A teacher was removed from an eighth-grade classroom last week for reportedly allowing students to read from a graphic novel adaptation of "The Diary of Anne Frank" that includes sexual content and images of nude statues.
The Hamshire-Fannett Independent School District teacher was removed from the classroom on Sept. 14, as first reported by local news station KFDM last week. District spokesperson Mike Canizales told the station that this version of Frank's diary "was not approved" to be read in class.
"The teacher was sent home [Wednesday]," Canizales said. "There is an active investigation."
Canizales would not confirm the details of the incident after multiple requests for information from NBC News. Canizales instead provided an email that went out to parents on Friday about "concerns" over the reading curriculum and a substitute teacher.
"The District is currently in the process of posting the position to secure a high-quality, full-time teacher as quickly as possible," the email said. "During this period of transition, our administrators and curriculum team will provide heightened support and monitoring in the reading class to ensure continuity in instruction."
“Anne Frank’s Diary: The Graphic Adaptation” is an illustrated version of Frank's unabridged diary, which was first published in 1947, two years after she and her sister died in a German concentration camp.
Ari Folman, the artist and filmmaker behind the adaptation, told NBC News in an interview Thursday that he was “devastated” by the teacher’s removal.
This version of the diary includes sections omitted from earlier publications, in which Frank suggests to a friend they show each other their breasts and a section where Frank walks past nude statues.
The book was removed from a Florida school library in April after a leader of Moms for Liberty in Indian River County raised objections to the content. A spokeswoman for the School District of Indian River County said the book had only been checked out twice before it was removed.
The graphic novel was also on a list of books removed by the Keller Independent School District in the Forth Worth, Texas, area last year, according to NBC Dallas-Fort Worth.
