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March 22, 2024 Editor, The News-Gazette: It was disheartening to read Rebecca Taylor’s paid letter to the editor attacking our local public education. As parents of two young adult daughters who attended Rockbridge County schools K-12, our experience is nothing like what Ms. Taylor describes.
Our family’s experience is that everyone from the Board of Supervisors/city councils, school boards, school administrators, teachers, and also support staff care deeply about the education of our children and are doing the best they can with the resources they have and the challenges they face.
We think it does these public servants a great disservice to accuse them of implementing a curriculum pushed by “… wealthy, powerful, nonelected individuals, organization, and unions …” to “promote their own agendas and Marxist ideas …” with the goal of “the demise of families and a society motivated by fear.”
We agree with Ms. Taylor’s concern about parent involvement in their children’s education. A shocking number of children in our local schools, however, do not live with even one of their parents. Does this mean that we should punish the children for the failures of their parents, and that “Unruly students should not be the state’s problem …”? That “Education should be a privilege…”? Do we want to wait until those students are ready for rehab or prison before they are the “state’s problem”?
We understand that it can be incredibly frustrating to pour one’s heart into a project and it doesn’t work out as hoped. It’s natural to look for someone else to blame, but it’s unfortunate when that results in lashing out at individuals who are working towards the same goal.
We wish Ms. Taylor and all the other educators in Rockbridge the very best in their efforts to educate our children. ERIC and ELISE SHEFFIELD Rockbridge County
