Dear Editor:
The following letter was sent to all of the Board of Education members.
I am writing to you to ask you to reconsider your decision to possibly remove Reading and Writing from the middle school curriculum as well as possibly terminate the positions of some very valuable teachers and faculty. I am well aware that this is a budget issue but I am also aware that the previous Superintendent and his regime where quite the “spenders,” but our children should not pay the price for that.
I always thought it was a shame that Reading and Writing wasn’t taught beyond eighth grade so you could imagine what I think of it not being taught beyond fifth grade. There is nothing more powerful then the written word and good writing skills are skills that will help you with everything you do in life, as it teaches you how to organize and articulate your thoughts. The Reading and Writing course is the cornerstone to a good education as it is necessary in nearly every class they will ever take and it teaches critical thinking skills which this generation so desperately needs. Siri should not be teaching our children grammar, sentence structure, and punctuation.
If I am not mistaken, a meeting was held to discuss these plans with fifth grade parents. Why weren’t third and fourth grade parents notified? I am a proud mother of twin fourth graders and I was not notified nor were the parents of the third graders. This decision will surely impact them in the next two to three years, wouldn’t it?
Parsippany Focus shed light on a meeting that recently took place in which Senator Sweeney and Senator Pennacchio visited to discuss the fact that the Morris Country schools are possibly the most “underfunded” in the state. Their plan as I understand is to try to get more money into this particular district. If this happens our little budget problem is solved, no?
Once again I am politely asking you to reconsider this decision as it will have a lasting negative impact on the students in this district. If the previous regime came up with millions to put in turf fields against the taxpayers wishes surely you can find somewhere else to pull funds from, or come up with money to keep this essential subject in our curriculum and some great staff employed, right?
