Senior Ellie Howell holds her sign as Lakewood High School students walk out on Sept. 25 to protest proposed changes in the curriculum for Advanced Placement U.S. history.(John Leyba, The Denver Post)
The Jefferson County teachers participating in the recent “sick-out” were modeling the civil disobedience the current school board hopes to eliminate from AP History. The teachers are dealing with an entity that does not bargain in good faith, as demonstrated by the board’s recent disregard of the recommendations delivered by the mutually agreed-upon third-party fact-finder.
Based on the board’s history, including the hiring of Superintendent Dan McMinimee without seriously considering other candidates, there is no reason to believe traditional means of communication will be met with honest consideration. I applaud the courage of Jeffco’s teachers and students battling the tyranny of the current school board.
Heidi Walker, Arvada
This letter was published in the Oct. 5 edition.Re: “Abuse of history in Jeffco?,” Sept. 28 Vincent Carroll column.
Vincent Carroll’s column was disappointing. It is not so much that I disagreed with its content but rather Carroll’s decision to devote so much energy against a tabled proposal written by a single board member while ignoring a far larger issue: What does this entire affair say about the mindset of teachers whose professional values include sending out 17-year-old students to fight their battles for them?
It is as if an enraged bull with a duck on its back had broken into a china shop, and Vincent Carroll decided to write about the duck.
Paul R. Heyliger, Fort Collins
This letter was published in the Oct. 5 edition.Re: “Jefferson County Public Schools faces crisis over school board changes,” Sept. 28 news story.
Your article tells us that only about 33 percent of the registered voters in Jefferson County bothered to vote in the last school board election. This means that only about one out of every five registered voters in Jeffco actually cast a ballot in favor of the people who have blown up the Jeffco school system.
The people of Jefferson County have learned the hard lesson that all elections have consequences. Let this be a signal lesson about what can happen if too many voters decide to sit out the November off-year elections.
Guy Wroble, Denver
This letter was published in the Oct. 5 edition.Unfortunately, some of the students, teachers and parents in Jefferson County fail to understand the direction the school board wants to take with the curriculum. The goal is not to decrease knowledge of American and world history as well as our Constitution, but to increase this knowledge. In my dealing with students on a day-to-day basis while in practice, I found their knowledge of the U.S. Constitution and American history to be abysmally deficient. Unfortunately,
I also find that to be true of too many adults.
Why not give the school board and perhaps the suggested curriculum committee a chance to improve this situation? Why not give them a chance to correlate current events with past history? This would promote knowledge and critical thinking.
William F. Hineser, Arvada
This letter was published in the Oct. 5 edition.A centenarian outsider’s observations on Jeffco student protests:
1. Kids today are smarter and more empowered than my generation was at that age. Pawns? Hardly.
2. AP History emphasizing “patriotism” and ignoring civil disobedience is as stupid as AP Math without negative numbers and AP Science without electrons or evolution.
3. Sixteen-year-olds should have the vote in school board elections. They have more at stake and couldn’t do worse than the present electorate has.
Ralph Taylor, Englewood
This letter was published in the Oct. 5 edition.Oh, give me a break! The kids in Jeffco are protesting against “revisionist” history? What do they think they are getting right now, and have been getting all their lives? History is written from the perspective of modern-day authors, who don’t teach history as it happened, but instead from their own feelings and opinions. Although I’m sure some of these kids are very intelligent, most of them don’t really understand what they are protesting. But the weather has been beautiful, and I would also prefer being out on a beautiful day to sitting in a stuffy classroom learning history about what actually happened at the time our country was being born and becoming the great nation that it did.
Dianne Guilinger, Arvada
This letter was published in the Oct. 5 edition.
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