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An unidentified Hamshire-Fannett ISD middle school teacher was fired after parents raised concerns that she assigned her eighth-grade students the graphic novel version of “The Diary of Anne Frank” that included scenes depicting nudity and lesbian attraction.
Mike Canizales, the school district’s communications and community engagement coordinator, reported the district is currently in the process of posting the position to secure a highquality, full-time teacher as quickly as possible. He also noted that a substitute teacher took over the teacher’s class on Sept 13.
Amy Manuel, whose twin sons are in the eighth-grade reading class, reported she objected to the book’s content regarding Frank’s attraction toward another girl, saying of the passage in which Anne writes about her fantasies, “That’s not okay.”
Sept. 12 in an email, administrators apologized to parents about the assignment, which they called “not appropriate.”
“The reading of that content will cease immediately,” H-F ISD officials wrote in an email.
Anne Frank, the Jewish teenager murdered by Nazis who documented her family’s efforts to escape persecution, wrote her thoughts in a later-published work that drew controversy.
In 2018, a graphic novel version of the diary began to revive similar criticisms from parents; a Florida school district banned it in April.