Promotions and Test Scores

Re “School Strains Under Effort to End Social Promotion,” March 27: This article, while not explicitly saying so, delivers a good argument against the idea of tying teacher pay to student test scores. No matter how able or motivated the teacher is, there are too many factors outside his or her control that influence a student’s performance in the classroom.

Would you base a doctor’s salary on the overall health scores of his or her patients? I think not. Yet we expect doctors to be competent and pay them accordingly. If doctors were paid teachers’ salaries, we would have a severe shortage of competent doctors.

MANUEL KATZ

Venice

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I partially agree with David Friedman’s analysis that family wealth may have an impact on a child’s test scores and doing well in school (Opinion, March 26). However, I can attest that money is not the only or major contributor to a student’s success. Both my parents worked 10-hour days at minimum wage, a cook and a seamstress. Neither spoke sufficient English to help me do homework. I had to work in a fast-food takeout to supplement my own expenses. My grades actually improved in my junior and senior years in high school, as I worked after school, because I learned discipline. My Latino co-workers also had better grades than the other Latino students who were not working part-time after school.

ROBERT K. JUNG

Los Angeles

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It’s about time! You finally published an article validating what teachers have known for a very long time regarding the relationship of economics and student performance. Your editorial board needs to read Friedman’s article before it aligns itself with Supt. Ramon Cortines and misinforms the community that low scores on standardized tests can be remedied if only we had better teachers in LAUSD. Maybe if we had a more equitable distribution of social services, better pay for teachers and better parents, the public school system nationwide would not be in the state it is.

LYNN RABIN

Continuation High School Teacher

LAUSD

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Re “Bond Backers Weigh Second Try,” March 24: California Teachers Assn. President Wayne Johnson’s mean-spirited remarks blaming “older voters” for defeating Prop. 26, the school bond issue, misses the point. Johnson hopes that senior citizens will develop “some sort of a social conscience to provide a decent education for the children of California.”

It is not the responsibility of the taxpaying citizens of California, older or otherwise, to subsidize or educate another nation’s children. That’s the bottom line. No amount of whining or finger-pointing will alter this simple fact.

JOSEPH A. LEA

Anaheim