Riordan Role in Education

How can you assume that the Los Angeles Board of Education does not embrace Mayor Richard Riordan’s push for educational excellence in our schools when you have not polled all of its members? Your editorial, “A Bully Pulpit for the Schools” (Oct. 19), certainly does not reflect my views.

I welcome Riordan’s efforts. I was disturbed during his first term, when although he sought and gained the advice of the late education expert and reformer, Helen Bernstein, he failed to follow Mayor Tom Bradley’s precedent-breaking establishment of a full-time paid staff position of education advisor and liaison to the L.A. Unified School District, the position I filled during most of my 20-year tenure with the Bradley administration. I am exceedingly pleased that Riordan has now reestablished that staff position to augment the advice he is receiving from Ted Mitchell.

I intend to take advantage of Riordan’s longtime interest in the welfare of children and his offer to help the LAUSD restore excellence to its schools. I will continue to work closely with him and his staff, as I have since I took office, because we share the same education goals.

VALERIE FIELDS

Board Member

LAUSD