After a teacher in Austin, Texas shared a children's book about transgender identity in class, the Eanes Independent School District has clapped back, calling the book out of place and offering counseling to students who heard the reading. The book in question, "Call Me Max" by Stonewall-Award winner Kyle Lukoff, centers on a transgender boy outlining his identity and is meant to help explain this idea to younger children. According to Today, the controversy climbed when local parents wrote to Forest Trail Elementary calling for the teacher in question to be fired. Eanes district's chief learning officer Susan Famborough responded, stating that while the book was listed as diverse reading, it was "not appropriate to be read aloud to an entire elementary-age class." Famborough's response quickly added that "counselors were made available to support students, and the school administration worked with families to provide an explanation and reassurances." The backlash to these responses was swift, with both the book's author and a variety of resident around the district expressing their dismay with the negative precedent these events could set for young transgender children. Jo Iveseter, whose transgender son Jeremy attended school in Eanes from kindgeraten to his senior of high school, had some choice words for the districts decision to ban the book. "It tells them that they must be invisible, that they can't talk about who they are, that they are unworthy," Ivester said of the district's decision. Lukoff reacted similarly, taking to Twitter to express his grievances with the elementary school's interpretation of his book. "Do you believe that a read-aloud about a transgender child is an equivalent trauma?" asked in the Tweet. "How do you think transgender people in your community felt having their identities treated like a disaster?" Tap link in bio to continue on @EDGEmedianetwork ?️‍??(?: Cover / Call Me Max / Reycraft Books / ?️: Brendan Walker / @brendan.m.walker)

After a teacher in Austin, Texas shared a children's book about transgender identity in class, the Eanes Independent School District has clapped back, calling the book out of place and offering counseling to students who heard the reading. The book in question, "Call Me Max" by Stonewall-Award winner Kyle Lukoff, centers on a transgender boy outlining his identity and is meant to help explain this idea to younger children. According to Today, the controversy climbed when local parents wrote to Forest Trail Elementary calling for the teacher in question to be fired. Eanes district's chief learning officer Susan Famborough responded, stating that while the book was listed as diverse reading, it was "not appropriate to be read aloud to an entire elementary-age class." Famborough's response quickly added that "counselors were made available to support students, and the school administration worked with families to provide an explanation and reassurances." The backlash to these responses was swift, with both the book's author and a variety of resident around the district expressing their dismay with the negative precedent these events could set for young transgender children. Jo Iveseter, whose transgender son Jeremy attended school in Eanes from kindgeraten to his senior of high school, had some choice words for the districts decision to ban the book. "It tells them that they must be invisible, that they can't talk about who they are, that they are unworthy," Ivester said of the district's decision. Lukoff reacted similarly, taking to Twitter to express his grievances with the elementary school's interpretation of his book. "Do you believe that a read-aloud about a transgender child is an equivalent trauma?" asked in the Tweet. "How do you think transgender people in your community felt having their identities treated like a disaster?" Tap link in bio to continue on @EDGEmedianetwork ?️‍??(?: Cover / Call Me Max / Reycraft Books / ?️: Brendan Walker / @brendan.m.walker)