Carranza’s Sour Note: Nixing Entry Auditions
I felt bad for the talented black and Hispanic students at the performing-arts middle school in Brooklyn, where the crazy schools chancellor just scrapped auditions in order to be admitted (“Where’s your school spirit?” Sept. 22).
Now, half the school must be for homeless students, those who are learning English and lowincome students. It’s true that homeless students are at a disadvantage for admissions, but is the goal to lower standards?
Our idiot mayor has no idea how long it took to get some good schools in the city, and it is beyond reckless to make decisions that wreck them in an instant. Carol Meltzer Manhattan
The final nail is in the coffin: Mayor de Blasio, a non-educator and a politically ambitious progressive who is not a product of New York City schools, has found his twin in Chancellor Richard Carranza.
Anyone who doesn’t understand what the entry of 50 percent of poor, homeless or English language-learners (who might not be up to grade level or even behavior level) will do to the atmosphere in classes and schools should not be making these decisions. Dianne Stillman Brooklyn
Good education is built on standards. They’re needed to bring in the best and graduate the best. Students need incentives to do their best. Education based on a lottery system is not education based on merit. Robert Shaw Deland, Fla.
Why are parents at the Brooklyn performingarts school shocked to learn that, under de Bla- sio’s new diversity plan, it can no longer audition prospective students?
Honestly, if the mayor ran this city based on merit, he’d never have been re-elected to a second term. Johnny T. Sollitto Brooklyn
I have never seen such an idiotic, politically correct idea in my life.
To eliminate auditions in favor of a lottery program in the name of diversity is absurd and denies truly talented young people the opportunity to study in arts and music programs.
The tire-squealing you’ll be hearing is the sound of parents bolting New York with their talented kids. Joe Burke Cape Coral, Fla.
I hope de Blasio and his new schools chancellor never get the chance to run medical schools.
I personally prefer competency over diversity. I bet they do, too, but their cowardice prevents them from stating that. William Cook Little Egg Harbor, NJ