and audit of public-school library selection and purchases. It covered funding, vendors, publishers, librarian qualifications and training, collection standards, distributor influence and professional groups.
After feasibility concerns, the motion was amended to ask staff to bring back a timeline for conducting the review. It passed unanimously.
On May 18 at 5:26 p.m., USBE member Emily Green emailed USBE Chief Audit Executive Debbie Davis asking whether the library-selection and acquisition review could become a formal audit.
On May 19, Davis explained professional internal-audit standards and the Board approval process. She asked Green how the project should rank against current work, then sent a partly completed form for setting priorities.
RatedBooks’ annual report names Brooke Stephens, Amy Bruner and Renee McCurdie as directors. Stephens is also listed as president and incorporator. The report attaches a Form 990-N for calendar year 2025.
In How to Use the NBRI, Stephens opens a packet and calls it “the challenge form that was submitted in Clay County by Bruce.” She points out his circled passages and says the documents give parents information unavailable elsewhere.
The displayed packet for 100 Sideways Miles by Andrew Smith uses a We the People 2 advocacy form dated July 21, 2025, with handwritten annotations.
The same demonstration advertises automated inventory reviews for $100 per library and shows an exported school inventory matched to ratings. Stephens also demonstrates author flags linked to an Israel-boycott list, explains that the LGBTQ field is a broad yes/no flag, and shows a parent “green light” form she says will be put into PeachJar.
Clay County (FL) packet · 10:26–10:45 in the original
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have the removed and challenged and the parent can read read those reviews. Okay, so this one this removed document, this is the challenge form that was submitted in Clay County by Bruce. And he has circled things and um give information to parents that isn't out there anywhere else. So this
Open original recording at 10:26NBRI inventory reviews and parental preferences
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we didn't know about. All of these are reflected in NBRIs are 33,000 books. We also have LGBTQ, and that's because it violates some of the laws here or some of the local laws and policies. This is just a sampling to say that um people called this law right here the don't say gay bill and this is basically for K through three. Um they don't want any instruction on sexual orientation or gender identity. If it has explicit gender ideologies, meaning that they're saying, "Hey, you might be a girl, you might be a boy. Go ask you know, go ask your teacher to help you transition." It would be rated a two. But, if you have no instruction or information, there is just diverse characters. And then a zero has no gender ideologies, is that you can get automated inventory reviews. And that is $100 per library, whether it's a school or a community, it doesn't matter. Um and so you just click on here. And it gives you the information on how to export it if you have Destiny Follett. If you have something else, it should be pretty simple to export that. You get the best results if you have the title, author, and ISBN numbers in there. So no school can say that they don't know what's in there. They now have the opportunity to see it. And now we're going to search this and see. So Syracuse High School, this is the inventory list that was run. And we see that these books are all rated five. This has been challenged and retained. So we know that's there. This was challenged and removed. So sometimes it will show up in their inventory that they have exported, but it says not available. So go check the the um inventory to see the status of the book in Follett. Five means it's deviant, four means it's adults only. Three means it's youth restricted. It's like a rated R. The content designation means somewhere it was reported as removed. That means that maybe it was temporarily removed so it could be reviewed because it was donated and then it was put back. The LGBTQ scale, just so you understand that, means that it might be a brief mention somewhere. Um or it might be a central theme. We do not differentiate right now because we don't have a scale and because we've aggregated all of these reports, so right now it's just a broad yes or no. In our green light form, this is where parents can give this to librarians. They can click on it and print it. Um we had to We're going to be putting this into Peachjar. What the librarian will do is run the title through the NBRI and see what the rating is and contact the parent first. The parent can read the reviews and give their green light for their child to check it out. Informed choice. They can't make a choice if they don't have the information. And so the parents should be the one deciding for the kids, especially with how explicit this content has become. We have the removed and challenged and the parent can read read those reviews.
During debate over how soon reviews must begin, captions identify Vice Chair Joann Brinton suggesting schools be told about RatedBooks to find reviews and book content.
The captions identify Davina Sauthoff as recalling a previous assistant attorney general’s caution that the site was not an industry-standard professional review source and used a different lens. Chair Jennie Earl offered a separate recollection about individuals, organizations and consulting several resources.
Earlier in this June 5 policy discussion, Assistant Attorney General Darin Goff warns that using “uplifting and captivating” to exclude books could invite a viewpoint-discrimination claim. He offers “educationally enriching” as an alternative. This is legal advice about a proposed selection criterion, rather than a finding that a violation had occurred.
