LETTERS
LETTERS Railroads Frank Browning's "Murder of the Sunset Limited" in the June issue is probably the finest article I've read in recent times about our privately owned railroads and their...
...This "educational heresy" comes from a former teacher with twenty years' experience in the second, third, and fourth grades...
...Most educators understand the limitations of any label and prefer to look at these students in terms of their educational needs...
...Even the title of the article is misleading...
...I regret any inaccuracy that may have caused embarrassment to Screw...
...There is a story for your readers on this subject...
...Many—perhaps most—students, like Tom Johnson and his friends, are unchallenged and bored in today's rigid, workbook-and-test-oriented classrooms...
...It is not polite to accuse some of this country's most prominent doctors, and most prestigious hospitals, of death-dealing...
...And a large majority of them are not receiving the special instruction that they need—the Federal Government and most states have been niggardly in funding special programs...
...Equal education does not mean the same education for all...
...The reality is that we have come to use labels as the mechanism through which funding is made available to school programs...
...others may follow...
...Both the advocates and the challengers of special education programs have failed to recognize that talented children and adolescents do evidence clear-cut differences from their peers...
...Francis J. O'Donnell Washington, D. C. The brightest I was appalled to read "All the Best for the Brightest," by Anne Gardner Remley (May issue...
...C. Everett Koop ("Dominoes," June issue), is incorrect...
...Most hospitals were found not to have substantially complied with the Act...
...This link between the workplace and the community is the cornerstone of the Steelworkers' OSHA/ environmental goals...
...As of May, approximately thirty-five hospitals had been visited...
...Of the perhaps 5 per cent of the population that is scientifically literate, the majority end up working for the Pentagon, the nuclear establishment, or the multinational corporations...
...Lens's article concluded, "The alternative is a Reaganite form of the corporate state—a prologue, perhaps, to fascism...
...Floyd L. Yeomans Shelbyville, Tennessee Optimist Jim McClellan gave us much important information on the "Two-Party Monopoly" (January issue), but his article was defeatist...
...Congratulations...
...And the promises that were made to the effect that amalgamation would help solve the problems have turned out to be hollow...
...public schools...
...This in turn leads more than half the children we work with in the Institute to doubt themselves—not flaunt themselves, as suggested by the Remley article...
...The Federal Government has not signed a contract with Massachusetts specifically authorizing it to take over enforcement of the Act...
...To further the achievement of these goals, we are an active member of the National Clean Air Coalition...
...Researchers have noted, too, that teachers' expectations and students' learning opportunities dwindle for youngsters placed in "slow" tracks in school...
...One administrative complaint has been filed with the Federal Department of Health and Human Services...
...Indeed, John Sheehan personally testified before Congress in 1977 and again this year in favor of strict environmental controls and served with distinction on the National Commission on Air Quality...
...I fully recognize the right of others, including your writers and readers, to disapprove of Screw...
...You may riot, however, cancel my subscription...
...A selection of letters will appear next month...
...Negotiations with other hospitals are in progress...
...Remley implies that service to gifted children is provided at the expense of non-gifted and that all inadequacies of public education can be attributed to provision of services to the gifted...
...The challenge is to provide appropriate educational experiences for all children—even the gifted...
...Separating human beings of any age on the basis of "giftedness" is as damaging and misguided as separating on the basis of color or race or other artificial criteria...
...Lost Children," by Betty Medsger, and "Breaking the Incest Taboo," by Marcia Yudkin...
...But now Kenneth Hinton (June "Letters") has plumbed new depths, demanding cancellation because of an advertisement for another magazine he dislikes...
...Testimony about the ill effects of labels abounds...
...Thomas M. Stephens Columbus, Ohio Giftedness and creativity are where you find them—that is the only positive statement that may be made about these admirable qualities...
...Anne Gardner Remley Ann Arbor, Michigan Don't cancel It is disturbing that a seemingly growing number of readers demand you cancel their subscription because, horror of horrors, you printed one article (out of hundreds a year) they disagreed with...
...These students are found across all racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic groups...
...It is not polite to write of such things...
...The term "gifted", like other educational jargon, is nonsensical, as Remley implies...
...Clean air Although Francis J. O'Donnell's piece on the Clean Air Act's coming reauthorization battle (May issue) is both informative and timely, the section concerning the role of the United Steelworkers of America needs clarification...
