EDUCATION
Myths recirculate on Common Core
While it might have been a good idea to ask students for their opinions on the Common Core State Standards (“Our students’ perspective,” Opinion, April 13), it would have been much better if the students had been familiar with what Common Core is. The students provide articulate analyses of high school curriculum issues, but Common Core has nothing to do with the integrated math curriculum one student mentions as a problem. (That was a particularly harebrained idea of the Georgia State Department of Education that preceded Common Core.) It is not “prepared package lessons” condemned by another of the students. It does not involve “being told what to do every day,” nor does it emphasize memorization and cramming. The articles just perpetuate the myths and misinformation surrounding Common Core.
KATHLEEN BURK, ATLANTA
Hall must endure a far bigger battle
In response to “Leaders ask state to drop Hall case” (News, April 13), having seen a loved one in the last stages of cancer, I doubt the public trial of Beverly Hall is a concern to her. It’s trivial compared to the issues she is facing on a personal level with her beliefs, family, friends and pain. The compassionate minister Andrew Young understands the proper priorities of a person who’s in the last months of life, especially when they have time to prepare for it. There have been numerous other trials, so why another one? Mr. Bower’s statement is nothing more than callous political posturing. What a sad commentary of today’s cynical politics, from a once good public servant.
JAMES WILSON, MARIETTA
HEALTH CARE
ACA enrollment not indicator of success
So 220,000 people signed up in Georgia for the Affordable Care Act, and this somehow passes for front page news ("Ga. health sign-ups top 220K," News, April 17)? If I ran a business where the government mandated that the general public bought my product, eliminated all viable competition and then provided cash rebates to help buy my required product, what other results would I expect? Anything other than 100 percent market dominance would be considered a total failure.
DOUG LOCKER, DECATUR
EQUAL PAY
Sowell correct, it’s not a man’s world
Thomas Sowell is spot-on in pointing out the misleading nature of the statistic saying women earn only 77 cents to men's dollars ("Facts undercut the left's 'war on women' slogans," Opinion, April 16). The truth is that we don't live in a "man's world" in which women have lost a mythical "battle of the sexes." Societies have both patriarchal and matriarchal elements. To a large extent, the 77-cent figure represents women's greater freedom to move in and out of the paid labor market. Men's profound disadvantages in some areas can be seen in their over-representation among the homeless and incarcerated.
DENISE NOE, ATLANTA