RatedBooks question, staff caution and Earl’s reply
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cognizant of the time schedules of everyone i wondered too i have just seen that ratedbooks.org is now free and open to the public is that a resource that our librarians and school districts can be made aware of so that they could more easily look at reviews and content in books so i believe our previous aag talked about rated books and i don't remember if it was in a committee meeting or if it was in an email thread just that potentially that the perspectives that in which that this is not a you know industry standard website that is reviewing books based on the way that professional industry reviews titles and so they may be looking at titles in a different way through a different lens than what we would want a title to be reviewed at and does anybody remember that conversation with our aag i just think it was if i remember right it was um that we that they're maybe using a variety of resources and not there was something and i can't remember the specifics but you know an individual person versus an organization or something like that but that doesn't that doesn't prohibit someone from using several sources to review their content because if you know you can go to several sources and get different there's quite a few out there right now so and i think a lot of districts are aware of the different resources we have some on our page and there's some others out there it's an it's an easy thing to go and kind of just get a general feel and then go from there if
Reale explains her opposition
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this kind of work and i also just don't feel like it's necessary because i feel like those librarians are are first of all because we have already so many procurement laws and rules and policies in place as a state like i always joke when i hire someone that's from the public sector and they come to work with me at the college i'm like well there's about 10 000 things we need to do before you get that lunch bought for the meeting right because we work for the state and it's taxpayer dollars and it's very important to make sure that our dollars are used wisely and that there's accountability and so the work that can be done here could be really interesting but i just i don't think we have the capacity and it's hard for me to put this um on even having been on audit uh for the last four years the work that it takes for these leas to do this it's just it's hard for me to support it because i just don't think that at this time they have the capacity and our leas have the capacity and i you know i just trust our librarians that they're procuring um the right kinds of books but i totally understand where you're coming from ember green and i think this is really thoughtful and um but i just from a big picture perspective i can't support it so
Scheduling and funding motion
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not intentional but okay so um so i would move that we we move the comprehensive school library monitoring timeline forward to law and licensing's july meeting requesting 60 000 in funding from discretionary funds from discretionary funds okay and then do do i need to clarify and to move forward to full board in the august 2026 meeting yeah i think that would be appropriate yeah that would work okay so the any well let me read it and then if there's any discussion uh yeah after library we need the word monitoring if you don't mind okay so let me read it and if we need to adjust anything we can um that the committee asked board leadership to add the comprehensive school library monitoring timeline to the july lawn licensing committee meeting requesting 60 000 from the discretionary funds and to move the timeline forward to the full board meeting in august okay all those in favor aye aye all those opposed okay uh board member real is in opposition there were four before this
Green names review sources and vendors
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Read the full existing caption file; public page contains the matching passage.
Green moved to send the Comprehensive School Library Monitoring Timeline to July’s Law and Licensing meeting, seek $60,000 in discretionary funds and forward it to the full Board in August. It passed 4–1, with Sarah Reale opposed.
Reale objected to adding a procurement review when procurement laws already applied and said she trusted librarians. The proposed timeline estimated 680 USBE staff hours and 789 local-education-agency staff hours across four phases.
Emily Green named review sources School Library Journal, Booklist, Kirkus Reviews and Publishers Weekly, and suppliers Follett, Mackin, Ingram and Baker & Taylor. She asked whether the review would examine their school-library relationships. Staff welcomed her research and asked her to send it.
The state’s saved removal list records June 5, 2026 as the statewide threshold date for Lucky. The districts listed in the October 7, 2026 saved copy are Davis, Granite, Tooele, Washington.
The district told the Tribune an internal investigation found “there was no policy violation.” It did not say how it determined what Stephens accessed. A student-privacy attorney quoted in the report said, “There’s no reason a volunteer should have access to that personal information.” USBE said student checkout records are education records protected under FERPA.
Reached by phone, Stephens said, “Nothing happened,” then ended the call.
In the Cari interview Stephens said an unnamed senator did a great job obtaining an audit.
The audit discussed here is the Legislature-ordered review of school-library content, following the earlier audit of removal procedures. Stephens does not name the senator in this interview; the audit records and motion appear in the audit entries.
In the Utah Moms for America interview, Stephens said library lists could be matched against 34,000 reports. She described a separate paid service to put ratings into library systems, with a software connection, or API, updating them as books and reports changed. Price depended on library size.
Stephens discusses an unnamed senator and an audit · 51 seconds
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And I do want to say one more thing that there was an audit done and for years, I mean, I think it took four years for this whole process to be implemented. But in that time, so many people said, you're trying to get rid of Tom Sawyer. You're trying to get rid of Romeo and Juliet. And they were saying all of these things. And a lot of our elected officials believed them. And then we were able to get an audit done. We have one senator who did a great job and was able to get an audit done. And within the first, I think, two schools they went to, they found enough books. They were supposed to go all the way across the state. And in the first two schools they went to, they found enough books to fill the criteria of the audit. Oh, yeah. And that's.
Full original · 3354–3405 secondsStephens pitches ongoing library-system integration
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to know what school it's from we can run it for you so you can clean it it could be a public library. It doesn't matter. Send it to us. We will match it against our 34,000 reviewed reports and send it back to you so that you can feel more confident in is this appropriate for children or not. We also have a service that goes by for your, but it's, I can't give you a price because it's how big your library is, but we can integrate our ratings with your library system. So when patrons are using it they can see the rating in there and it's ongoing as we get more reports as you get more books those will be rated because it has an api that it uses to keep it live and active
The interview includes a discussion of libraries, classics and alleged restrictions on Dr. Seuss sales.