...Marcia Tewell Syracuse, New York As a reader of The Progressive for more than thirty years, I have come to expect insightful, factual articles informing readers about government and other aspects of American life...
...It is not just the mind or the brain that is being tested: There is "left-brain, right-brain" thinking, "emotional" thinking, "second-level" thinking, to say nothing of deviate and deviant thinking...
...It should be noted that the role of Steelworkers is not an isolated one in the fight for clean air...
...Socialism of a democratic, libertarian, and humanitarian sort is a wonderful ideal, but I have become a pessimist as to its practical realizability...
...As the military-industrial-nuclear complex leads us down the road to Armageddon, crucial national decisions that might reverse this trend are made on the basis of ignorance, misunderstanding, and superstition...
...Al Goldstein New York, New York The author replies: My reference to Screw magazine was based on reports published elsewhere...
...Included in the scientifically illiterate 95 per cent are almost all members of Congress, the President, and his Cabinet and advisers...
...Wolf Salt Lake City, Utah How often must it be reiterated that segregation of children with the use of any label has detrimental effects on those individuals...
...Koop has exposed more overt practices as well, such as the administration of a sedative dose which the physician knows to be lethal...
...dozens of parents responded...
...I started bitching to my teachers, drew administrative attention, and got placed in an "advanced" system of schooling, which in reality merely let me do my own thing (mostly reading of trashy science-fiction...
...It is one of Federal ineptness, squandering of human potential, biases against able students, and a deliberate failure to assist our last major natural resource...
...Remley uses quotes out of context and begs the question as she tries to make her points...
...Nothing could be farther from the truth...
...LETTERS Railroads Frank Browning's "Murder of the Sunset Limited" in the June issue is probably the finest article I've read in recent times about our privately owned railroads and their public-be-damned attitude...
...Koop has not been polite...
...The Hill-Burton Act permits individuals and non-Federal officials to file complaints with HHS and to pursue them in court if necessary...
...You published better ideas in the "Letters" columns of the May issue...
...As Lee Kean points out, most youngsters, not just a select few, are capable of learning far more than they do in U.S...
...I am eighty-one, and have been a socialist (small s) since 1918...
...A "HAT" is no less likely to experience the isolation of riding a special bus or van to an out-of-neighborhood school into a segregated class than is a child with a learning disability label...
...John J. Sheehan Legislative Director United Steelworkers of America Washington, D. C. The author replies: I certainly did not mean to imply that the USWA is an unwilling partner in the clean air battle or that the steel stretchout bill is poor public policy...
...Fenwick Anderson Middletown, New York Health care As a follow-up to Michael Baiter's report on the Hill-Burton Act, "The Best-Kept Secret in Health Care" (April issue), your readers may be interested in a program instituted several months ago by the office of Attorney General Francis X. Bellotti of Massachusetts to investigate compliance with the Hill-Burton Act...
...However, we can no more blame these ills on the fact that we are attempting to provide for gifted children in our schools than on the fact that we are attempting to provide for handicapped children...
...Lee Kean Carrollton, Ohio The author replies: Some of these correspondents note that many able students are not receiving an adequate, education in public school...
...The ad, he says, "clearly tells me that you subscribe to the sick philosophy of that publication...
...JoanS...
...Children and teachers do respond positively to having particular talents identified in a manner which leads to meaningful development of particular talents and utilizes existing resources in the school, home, and community...
...The research studies with which I am familiar concerning the effects of labeling address the assignment of negative or pejorative labels such as "retarded" or "disturbed" and not the use of the label "gifted...
...She used half-truths, cited quotations out of context, and generally misinformed in an apparent effort to prove her predetermined argument—that gifted education must always be elitist...
...These youngsters need more flexible, stimulating, and open-ended learning experiences...
...The implications of being labeled Highly Academically Talented (yes, HAT) are no less of a stigma than being labeled Significantly Intellectually Impaired (yes, SII...
...If both strike you as somewhat morally confused, perhaps you should run another cartoon of a woman with a sign, "Kill it before it calls you Mama...
...Now I know...
...They appear driven, selfish, single-minded— or motivated, field independent, and purposeful-depending on the mind set of teachers, parents, peers, and the talented themselves...
...First, talented children have discovered a personally meaningful set of behaviors which allows them to "act on their environment" in an atypical manner for someone with their experiential base...
...But there are clearly measurable differences among students in aptitudes and achievements based upon scientifically devised tests...
