Lawmakers care about tests, not schools.
I agree almost completely with Sentinel columnist Scott Maxwell’s assessment of our dismal education system (“Florida’s teachers are leaving in droves,” Sunday). Maxwell encourages our state legislators to start listening in order to make sound decisions for the betterment of the educational process. This is where we differ.
I believe the current state legislators who are making these reckless decisions just don’t care about the state’s education system. They’ve been too busy feeding their testing buddies’ pockets and trying to divert public funds to private charter-school corporations to pay much attention to what they are doing to the overall system. So instead, they demonize teachers for trying to do a job that is made harder and harder by the very institution that should be giving clear oversight and funding.
In other words, they’re representing someone’s interests, but it’s not the people of Florida. The damage being done has been getting worse over time. They are undermining the fabric of our society, and we’re letting them get away with it.
With the recent legal victories reaffirming our right to nongerrymandered districts, I would like to think the tide may change to allow for a better education system for all of Florida’s students, but is it too late?
The teachers leaving are the human “canaries in the coal mine,” and our current state legislators just want to dig deeper. We should make our voices heard in November. John Gilliam Orlando Too much Trump
Why would the Sentinel publish an article about how Donald Trump is dredging up decadesold allegations about Bill Clinton’s marital infidelity (“Donald Trump sees political gain in Bill Clinton’s extramarital affairs,” OrlandoSentinel.com, Saturday)? The Sentinel is part of the problem.
We all know why he is doing it, because a) it’s all he can attack Hillary Clinton on; b) he has the hubris to insist no one levy similar allegations against him without incurring his wrath; c) he views women as simple objects with no value independent of their men; and d) he’s getting attention by doing it.
Stop giving it to him. A story like that should have focused on the hypocrisy of an outrageously unqualified and ridiculous human whoopee cushion like Trump constantly flagellating a serious, qualified female candidate for a ridiculous and wholly irrelevant personal issue, the likes of which cast even darker aspersions against him.
The media need to shine more light on that. It’s ridiculous to read about Bill Clinton’s “redfaced finger wagging” in the shadow of Trump’s orange-faced ham-fisted goose stepping. We deserve better, as a society, than media that cower in the path of an ignorant bully who can dish it out but can’t take it. Judi Hayes Orlando Hillary wrong choice
After 43 years of voting as a Democrat, this will be the first year that I am not going to vote, as I cannot bring myself to vote for Hillary Clinton.
And when many other Democrats and independents also do not vote — or else they indicate Bernie Sanders as a write-in candidate — in the coming presidential election, and Donald Trump consequently wins the presidency, then the Democratic Party will realize that it should have backed Sanders as the Democratic presidential candidate, instead of anointing Clinton. Jay Stein Orlando