Cari and Brooke both participate.
Cari and Brooke discuss classics and Dr. Seuss
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I need to hit on that because during Obama's administration, both in America and in Canada, and they're still doing it, they're clearing books out that they would consider to be too white in perspective. So they're just dumping them into dumpsters. I've had friends who've done it who called me and said, hey, do you need any books for your classroom? Because there's a ton of books right here being dumped. And they're constantly being dumped so that they have room for these other things. Let's remember, it was again, around 2018 or so, maybe earlier, where they said that some Dr. Seuss books needed to be removed. And then I mean, getting rid of, Amazon couldn't sell them. I mean, so they're removing them. Amazon can't sell them. I don't know how that's not considered book banning. And that was from the left. Well, even the Gulag book that I read coming out of the ice, which is really like, I love that
Original recording · source 1875–1940 seconds
July’s newsletter featured ClearView, inviting authors and publishers to submit unpublished PDFs for RatedBooks-scale reviews. Submissions require an intended age and genre. It linked an Author Assurance Statement and promoted a named author’s book as an alternative purchase.
The state’s saved removal list records July 6, 2026 as the statewide threshold date for Different Seasons. The districts listed in the October 7, 2026 saved copy are Davis, Jordan, Tooele, Washington.
Utah’s business-information report lists Scholar’s Lab as an assumed name effective July 8, 2026, with S&S Apps, LLC as owner and Brooke Stephens as registered agent. Its business ID is 14713126-0151.
On The Defending Freedom Show, Wallace sent parents to Take Back the Classroom to locate books. She said she supplied its title list and expanded it after a fundraiser. For missing reports, she recommended RatedBooks and named Stephens in Utah.
Rod Hall moved to adopt 2026 Timeline Policy, Draft 1, on first reading and provide $60,000 in discretionary funds. The committee approved it unanimously, with Erin Longacre absent, and sent it for second and final reading.
The July summary describes the June 5 action as unanimous. The June committee’s own summary instead records a 4–1 vote with Reale opposed.
In NBRI’s testimonial, Queen Creek Unified board member Kelli Anderson said she sent every library’s catalog and received matching reviews within a week. She said NBRI supplied a scale and links explaining flags. She planned to share it with nearby districts.
This is a testimonial published by NBRI. It records Anderson’s account of the service and her plan to share it with nearby districts.
A saved NBRI index copy dated July 14 shows a “Filter by Content Designation” panel with LGBTQ, CRT, Potential Violation, Challenged, Removed, and Recommended options. In a July 1 interview, Stephens had already described using a content-designation filter to select LGBTQ and then searching by rating. The July 14 copy is the earliest dated version located with the explanatory text below; it does not establish when that wording was first added.
Filter by Content Designation
“Classifications reflect third-party data. Independent review is recommended, especially in the case of removals and challenges. Some removals and challenges refer to a temporary withholding for review of donated content. One of the best ways to verify a removal is to search the library’s online catalog for the book. See this document for more information. Hover over the designations below to see a detailed explanation. Designations are provided to help libraries stay in compliance with federal and state law and local policies.”
The board approved consent items 1–4 and 6–9, including the removal recommendations for Sybylline and The Sympathizer.
Appeals argued that the challenger had reached the unsuccessful-request limit. The appeal committee said a request fails when its appeal period ends unchallenged or the board makes an appeal decision final. It found the limit had not been reached when these requests arrived.
Jul 21, 2026: consent items, with item 5 pulled Jul 21, 2026 · 75 seconds
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Okay. Consent items. We have consent items one through nine. Is there any one of the consent items that anyone would like to move off to a business item? No? I'd like to move number five just for, I just want to make a comment. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. So we'll come back to that one. So let's go ahead and do we have a motion to approve consent items one through nine, not minus number five. I move to approve consent items one through four and six through nine. Oh, good. Listed in the agenda. Second. Okay. We have a motion by Ms. Price and a second by Ms. Powell to approve consent items one through four and then six through nine. Any discussion? Okay. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Okay. Those passed.
In a CleanBooks-vb video, Baggett demonstrates scanning a cover or ISBN and searching a title in BookLens. Later, discussing What Unbreakable Looks Like by Kate McLaughlin, she cites a five-out-of-five RatedBooks rating and calls the book inappropriate for minors.
World Library Association’s About page lists both Stephens and Bonnie Wallace. Stephens’ listing identifies her as founder of RatedBooks, LaVerna in the Library and NBRI, and as Utah Moms for America’s civic engagement director. Wallace’s listing identifies her Llano County library-advisory role.
The saved export of the Utah tracking workbook contains 11 tabs, including “35 Utah locations.” The linked Jordan page described it as the “February 2025 most current list.”
The workbook combines book reports, ratings and location information with claimed statutory violations.
ClearView offers RatedBooks-scale manuscript reviews using an AI scanner. It labels AI reviews green and human reviews orange, asks for PDFs with age and genre, and says reviewed books will be posted.