...On the other, a Bella Abzug who wants to ban the Bomb but "keep our options open" on instruments that poison and dismember small sons and daughters in utero...
...But such experiences are equally needed by the "rejects" who fall below the magic cut-off line of "scientifically devised tests," or who don't fit the test designers' narrow notions of excellence...
...One could get the impression that the union is a reluctant partner in the fight for clean air...
...The facts are as follows: Screw has never solicited, much less offered money for, or published, photographs of children engaged in sexual activities...
...Second, they are at least vaguely aware that they are "different" from their peer referent group in some ways—but not in all ways...
...The goal of the union is to see for our members a workplace which is healthy and a community which is free from toxic pollution...
...The USWA recognized as far back as 1968 that the nation's air was in need of a program to make it fit to breathe...
...Morton Levy Chief Accountant Joan Entmacher Assistant Attorney General Public Protection Bureau Commonwealth of Massachusetts Boston, Massachusetts...
...The passage of a steel-specific amendment to the Clean Air Act will have a positive effect on both environmental quality and the steel industry's ability to compete in the domestic steel market...
...Marcia Yudkin Berkeley, California Family fallout The Progressive has received heavy reader response to three articles in the May issue: "Hard Times for the American Family," by Jean Bethke Elshtain...
...Now, I was annoyed by an article in the same issue attacking special education for gifted children, an easy target because it's currently trendy...
...There is a serious lack of research asking what harm may come to students who are labeled and separated into two camps, the "gifted," and—by default—the "ungifted...
...One runs into such contradictions right and left these days...
...In the United States, according to the NSF report, the vast majority of today's high school and college graduates are scientifically illiterate...
...It could have been written in support of that monopoly, calculated to discourage citizen efforts to regain their political rights...
...I agree...
...Is it not time for you to publish a factual story on the important issues concerning public education...
...Anne Gardner Remley's article was no exception...
...In some of the leading hospitals in the United States and Canada, handicapped newborns have been deprived of routine life-saving procedures because the parents chose death over life for their less-than-perfect child...
...Federal support for research has been inadequate and often misdirected...
...Sometimes it is a matter of neglecting to open the blocked intestine of a Down's Syndrome child...
...I believe that is one reason why his confirmation as Surgeon General is now in jeopardy...
...Programs for the gifted have been scarce, sporadic, and in many cases nonexistent...
...Philip A. Perrone Guidance Institute for Talented Students University of Wisconsin Madison, Wisconsin Anne Gardner Remley's "All the Best for the Brightest" is just about the best article I've read concerning the Great Gifted Hunt sweeping the school systems...
...Juli Loesch Prolifersfor Survival Erie, Pennsylvania LETTERS Correction Marcia Yudkin's article in the May issue, "Breaking the Incest Taboo," contains a most serious and unfair misstatement of fact concerning Screw magazine, of which I am the editor and publisher...
...One could go on and on...
...Not just the "brightest" or the "gifted," or those heading for careers in science, complete these courses, but the entire school population, male and female...
...For example, here in Missoula on the southern route of the Old Northern Pacific (now combined with three other lines into the Burlington Northern) passenger travel has been completely wiped out, and if the Reagan Administration gets its way, it will be wiped out on the "high line" as well, leaving this state completely without passenger service...
...One could hardly argue that "all the best" has been available "for the brightest...
...Also, the Industrial Union Department of the AFL-CIO and major environmental groups have recently launched a network of environmentalists and trade unions to defend OSHA and the Clean Air Act...
...Compliance with the Act during the last six years was reviewed...
...As best as I can determine, your factual misinformation derives from a misreading of a 1977 article in the San Francisco Chronicle that reported that one Gene Abrams "placed an ad in Al Goldstein's Screw magazine offering $200 fee for girl model, 8-14 (must have parents' consent), one-day photographic session...
...It is difficult to understand how anyone who has spent time in a classroom working with children could think that a test could measure the unfathomable intricacies of the human psyche...
...He is always good...
...As a student in the ninth grade last year, I was bored (as was 95 per cent of the school populace...
...The syndrome which has infested the SP has obviously spilled over to the other railroads...
...An example of these tactics is evident in the discussion of the adverse effects of labeling...
...When have Americans given up without a fight...
...Hinton's letter clearly tells me he's more adept at huffing and puffing than thinking...
...This is far from helpful, though it is important to recognize how special privilege has taken over our government—if, then, we do something about it...
