ORLANDO — Upset that “pornographic” novels were in public school libraries, state leaders demanded administrators remove 55 books from their shelves, and Orange County Public Schools complied last month. But newly obtained library data shows many of those books were rarely, if ever, checked out by students during the past academic year.

OCPS had 41 of the books on the state list in circulation during the 2024-25 school year, district data shows. Twenty-two of the books were never checked out from any of the district’s schools. The 19 that were checked out left the shelves fewer than 10 times each in a district with almost 60,000 high school students.

The state’s push to rid schools of the 55 books — documented first in a threatening letter from Florida’s attorney general to Hillsborough County schools — frustrated some Orange school leaders who called it a “non-issue” given that most of the books never got checked out.

But it also prompted worries from some First Amendment advocates who are alarmed that the state, which already leads the nation in school book bans, demanded specific books be yanked from schools based on out-of-context passages some found objectionable. And it highlighted a broader worry among educators that teenagers are not reading books for pleasure as much as they once did, in part because of cell phone use.

“Our children spend a lot more time on social media platforms than ever before — and gaming. That has taken away from reading,” said Superintendent Maria Vazquez.

If OCPS students are reading, they aren’t getting books from school libraries as much anymore. Book checkouts are down by almost one million since 2016. Elementary school students on average check out almost 20 books a year from school libraries — but high school students just one.

As state leaders threatened Hillsborough over the 55 books, OCPS and the Osceola County school district decided to remove them, too, even though OCPS’ attorney said he did not think they met the legal definition of pornography. Seminole County Public Schools said it did not have any of the titles on its shelves, and the Lake County school district did not respond to questions about whether the books were in its libaries.

The book on the state’s list that was checked out the most in Orange was “Storm and Fury” by Jennifer L. Armentrout, a fantasy novel about a woman who can communicate with ghosts that includes sexually explicitly scenes. It was checked out nine times in total from the five OCPS high schools that had it on library shelves.

By comparison, the most checked-out book in OCPS last school year was “Treasure in the Lake” by Jason Pamment, a graphic novel about two friends who discover a hidden city. It is meant for children in grades 3 to 6 and was checked out 4,987 times.

Other books on the state’s ban list include: “A Clockwork Orange” by Anthony Burgess, a novel about a 15-year-old delinquent in dystopian England, that was checked out just twice from OCPS libraries last year; “Forever” by popular author Judy Blume, a young adult novel about a girl falling in love for the first time and losing her virginity, which was never checked out; and “This Book is Gay” by Juno Dawson, a non-fiction guidebook for young LGBTQ+ people, that was also never taken out.

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier called books on the list “patently pornographic” and said Hillsborough’s failure to remove them “put children at risk,” a charge repeated by then Education Commissioner Manny Diaz.

A spokesperson for the Florida Department of Education, after being told how few OCPS students checked out the targeted books, repeated the same point.

“Minor children should not have access to pornographic materials, let alone have access to those materials in publicly funded schools,” Sydney Booker said in an email Thursday.

But Melissa Byrd, an Orange County School Board member, called it a “non-issue that was made an issue because it’s political,” given the limited checkouts.

Board member Angie Gallo agreed, saying at the June 16 meeting where the board authorized the books removal that “there’s been way too much time … spent on something that very few people are reading” when “at the heart of what’s happening to our children really is the internet and our phones.”

Gallo also said the state’s demands were an “overreach” that made her “very uncomfortable and very nervous.”

First Amendment advocates were also upset, worried the state was stomping on local school boards’ authority and wrongly labeling any sexual descriptions in novels as “pornographic.”

Stephana Ferrell, the co-director of the Florida Freedom to Read Project, which was formed to fight book bans, said she fears the list of 55 is just a start and the state will next try to remove books in higher circulation.

“They picked what they thought were 55 books nobody would miss. And so the fact that your data shows that there isn’t a lot of checkouts here is kind of the point, right?” she said.

New state laws passed in 2022 and 2023 put heightened scrutiny on school library books, requiring media specialists — teachers with additional library training — to review and approve all books in classroom collections and school libraries and to exclude those that include pornography or “sexual conduct.”

New state training for media specialists also warned them to “err on the side of caution” when approving books and that they can face criminal penalties and lose their teaching certificates if they approve inappropriate books.

Last year, Florida led the country in school book bans with 4,561 instances in the state’s public schools, according to a report by free-speech group PEN America.

But despite the controversies, far fewer students are reading for pleasure. A study by Pew Research Center found that the percentage of 9-, 13- and 17-year-olds who said they read for fun “almost every day” has been declining for decades.

Margeaux Aydt, a 2024 Winter Park High School graduate, said she never checked out books from school libraries. Now a student at the University of Central Florida, Aydt also said she didn’t read for pleasure in high school.

The media center at Winter Park was often used for standardized testing, so it never seemed available for students to come in, she said.

“No one was ever really in there,” Aydt said.

Some teachers used to suggest students find resources for assignments in the library, but with information more freely available online that has “completely gone away,” she added.

Allison Kibbey, the district’s director of instructional technology and library media, said school libraries have tried to meet the digital demand by highlighting what books can be checked out on e-readers.

Digital book checkouts through the schools have increased in the last year, she said, and many older students may also be reading books on their devices that they access elsewhere, all of them finding that more convenient than a visit to a school library.

“They’re not not reading. They’re just not necessarily coming to the media center,” she said.

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