At 10:25 a.m., Emily Green emailed Mike Green the School Library Monitoring Timeline. At 12:17 p.m., he replied with a survey draft. Its C-3 / Table C-1 named “Content-rating rubrics or sites (identify, e.g., RatedBooks.org).”
The proposed survey asked whether each review source was used regularly, occasionally or not used. Emily circulated a revised version to board members that evening and requested placement in board backup. The RatedBooks row remained.
At 6:25 p.m., Earl replied that her overall impression of USBE member Emily Green’s survey was positive and welcomed compensation for participating schools. She suggested labeling the graph above C-17 “Other suppliers” and questioned the size and usability of B-2.
Cybil Prideaux returned a board-formatted survey PDF and a memorandum to Green, saying she would upload them to agenda item 7.12. The PDF retained the RatedBooks example in Table C-1 on printed page 12.
The proposed questions also covered approval plans, standing orders, opening-day collections, shelf-ready processing, cooperative contracts, dues, conference travel, incentives and professional-organization financial records.
At 11:48 a.m., Carol Lear emailed USBE member Emily Green that the survey questions were extensive and technical. She asked whether collecting historical information was realistic for more than 160 local education agencies and supported offering the document as an optional planning guide.
At 6:27 p.m., Amanda Bollinger asked Green whether she had assembled the document herself or had been working with staff.
After the 10–5 vote to include USBE member Emily Green’s addendum, USBE Chair Matt Hymas objected to board members directing the staff project lead rather than leaving that work to State Superintendent Molly Hart. “At what point, guys, do we say, ‘This is not our job. I can’t do Molly’s job’?” he asked.
Hymas said he faced pressure from legislators, described frustration with his own board members, and said it was unfair to treat staff as belonging to all 15 members rather than to the superintendent. He asked Vice Chair Amanda Bollinger to chair while he stepped away.
In a separate statement several minutes later, Hart said: “We have 15 members. And honestly, I have 15 boards. I don’t have one board.” She described the difficulty of managing that arrangement and called for discussion of how the board and agency conduct their work.
Approved minutes record the amended plan and $60,000, with added documents left for staff refinement and committee discussion. The recording and minutes give different final counts. The earlier 10–5 vote concerned Green’s addendum. The September 4 minutes approval addresses a separate count correction.
Matt Hymas objects to direct board instructions to staff
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This is tough. I'll say what you're not going to say, Davina. No, you're fine. Just, here we are. We've got Davina over this project. Molly's sitting right here, and we're saying, “Forget you, Molly. Davina, when can you get this done? How quick can you get it done?” Here's the priorities. At what point, guys, do we say, “This is not our job. I can't do Molly's job”? And I've been getting this pressure and conversations—not only from—staff doesn't say anything. Molly dances around it because she's kind. But I get this pressure from legislators all the time. And I'm going to go sit before them again and say, “No, we're relevant. We're telling the agency exactly what to do.” And that's not going to go over well. And so, again, the vote that just passed, 10 to 5—10 of us say, “Yes, forget this. We're doing this. This is where we're going.” Again, I'm exaggerating the mentality here, right? You could probably feel some of my frustration, as I'm doing what I can, and we are doing what we can as leadership, to keep this board on the map, and we're being fought with our own members here. So, again, we have an idea. We want to see something done. And here we are saying, “Davina, how fast can you get this done?” You don't belong to Molly anymore. You belong to us, all 15 of us. That's not fair to her. That's not fair to Molly. It's not fair to any of these other staff members back here. So with that, I'm going to ask Vice Chair Bollinger to chair for me for just a second while I just step away, if that's okay.
Molly Hart describes managing 15 board members
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You spend a lot of time on certain activities. You know, something like—let me give you an example: consent agenda. Consent agenda is designed to be quick. It's designed to be things that are operational, noncontroversial, operational. And the rules of what goes on a consent calendar are pre-established. You go through it. There are things you can just check off the list. Well, that's not what our consent calendar has turned into. So we haven't renegotiated those understandings as a board and as an agency, so that we can meet your needs in an efficient way. We have 15 members. And honestly, I have 15 boards. I don't have one board. So that's very hard to manage. So then you get bottlenecks, and then you wonder—then it makes it worse. So it's a self-fulfilling prophecy. At some point, we need to have some discussion about how we do our business, our rules of engagement, because for the very reason you're talking about, it comes up in a lot of spaces. And, you know, people have talked around the edges of it.
Sarah Reale moved to recommend that the full State Board find Davis used the wrong procedure by placing the Fight Club appeal in its consent vote. The proposed action would send it back for a separate Davis agenda item.
The Standards and Assessment Committee passed the recommendation unanimously. Its proposed corrective action concerned the district’s appeal procedure.
The preserved “Books to Challenge in DSD” workbook contains batches annotated with challenge dates. By the August download, the worklist had grown from roughly 80 to 130 rows.
The accompanying instruction sheet tells users to choose a title, copy report excerpts, ask AI to identify possible bright-line violations, file a challenge, comment on the list and repeat.
