Orange Trustees Just Don’t Get It

Giving Bill Lewis as many column inches as you did (“Use Public Schools for Learning, Not for Social Welfare Programs,” April 21) allows him to expose the depths of the lack of understanding that permeates the majority of board members of the Orange Unified School District. Public education is the only means for acculturation and general economic improvement, in which school-based clinics are but one factor in improving the lives of our future generations.

Mr. Lewis speaks of a healthy but hopeless future. What kind of future does he foresee for a well-educated child in poor health, with any of the many health problems that grow more devastating as they are allowed to continue to plague children who cannot receive early medical care?

He claims that outside agencies can take care of medical and social needs. These same agencies are already swamped with those who need help, and with federal and state governments attempting to throw even more people in need of government assistance into nonprofit services and clinics, Mr. Lewis’ children will have to stand in a long line to get help, if they are lucky enough to get any.

But Mr. Lewis is attempting to divert our attention to only one part of Gov. Pete Wilson’s “Healthy Start” continuum. It is not only children’s health that is at risk from the Orange board’s philosophy, but also children’s ability to function in this new “information age.”

Raising children indeed takes a village. Mr. Lewis would undercut the support of this village and remove from it one of the most potent forces for raising children. The schools have a much larger role in our society than simply math and ABCs. They must help develop a whole person. Whether the child’s parent(s) can or cannot afford outside help, or do or do not qualify for government assistance, our public schools are the first and foremost tool for producing healthy and hopeful children.

LEE PODOLAK

Orange

* After reading letter after letter from people who missed the point, it was very refreshing to see Bill Lewis’ article.

It’s amazing that the same teachers who complain the loudest in protest of Prop. 187 (“I’ll never be an INS snitch!”) are perfectly contented to be social workers, jumping on the freebies gravy wagon at taxpayer expense. If kids are hungry, it’s because Mom and Dad blew the food stamps. We are currently graduating students with the IQs of kiwi fruit, barely able to speak coherently, never mind fill out like, a job application, you know.

But these same kids who can’t name two bordering states, or make change from a $5 for a $4.95 sale are full of bilingual self-esteem and multicultural PC--all of which means nada in today’s job market. But the teacher/social workers are happy. They have job security as long as these kids keep reproducing.

We are already spending millions on welfare, housing and medical care; we don’t need to duplicate these services at school. All we are doing is fulfilling a cycle of parental irresponsibility--right from the moment of conception through adulthood.

It is not cruel that we want people to plan their families responsibly and not have children they cannot take care of. It is the irresponsible who are cruel. The fact that over one-third of these kids are here illegally only adds insult to taxpayer injury. I hope the Orange school district leads the way to ending these programs and returns to education as a priority.

APRIL O’HARA

Anaheim

* We appreciate The Times’ coverage of the efforts by some Orange school board trustees to eliminate social service programs at Lampson [Elementary] School. We want to commend the trustees who voted to retain these programs which are so vital to the academic success of disadvantaged children.

To those board members who vow to continue the battle against grants on a case-by-case basis, I say that the board was elected to serve the parents, teachers and children of our community, not to act as adversaries. Those members who do not get the message of the many who spoke out in favor of social services should either resign or be voted out of office.

RUTH and TED SHAPIN

Orange

* Boy, is Bill Lewis out of touch with reality!

First, he says, medical and social needs are best addressed by parents. Who does he think decides to send their kids to the clinics, the “tooth fairy”? Lewis says “these services are already provided” elsewhere. Many of the families near the affected schools don’t have a car. What will he say next? “Let them eat cake?”

He is concerned that the clinics will lead to “government rearing of children” and that “parents have little understanding of exactly what goes on in these clinics.” The clinics are not operated in secrecy, and the parents are not as dumb as he seems to think. Next he’ll be seeing “black helicopters.”

Lewis says that clinics don’t address the academic subjects and that they will turn teachers into “social workers.” He’s correct about the first, wrong about the second. I am a teacher in Orange Unified. I was there when he came, and I’ll be there when he’s gone. I and the rest of the teachers address the academic subjects, and we will be able to do so best with kids that have had something to eat and have had the benefit of basic health services--services that Mr. Lewis should thank God he is able to afford for his own kids, but would deny to those less fortunate than he is.

JAN J. MILLER

Orange

* In regards to the Orange Unified School District trustees’ issue of allowing or not allowing grants to be applied to the various schools based on needs of those attending the schools:

It seems Max Reissmueller and Martin Jacobson thrive on creating an us (school board) versus them (public school employees, teachers, students, etc.) atmosphere. Dissatisfaction with each other has been the prevailing norm.

Time after time, issue after issue they instill waves of disregard for the feelings of the majority of the people actually having children in the various schools in the district. (Remember, Max Reissmueller home-schools his children.)

Instead of calm waters of togetherness, they veto ideas such as forming a volunteer committee to review grant proposals; the committee would be comprised of volunteer teachers, parents, administrators and board members.

It seems contradictory to leave the grant review to the board’s heavy leanings to the Christian Right’s agenda.

It’s like Max Reissmueller is out to punish the public school system, blaming it for his failure to graduate from high school and having to attend a continuation high school. I’ve got news for him: It’s not the institutions (schools, marriage, government, etc.), it’s the people that make up the institutions that must be held accountable!!

So, let’s come together and start building a coalition of unity. A district divided hurts only those that must benefit from tolerance. The children--our future.

MELINDA C. MOORE

Orange