Print edition: 
School board’s job to evaluate policies
I attended the Wichita school board meeting Monday night. This was supposed to be a workshop for board members to study the proposed boundary changes and school closings and to ask questions. However, when board member Lanora Nolan tried to ask legitimate questions and air valid concerns, superintendent John Allison and board president Betty Arnold shut her down. Their treatment of Nolan was unacceptable.
USD 259 board policy reads: “It is the responsibility of the board to adopt and evaluate the effectiveness and implementation of policies.” Why is Allison leading the board when the board is supposed “to exercise its own judgment”?
Why were board members, just three weeks from the final vote, having a workshop? If the board doesn’t know why certain schools were picked, then who chose them – Allison and the consultants? If the board doesn’t know what criteria were used, then who does?
Bryant Core Knowledge Magnet Elementary School is on the closing list, but we have never been told a legitimate reason why. Looking at all the facts shows that Bryant is worth keeping. Were the focus group and community meetings just a sham to say the district “listened” to the public, while all along Allison made his decision many months ago?
ANGELA STEEBY
Wichita
What merit means
For 25 years I coordinated a team-taught course that relied on 27 faculty volunteers every third semester. I saw that some teachers got a big positive response some years and not others, and some had a low but steady positive response. Some that I found most interesting had positive responses more rarely. There was never a single one who was not somebody’s favorite.
I have concluded that there are two kinds of people in this world: those who still believe in “merit pay” and those who know what that means.
I strongly support President Obama in most of his efforts, but I am disappointed that he is still a believer.
My mother’s reward for moving all her first-grade students in an inner-city school to a second- to seventh-grade level in reading was that the principal put her on probation for “pushing the children.” I think most of us could cite many such examples. Most teachers keep on plugging along anyway because they care.
DOROTHY K. BILLINGS
Wichita
Strings tradition
Regarding “Professor has high expectation for music students” (Jan. 22 Arts & Leisure): As a violinist in the Wichita Symphony Orchestra for more than 42 years, a music educator and string teaching specialist in USD 259, and an alum of Wichita State University, I am quite upset. WSU professor Alla Aranovskaya is sorely lacking in her facts. Her observations regarding private teachers and music education in Wichita and in the United States seem self-promoting and will only alienate local private teachers and public school music educators.
The Wichita Symphony sponsors one of the largest youth orchestra programs in the country, with more than 250 students. Many local private string teachers teach 20-60 students per week. Area string students are receiving scholarships to top music schools. The Wichita East High School orchestra, Robinson Middle School orchestra and WSU orchestra have been chosen to perform at the prestigious Midwest Clinic, an international band and orchestra conference in Chicago.
With the international recognition of outstanding string players in Wichita, I find Aranovskaya’s comment that parents who pay for private lessons for their children are in many cases “just throwing their money away” not only inaccurate but intensely insulting to local string teachers. The string tradition in Wichita is healthy and excellent.
CHERYL MYER
Wichita
Kansas values?
I read with interest “SRS official defends food-stamp policy” (Jan. 31 Eagle). The public policy director of the Kansas Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services argued it was OK for 2,066 U.S. citizen children, born to illegal immigrants, residing in Kansas to no longer be eligible for food stamps.
SRS, as we have been taught in Kansas, exists as a “safety net” for Kansas indigent adults and children of all ages. With its policy director giving approval for our Kansas children, who are U.S. citizens, to be deprived of U.S. food commodities, she and our Kansas governor seemingly are saying it is all right if these children go hungry. I have difficulty understanding that – our governor emphasizes “pro-life” is the way for Kansas to go forward, and yet blocks federal money for 2,066 Kansas children.
Will the next steps be that we no longer support equal health benefits or equal education services for these children?
Religion is important to Kansans. All faiths believe we have a commitment to treat others as we would want to be treated. What happened to the basic values of our state politicians?
DORIS WELLER
Wichita
Be responsible
Regarding “How dare state cut aid to U.S. kids?” (Feb. 2 Letters to the Editor): It is this kind of irresponsible, blue-sky, Pollyanna thinking that has helped bring us to the financial precipice we now face.
What part of “We don’t have the money” do some people not understand? These are children of parents who are here illegally. They are technically citizens if they were born here, which is a law that needs to be changed. Illegals sneak across the border when it’s time to give birth because they know we won’t turn them away at the hospital and that their children will be entitled to a lifetime of free, taxpayer-funded benefits under this insane law.
Spending has got to be reined in, or we will soon go the way of Greece. This seems like a perfectly appropriate place to cut costs. It could help balance the federal budget while providing the added advantage of perhaps reducing illegal immigration by making it less appealing for people to come here illegally.
We need to grow up and be responsible adults.
JEFF MINAR Sr.
Wichita
Allow smoking
“Ban smoking in casinos” (Feb. 8 Eagle Editorial) said the casinos were “state-owned.” Not one dollar of Kansas taxpayer money purchased the property in the casinos, built the buildings, installed the infrastructure, supplied the machines and equipment, or pays the wages of casino employees.
I have talked to many of my family and friends who are nonsmokers, and they all indicated that they did not find the air quality at the Kansas Star Casino offensive and felt the ventilation system installed was more than adequate. The Eagle editorial said that “experts question how well the technology works,” but I could find twice as many “experts” who would indicate that it works fine.
The editorial also noted that $196 million of Medicaid expenses were for tobacco-related illnesses. Medicaid in Kansas costs almost $3 billion per year. Perhaps there are some other illnesses that also need to be addressed.
Should breaking a “promise” to casino operators about allowing smoking be a big deal? Heck, no. Boeing did it to Wichita, so why shouldn’t the state do it to the casinos?
Beware, nonsmokers, the alcohol and the prime-rib buffet are next.
MIKE PRUITT
Wichita
Buckle up, kids
As a retired Episcopal priest, I’ve experienced many tragic funerals. But in my experience, the most horrendous is the death of a young person – a teenager whose folly or foolishness resulted in a truncated life.
That’s why the special traffic enforcement project at Wichita Northwest High School was so important (Feb. 3 Local & State). I’m thankful that the Wichita police enforced the seat-belt laws of Kansas – laws designed to protect drivers and passengers. Those young people need to be awakened to the dangers of irresponsible driving and the necessity of responsible and mutual concern for all who share the ride.
I hope the parents demanded that their teenagers pay the fine themselves and that some driving limitations be imposed.
Buckle up, kids, so that some poor priest won’t have to announce your death and bury you or your friends.
BOB LAYNE
McPherson