The preserved NBRI pricing page offers small, mid-sized and large institutional access at $399, $999 and $2,999 per year. It also lists individual access at $50 annually or $10 monthly and invites institutions to ask about a white-labeled portal.
The saved Utah teacher and homeschool HEART product pages still open with “USBE approved” and display iKeepSafe student-privacy wording. The teacher page shows a $100 regular price reduced to $50; the homeschool version is $15.
The state’s saved removal list records August 19, 2026 as the statewide threshold date for Push. The districts listed in the October 7, 2026 saved copy are Davis, Granite, Washington.
Community Library Network chair Tom Hanley questioned July young-adult purchases using Rated Books, ScreenItFirst, Compass Book Ratings and Take Back the Classroom. He read two novel descriptions and questioned public funding for books he said broke board policy. He sought a later discussion.
An Idaho public-library trustee used outside rating sites to question purchases. This was separate from Utah’s school-book process.
Tom Hanley cites rating sites while reviewing July purchases
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I have some comments in line kind of with the director's report, but not the same thing, but this has to do with the director and what we're doing here. It was encouraging to me to get a number of compliments from our constituents, from the public, about what we're doing with regard to selecting votes for minors. And that's kind of what we let our campaign on, but there's always a big but when you improve. We have an acquisitions policy, and in there, it requires an Excel spreadsheet to be put out each month as part of the packet, and we did get that. And for July, I look at it specifically for young adult fiction purposes, there were 24 purchases made. Unfortunately, seven of those, seven out of the 24, contain graphic violence, and this may not be a policy violation, but is it really desirable for minors? Is that a good reason why we're buying that? Worse than that, two books in particular didn't appear to actually violate our policy. And I'm sure that there is plenty of professional, there are professional references out there for the collections of whoever is purchasing these things to assure that they're aligned with our policy. I'm going to read what two of these are, I'm going to read the book. And speaking of ratings, there are, I pull this up here, there are books or there are references called compass book ratings, take back to classroom, rated books, screen it first, so forth. There are references out there available to the general public. I don't know what's available to the professional librarians in particular that I'm calling out here. And this is again, purchased in July. That was what our current right now packet says. This book is called The Girl in the Castle. It's written by James Patterson. And according to these different sources, it contains sexual assault, graphic violence, sexual content, minor drug use, and alcohol use, suicide ideation, and there are at least 76 swear words, 19 of which have the F word in them. And again, these are rated in there with the National Book Painting Index, whatever, Kiss the Book is, there's different organizations out there. And the other book, again, I'm not trying to be a downer, it was good to get positive feedback. I think we've done somewhat, actually, we have done better each month. I review those things every single month, but there are too many things slipping through the cracks. Here's another one. The Fault in the Stars by John Green. It contains sexual activities. Rating it on 1 to 10, it rates it a 6. Profanity, 10 out of 10. That's all bad. It's at the top of the charts. Alcohol use by minors, references to alcoholism, drug use, controversial, religious, historical, and social commentary. These are things that come right out of these rating systems. They're readily available to the staff. We ran an idea of ensuring we're buying good materials. It's very easy to be discerning as to what we purchase. Once we get it in-house, it's a different story. It becomes a big first amendment issue, but we can control the things that we're funding. And I'm having an issue with this thing. Obviously, I'm a little bit wound up because it irritates me because I've been going to these reports every single month for almost a year now. They're on our website. There's an Excel sheet attached to the board packet if you go online and look on there. And so, I like it almost, not right now, but why are the taxpayers funding these things that appear to violate the policies we wrote? And so, I think that may be a discussion for another board meeting. I don't know. We don't need to solve it here. I'm mixing it in as part of the director's report because we're reporting what we do. But we have, I marked it up very clearly here, our materials selection and acquisition policy. It's very clear as to what is allowable, what's not allowable. It explains and there's definitions of what's inappropriate for minors. It explains what is obscene. It goes into description of what propaganda is. And I don't want to go through each of these definitions here, but I'm getting a little disturbed by it. So, it may be a subject for another meeting, but, and I have met a number of times with the director and I'm assuming he's doing his best to work with whoever's purchasing these materials, but we can do better.
Recover America’s Inappropriate Books guide linked RatedBooks reports and urged removal of books with scores 3–5 in high schools and 2–5 in junior highs. For elementary schools, it said none of the listed books should be available. The page named Bonnie Wallace as legislative liaison and offered her help with challenges.
Pavement Education Project’s saved Inappropriate Books page says it partnered with Rated Books to display flagged North Carolina school titles. It promotes NBRI subscriptions and inventory matching, recommends Keller ISD policy and links a proposed obscenity-law amendment.
Oconee County Public Library’s Library Resources page lists Rated Books first under “Recommended Websites for Book Reviews,” describing its searchable ratings, page numbers and quotations. It lists Pavement Education Project next and links its recommended-reading page.
This South Carolina public library recommended RatedBooks and Pavement as parent resources.
The Board carried its general-consent business to unfinished business on September 4. The scheduled consent materials included the August 6 and August 7 minutes.
