Give me my time back
I would like the three minutes it took to read Mary Grabar’s op-ed. She churns out sentence after sentence in an article sparked by the current protests in Wisconsin. Ostensibly about how union membership causes teachers to indoctrinate their students with a liberal attitude, the article mostly consists of statements that assert the way she thinks about education with little supporting evidence.
The article would have been better titled “Conservative teacher thinks her worldview is best: an essay on missing the point of the Wisconsin protests.”
David Leedle, Atlanta
Stereotyping in extreme
Mary Grabar’s column is an example of unbelievable stereotyping and hyperbole. I did not realize that anti-bullying lessons are now “privacy-infringing” (how?) and represent a way to “emotionally pressure” students to “adopt a pro-gay agenda.” I believe that Grabar is mistaken regarding efforts to educate students about the harm bullying can cause. There is a difference between acceptance of gay people as people, and being “pro-gay.”
Similarly, I cannot understand how community service directs students toward liberal causes, unless helping people is now a liberal thing to do. When my son graduated from high school, he had mandatory community service. No one told him how to complete them; he shelved books at the library. How dare a school-sponsored organization encourage its members to perform such subversive activities.
Thank goodness Grabar is not a professor at the college where my son is a student. I would hate to think that someone so closed-minded and quick to judge was teaching my son anything other than how to be selfish and prejudiced.
Jan Rabinowitz, Atlanta
Stop flame-throwing
There’s so much wrong with Mary Grabar’s rant against teachers that it’s difficult to know where to begin. To be sure, there’s much room for improvement with public education, but Grabar does not come close to identifying any of the legitimate problems facing students and their teachers today.
Instead, she hyperventilates against educating students about real-world problems in their communities and against encouraging awareness of social issues. Along the way, she vilifies dedicated public servants through intentional mischaracterization of their methods and inflammatory descriptions of their motives. In her view, education is “manipulating students,” and paying teachers a salary constitutes “giving away taxpayers’ money to public employee union voters.”
Reforming education is a serious issue that merits serious discussion. Grabar’s flame-throwing rhetoric does nothing to move that discussion forward.
Marcus Patton, Stone Mountain
Shunning state’s poor
A few years ago, one of my sisters who lives in California sent her daughter to Spelman. “To teach her independence,” she said, and to afford her the opportunity for a quality education. That sister was an elementary school principal and her husband a dentist. Being the granddaughter of a college president who sat on the board of a major supermarket chain, my niece qualified for a scholarship from that chain. My sister said “No” emphatically. The scholarship should be awarded to a student who’s less fortunate.
You see, though we grew up poor in rural Georgia, our mother taught us the value of hard work; honesty; integrity; humility; helping and giving. Unfortunately, the “painful cuts” being made in the HOPE program are all targeted toward those who can least afford them.
Ronald D. Johnson, Austell
