Key Issue Is Teaching

* John Rossmann starts the new year off with typical teachers union disinformation with his Jan. 7 letter.

Rossmann uses the recent student improvements--attributed to the $1.5-billion class-size reduction program--as justification for the education establishment to extract more from our wallets. He says the $1.5 billion “is but a fraction of the past funding that enemies of public education have withheld. . . . “ This is a thinly veiled reference to the education establishment’s perpetual assault on Proposition 13.

While K-4 class-size reduction, which I supported, has shown positive results, it is a very expensive option, as its $1.5-billion cost attests. Two, money is not, and never has been, the root of California’s education problem. Rossmann’s beloved education establishment is.

More significant is what goes on inside the classroom. Over two years ago, the legislature enacted laws specifying the minimum phonics content in language arts instruction. Few districts are in full compliance with these new education codes, even though compliance would not have cost much. This is hardly justification to surrender more of the fruits of our labor.

One of the education establishment’s mantras is that we need millions more for teacher training. All along, we have been told that California’s low achievement is due to “unqualified” emergency-credentialed teachers, most of whom were hired to facilitate class-size reduction.

The teacher training money is not for these ‘unqualified” teachers--who paradoxically raised the performance of our K-4 students. It is for our “qualified” teachers who hold regular credentials. As it turns out, thousands of these “qualified” teachers to whom we’ve been paying salaries for years can’t teach phonics, traditional math, history or literature.

BRUCE CRAWFORD

Fountain Valley

* I want our schools to have rain-proof roofs, proper plumbing and electrical fixtures as well as clean walls. But make no mistake: Elegant buildings do not make a “good” school.

A “good” school requires a student body entering with a desire to learn. This attitude begins in the home.

There must be an involvement by either the biological parents or their surrogates, and expectation that the children leave home with the clear understanding that they are going to school to learn.

Parents and children must recognize the importance of education to the well-being and future happiness of the children.

We can discuss education methods, teaching credentials, standardized tests and many other important factors in the success of our education institutions, but none will succeed if we do not begin by involving the parents.

They must learn the importance of their role in the education process. They should come to the schools regularly and frequently. Here is a role for the bilingual teacher, as in many of our schools the children come from limited or non-English-speaking households.

Not infrequently, the parents have lived in this country for years without learning English. This is not to say they are “bad” people; it has always been thus in this country of immigrants. It is all too easy to blame the teachers for the results we observe in our schools. A comprehensive program to improve our education institutions must begin with parental involvement.

DON MARTIN

Santa Ana

* In “Smaller Classes Aid Test Scores, Results Show,” (Dec. 29), regarding students with limited skills in English, you have written, “Many students were simply unable to follow tests given only in English.”

I suspect the same students are simply unable to follow instruction only in English, as well.

Too bad we are outlawed from speaking to them in languages they understand while we also teach them English.

JANE CANSECO

Orange