Consent carried to the next day
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Amelia Swenson pressed to fill the District 8 position second motions been stated and seconded let's vote that passes 14 in favor one opposed that coming from member Boggess back to you member Boggess I have no further business at this time okay thank you board members just for your information tomorrow we have four agenda items that we have sent and then we also have consent to take care of tomorrow as well we're going to skip that today and that's going to carry over to unfinished business with that i would entertain a final motion i move to adjourn motion to adjourn seconded all in favor aye any opposed okay we're adjourned thank you
Open original recording at this passageThe committee’s motion asked the full State Board to find that Davis did not follow the proper procedure by placing the Fight Club appeal on its consent agenda, and to return it to Davis to be considered as its own agenda item. It would not have put the book back. The motion failed, 7 in favor and 8 opposed. The chair announced: “That motion fails. Eight opposed, seven in favor.”
Because the motion failed, the Board adopted no finding. It did not decide that Davis followed its policy. The Board ordered no do-over, and Fight Club stays removed.
Two softer versions also failed, each with 6 in favor and 9 opposed: an amendment adding “due to a technical violation,” and a substitute finding that Davis’s process lacked clarity.
In the recording, Assistant Attorney General Lora Cooper tells the Board its review is limited to whether Davis followed its own procedure, says a judge “would find that it was a problem,” and says the easiest way to clean it up is to send it back. Davis Assistant Superintendent Logan Toone tells the Board that Davis will handle future appeal decisions as regular business items and that “Whatever determination you make today, we will respect it.”
Full Board rejects the Fight Club procedure recommendation
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as well. Okay. Okay. Okay. So, the motion is that the board find the LEA did not follow the proper procedure in placing the item on the consent agenda and that it be returned to the LEA to place the item on a LEA board agenda as its own item for consideration. Let's vote. That motion fails. Eight opposed, seven in favor. Those in favor uh being member Earl, member Booth, member Reel, member Longacre, member Lear, member himus, and member Ballinger. Ballinger. Ballinger. Okay.
Attorney’s explanation of the appeal procedure · 8 minutes 30 seconds
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so remember Boggess remember Brinton yes I just had a question about this because I think the public perception is that Davis County was wrong to pull this book rather than that this was just a procedural thing and as I understand it the Davis School Board has done has put the books on the consent calendar after going through the appeal numerous times like 40 times before with other books so why other books because I applaud Davis District for pulling books that don't meet our you know that don't hit there they hit that bright line so they need to be pulled they are sensitive materials they don't have the educational value so they're following the law in removing the book so I just want to make sure and get clarification that is there a precedent set where they've done this with 40 other books so why this book because I think it's a good thing that they're being advocates to follow the law and remove the books a G cover well yeah come on up I figure y'all can hear me I don't know about anybody else so the issue is it was just strictly a procedural kind of a technical issue that led into more substantive problem and it's my understanding this is the first time that it's been appealed to the board so that's why it's come up and why it may have happened 40 times before but this is the first time it's come up to the board level now one thing that you need to understand is that the board is restricted by your rule 277 123 10 4 that you're strictly reviewing the procedure not substituting your judgment for theirs about whether or not it was or was not a sensitive material so and we really didn't even get into that because it was strictly on the procedure of how it got onto their their specific policy is that it has to be as I said out on the full board for approval during a public board meeting final decisions on the appeal and and you can do some of that if it's non-controversial and routine on a consent calendar I just don't think in this case it worked and I do think that a judge should it get to the point of being reviewed by a judge would find that it was a problem and the easiest way to clean it up is to send it back and have him do her in accordance with that thank you I've got member Davis next but before that I need a point of information and that is that these pumpkin cookies are on point Randy so again thanks to your wife I know that was worth the interruption member Davis go ahead yeah and this might be for AG Cooper again but is there anything that says that it's not okay to do this on a consent calendar because any member of their board can take it off the consent calendar if there's a big they get a lot of feedback prior to this any member of the board can take it off and say let's discuss this further I worry about this making it look like they're you know breaking some kind of a law somewhere also as member Earl was just saying if their own policy says these will go on a consent calendar then they would be okay is that is that true and maybe we need to make an encouragement to have a thorough and clear policy as opposed to take everything to the full board every book to the full board I mean it'll go to the full board but I mean take everything off of the consent calendar okay I'm not going to touch this thing is it okay it's they've adopted Robert's rules of order and Robert's rules of order specifically says that the only things that go on consent decrees I mean on the consent agenda or consent calendar are non-controversial and routine matters and so under these circumstances it's clearly not non-controversial routine I don't want to address because I don't know that this should ever be considered routine but their own policy policy specifically says that it has to be um to the full board for approval during a public board meeting and so it was it was a technical violation that kind of ran them into a substantive problem it's not something that can't be fixed it's not something that I think they were acting in bad faith on or anything like like they said they've done it repeatedly and nobody's called them on it this was the first time they got called on it so there's a better way to do it to where it's more open and transparent without looking like they were trying to sneak something through if you put something on a consent calendar yes anybody