...All this time I was goofing around and getting A's for it, I wondered why my "nongifted" (i.e., less bitchy) friends weren't able to join me...
...Indeed, as a matter of long-standing and strongly held editorial policy—which has cost us substantially in lost revenues—Screw refuses to have anything to do with any such materials...
...Currently, as various disability and minority groups are receiving legal mandates for educational integration, the gifted are being pulled out to suffer similar stigma...
...Jocelyn Tyler Pacific Grove, California Contradictions I appreciate the ironic contradiction in Joel Pett's cartoon (June issue): "Support the right of a fetus to own a handgun...
...The Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers Union is a member of the Clean Air Coalition...
...Ordinary, run-of-the-mill humans are just not up to it, though they mean well...
...sometimes the more subtle act of writing on the chart, "Feed on demand," and then sedating the child to the point where he cannot demand: This results in death by starvation...
...Elinor R. Curb La Habra, California The label "gifted" is abhorrent to children and most teachers alike...
...As a matter of fact, with rare exceptions, this arrogant attitude of the SPRR has characterized it since the days of the "Big Four" who pioneered and founded it—Charlie Crocker, Collis Huntington, Leland Stanford, and Mark Hopkins...
...The article stated: "In 1977, Screw magazine offered $200 for girl models...
...At any rate, few individuals involved in gifted education place any value on the label itself...
...As for the environmental stretch-out of the steel industry's Clean Air Act requirements, it is important to realize that these recommendations are the result of an eighteen-month study involving labor, government, and industry...
...Providing "enrichment rooms, flexible curricula, and smaller class size for all" is the only fair, honest, democratic, and successful way to reach all children and bring out the best in them...
...However, with a few more incisive articles of the kind written by Browning, possibly there is a glimmer of hope...
...I simply ask that they not be misled as to the facts with regard to Screw's position on the issue of the use of children in its pages...
...A small proportion of the student population—about 2 to 3 per cent— develop intellectually at least 30 per cent more rapidly than their classmates...
...Agreement has been reached with some hospitals which will require them to make up deficits of over $300,000...
...In this connection, the facts are that such an ad did run inadvertently in Screw in 1971, and that as far as we are aware we have not run any similar ad since—either deliberately or inadvertently...
...There is a lot we can do—with new understanding and new tactics—once our single-issue groups get together to work on the main problem: government by and for the people...
...People in other states who are concerned about increasing the availability of medical care to the poor may wish to follow the Massachusetts example...
...However, the state Attorney General's other law enforcement powers, the powers reserved to the states by the new regulations, plus the general right of public access and complaint provided in the Act itself, have enabled the Attorney General's staff successfully to conduct its program of field audits...
...William H. Fisher Missoula, Montana Pessimist Congratulations on Sidney Lens's article, "The Postponed Depression" (June issue...
...In the most vexing case, a few of them trusted initial Government press releases on the H-bomb story and assumed The Progressive was guilty of treason...
...Mercedes Santiago Wesleyville, Pennsylvania I believe your assessment of the infanticide/euthanasia situation, expressed in your editorial criticizing the appointment of Dr...
...I agree with Remley that many serious problems need to be addressed in our public education system...
...On the one hand, a Jesse Helms who wants to save the babies but "keep our options open" on nuclear weapons which could turn any city on Earth into an instant Auschwitz...
...I formerly resided in El Paso and I could observe, as a train buff, what was happening on the Southern Pacific...
...For example, by the time Soviet pupils finish their ten-year obligatory schooling, they will have had five years of physics, five years of algebra, ten years of geometry, ten years of calculus, four years of chemistry, one year of astronomy, and five-and-one-half years of biology...
...That, I prophesy, is what we will get—Reaganism, then fascism, then nuclear war...
...The point, which Sheehan's remarks underline, is that environmental, labor, and other groups must band together to defend areas of mutual interest from Ronald Reagan's regulatory relief thresher...
...Education is noticeably the one area in which your writers almost consistently fail to meet that expectation...
...As someone whose elementary teachers used to write on his report card that he disturbed other children—because he finished his work before most of them and then was bored—I can attest that it's a trend whose time should have come three decades ago...
...Tom Johnson Mercer Island, Washington A recent report by the National Science Foundation (NSF) claims that the quality of science education in the United States is falling way below that of other industrialized nations, particularly the Soviet Union, Japan, and Germany...
Vol. 45 • June 1991 • No. 7
