Kids aren’t reading. Sure — but neither are their parents in this video game world
Not ‘competence’ we need
The Southlake Carroll school board has created an administrative mess, as underscored by the indictment of two of its members. (April 7, 1A, “Grand jury indicts 2 Carroll school board members”) Aided by a noisy minority, the board has brought forth a divisive, racially discriminatory Cultural Competence Action Plan that a significant majority of Southlake residents oppose.
The board needs to follow common sense, apply individual responsibility and fairly enforce the Student Code of Conduct, not a twisted distortion of “competence.” The district does not need pontificating from the likes of state Sen. Royce West, who has no connection whatsoever to Southlake, attempting to dictate how to run the school system.
Fortunately, our democracy will soon allow for the election of board members who have the best interest of kids at heart.
- Donald Engleman, Southlake
Political games with kids’ lives
It’s amazing how many Republican politicians have raced to the border for a photo op of them clutching their pearls over the living conditions of the unaccompanied youths being held until sponsors can be located. These very same people were applauding the former president for separating mothers and infants and caging toddlers who crossed with their parents only to be separated and lost in the system.
If it weren’t for double standards, these opportunists would have no standards at all.
- Edward C. Wyman, Fort Worth
We’ve seen second-guessing
In Sunday’s column, Cynthia M. Allen said the potential for the pandemic to have catastrophic consequences is something “public health officials are still trying to scare us into believing.” (5C, “Dire COVID predictions about end of mask mandate were way off. Let’s be glad for that”) Not only does that dismiss our health officials, whose jobs are to alert us to possible dangers, but it also it implies the pandemic’s dangers are suspect.
Believers in cabals of blood-drinking pedophiles wielding control through vaccinations, 5G or evil overlord Bill Gates are pushing fear, not our public health officials. If Allen doesn’t believe them, whom does she believe when it comes to public health?
- Melinda Vaughan, Fort Worth
Reading pushed to the back
The story “Board candidates offer views on reading issues at Fort Worth schools” on Sunday’s front page, lamenting the failure of two-thirds of school children to read at grade-level comprehension and the Fort Worth school district’s attempts to combat it, does not mention the real problem: The kids don’t read, but the their parents don’t read, either, and probably neither do their grandparents.
Look at what is happening to newspaper circulation. What happened to the Book of the Month Club?
Reading takes practice. If kids read only under coercion at school, there will be little progress. How can books compete with the allure of streaming and video games and a literary desert at home?
- Curtis Basham, Fort Worth
Rangers fans, you did good
As a San Diego-area resident and Padres fan for more than 30 years, I would like to publicly thank the wonderful Rangers fans at Globe Life Field who so selflessly and gracefully cheered the Padres’ Joe Musgrove during his no-hitter against the Texas Rangers on Friday night.
It was heartwarming to see the excellent sportsmanship exhibited by Rangers fans as the game wound down and Padres history was made.
You folks have my most sincere gratitude, and I speak for many San Diegans when I say that y’all are a class act.
- Alan Iglesias, Escondido, California
This story was originally published April 13, 2021 at 5:00 AM with the headline "Kids aren’t reading. Sure — but neither are their parents in this video game world."