can take it off in fact they did that in this particular meeting they originally had one through six and then they only did two through six on the consent calendar so it it's something if somebody had come in and said hey you know we want to talk they could have taken it off and that didn't happen in that meeting but it was very minimal information in the paperwork about why the sensitive materials committee had made their decision so I don't think it I think that a court very well could find that they did not check all the boxes they needed to check should it get to that point may follow up so my my question is are we saying that every one of these should never be on a consent calendar or are we saying that there should be more clarity in their policy because one could argue if it's happened 40 times it kind of is routine but that's a matter of opinion I suppose but I'm just trying to get clear on what we're saying are we saying that every single charter and district these shall never be on the consent calendar and if so then I think this motion is probably what that's trying to say or are we saying be clear in your policy about your procedure because it could be argued that your procedure with roberts rules this isn't considered routine or non-controversial I just wanted to interrupt here and as you cooper tell me if I'm off base here we're kind of getting into this wider right now we are discussing did um but we'll set a precedent so I want to know did davis and and that could be something that we can go down that hole but did davis follow their procedure I don't we can't go through everybody's policy right now we could we could readdress policies right and say okay we need to ensure x y or z but what is before us is did davis follow their policy you're saying not necessarily as it is written and that's what we are discussing here so I'm hesitant to start getting into all that's what that's where I'm hesitant to start getting into right I mean this is a very narrow issue uh because we didn't like I said we I didn't reach the issue of whether or not fight club actually violate sensitive materials because we don't have to there is a procedural issue and the procedural issue is required that they follow their policy I think that a court should it get past us could very well find that they did not because they've adopted roberts rules and they did not follow those I don't want to argue about whether or not it was routine or non-controversial I mean I think the fact that we're here arguing about it shows that it's not non-controversial but the when you do that you have to kind of take it they have a way of opting out of roberts rules in their policy as well and they did not do that so their policy specifically says that the appeals committee will present their recommendation to the full board for approval during a public board meeting where the final decision on the appeal and rationale for the decision will be determined by majority vote of the board I think that a court very well could look at it and the supporting materials that went with it and say that that is not to the full board and not the full rationale and not presented to everyone so the solution for that is send it back and let them do it to where it is very clear
Before the consent vote, members said an edit to the August minutes had been emailed to the Board. The exchange included “Jenny voted twice.” The Board then approved the consent items. All 14 members present voted yes; Boggess was absent.
Why it matters: Minutes record board decisions and votes. Here, the draft put Jennie Earl on both sides of a $60,000 library-review vote.
Record check · October 23, 2026. The draft lists that vote as 9–7. The approved minutes list it as 6–9. The motion would have changed “include” to “consider” for Emily Green’s library-review document. It failed. The Board later passed the review plan itself.
Minutes edit clarification and consent vote
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i'm not seeing any hands online and i'm not seeing any hands here so go ahead hold on sarah is frantically there we go question really quick uh there was an edit on the minutes from last board and that was so we don't need to make that here we just sit now we're approving the minutes with that edit made it made right yes just clarifying that was emailed to board members for clarity there was uh jenny voted twice yes yeah yeah okay i just want to make sure that we're voting on the ones that are updated okay thanks that was a good clarification member booth go ahead i would move that we approve the consent calendar there's a motion to approve the consent calendar there is a second um we have virtual and in person so let's go ahead and vote on that and i will look for member bogus is she with us online remember bogus not hearing member hall yes thank you remember kelly yes thank you remember green yes thank you and member brinton yes thank you joe joe and i'm a yes also oh thank you davis is online now thank you member davis thank you and one one more call for member bogus okay that passes unanimously with one absent that being member bogus okay thank you board members uh now if we happen to lose enough
Open original recording at this passageProtect Salado Kids lists Rated Books on its Allies page, linking the homepage and background page. The same page also lists Protect Child Health Coalition and NCOSE’s Safe Schools, Safe Libraries project.
This records Rated Books’ listing on Protect Salado Kids’ Allies page alongside other groups and resources.
A parent asked about a later review of a book removed across Utah. Ben Rasmussen, USBE Records Officer, replied by email. He noted the Board’s 60-day window for review. Then he wrote:
“If the Board doesn’t reverse the decision at that time, my understanding is that the decision is final and there is no current process to revisit the matter.”
Ben Rasmussen · USBE Records Officer · September 21, 2026
The law’s 60-day agenda window starts after state notice to schools. The rule gives a board member 30 days to request that agenda item. These are different steps. Read the enacted law, pages 6–7.
The state rule lets local boards review past decisions when they get new information. But a local change does not by itself lift a statewide removal.
Why it matters: A family may ask its district to take another look. That is different from getting a book back in schools across Utah. Rasmussen’s reply describes no later state review process. He calls this his understanding.
Read the September 21 email and the policy question · public text excerpts
The state’s saved removal list records September 28, 2026 as the statewide threshold date for House of Earth and Blood; Identical; Kingdom of the Cursed; Me and Earl and the Dying Girl; Perfect; Storm and Fury; The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue. These titles met the threshold for removal from student access across Utah public schools.
Granite’s October 9 capture says the Bag of Bones decision is under appeal, a school-level committee is being formed and statewide guidance has pulled the book. The capture date does not date the appeal filing or removal.
The Author Assurance Statement says manuscript text is processed with a tool it calls “Claude Composer 2.5 Fast” to produce ratings and excerpts, and says other AI tools may be tested. It says submitted PDFs are downloaded to a RatedBooks computer and kept for reference unless deletion is requested. Rating reports are kept on its Google Drive; requested manuscript deletions are promised within 30 days.
Cari Bartholomew and Christine Sefein Wolk discuss banned-book displays and American classics in a preserved book-club excerpt.
Cari and Christine discuss banned-book displays
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>> I would say kids, I need to be clarified. To the students at the college. >> Um, and they love to put up signs that say read these banned books, which by the way is extremely stupid >> because you can't read banned books. >> Like they're not available if they're truly banned. >> Yes. But then they ban American classics like >> Huck Finn and all of these other ones by great American writers >> even Dr. >> language and Dr. Seuss was removed right because of language or whatever other reasons. So I I I that the hypocrisy so this banning of books is this argument that's going on both sides of the aisle right now and both are screaming at each other about
NBRI’s NarraTrue page links AI excerpt scans of school-library books. It calls the ratings preliminary and AI-produced, prioritizes school titles and sells scans missing from the folder.
A screenshot of the Doctor Sleep scan sheet shows page ranges, excerpt text, and an “AI identified Severity” column. The folder view lists sheets for several titles. These images show what the saved pages display; they do not identify who created or checked each scan.
The assurance PDF saved October 13 adds that RatedBooks may keep manuscripts to re-screen them against updated or expanded ClearView criteria, including new content categories. That sentence is absent from the PDF saved October 10. Both versions say authors can request manuscript deletion within 30 days.
KUTV reports that the State Board of Education has started its $60,000 review of how school library books are chosen, prompted by questions about the influence of outside organizations and vendors. USBE library media specialist Davina Sauthoff said the review is meant “to see what those relationships look like and understand that process from the vendor perspective.” KUTV reports she did not yet know what the specific concerns were, so staff had been directed to do a full process.
The review covers finances, the supply chain, rules and parent complaint logs. Districts had until October 16 to opt into data gathering and the survey. KUTV reported no set end date.
Estimated cost, not district-reported spending. Davis records supply the title counts. An outside benchmark supplies the assumed cost of books, reading and discussion.
This research model applies Kelly Jensen’s March 4, 2022 book-challenge benchmark to Davis titles with a recorded committee decision. Her published $575 calculation uses $155 for books and 28 person-hours at $15 an hour: seven people, each spending two hours reading and two hours discussing a title.
Adjusting that benchmark with the national CPI-U gives $673.87 per title in September 2026 dollars, or about $674. The same unrounded benchmark is applied to every school year.
The model totals $37,063 for 2022–23, $36,389 for 2023–24, $15,499 for 2024–25 and $34,367 for 2025–26. The partial 2026–27 year through October 17 adds $10,782.
Each dated title receives one benchmark review allowance for books, reading and discussion. Paperwork, appeals and additional review stages are unpriced.
| School year | Dated titles | Estimate |
|---|---|---|
| 2022–23 | 55 | $37,063 |
| 2023–24 | 54 | $36,389 |
| 2024–25 | 23 | $15,499 |
| 2025–26 | 51 | $34,367 |
| 2026–27 · partial | 16 | $10,782 |
Granite supplied a determination saying Bag of Bones passed plausibility review, was pulled from all shelves and received a unanimous objective-sensitive-material finding after members read excerpts.
The document body gives no action dates. February 11 appears only in its filename and properties. The separate October 9 appeal-status record still has no outcome in this production.
The Southern Poverty Law Center’s 2025 map lists “Moms for America - Utah” in Salt Lake City and “Utah Parents United” in North Salt Lake under “Antigovernment.”
“Antigovernment” is the Southern Poverty Law Center’s category for these entries on its 2025 map. This timeline reports the organization’s classification.
Utah put HB29’s state ban process in place in 2024. The first books met its count that August, with more added through September 2026. A June 2025 audit said local agencies mostly followed the law. It also said the removal process seemed to work in large part. A separate audit used a list from an unnamed lawmaker. Auditors chose 20 titles from its 186 RatedBooks entries rated 4 or 5. In 2026, HB197 did not become law. Then, on October 14, KUTV reported a new State Board review of how schools choose books. The report put the review at $60,000 and gave no end date.
Read the HB29 law entry, the September 2026 statewide threshold record, the first audit, the second audit, the HB197 outcome, or the October review report. To look up a particular event, search the timeline.
Political and cybersecurity records from this research are kept on a supporting page.
Brooke Stephens directs the Board to RatedBooks · 2:28–3:13
Open original recording at this passage ↗Darby Holmes describes the conference introduction · 39:47–40:15
Open original recording at this passage ↗