The Willow Glen Resident Letters DeCinzo should pick on Dando for a change How about asking Mr. DeCinzo to do a couple cartoons about Pat Dando? If nothing else, you'd be better able to claim that your newspaper doesn't play partisan politics. Does Mr. DeCinzo have some sort of grudge against Ron Gonzales? At least his most recent cartoon wasn't as crude an ethnic slur as the first one that I saw a few months ago. Still, criticizing a Latino for not speaking Spanish hardly seems fair. Given the prejudice--even hostility--that many Americans hold against foreign-language speakers, it's not surprising that many of us don't speak the language of our ancestors. I don't know much about Mr. Gonzales' Spanish skills, but if he doesn't speak Spanish, he hasn't committed any greater sin than my father (who doesn't speak a word of Welsh) or my mother (who only knows a few words of Swedish). It might be in your best interest to find a cartoonist whose "sense of humor" is more in line with that of your readership. Just a suggestion. Art Morgan Pine Avenue Neighborhood schools are still just that I would like to respond to the Oct. 14 letter from Sadie Mouber. I have two daughters in the SJUSD, and I was pleased that I was able to choose which schools I wanted to send them to. As of last year, all kindergartners and first-graders are required to attend their neighborhood schools. All neighborhood schools were not stolen away as the letter stated. Parents who enroll their students in a timely fashion have been able to have their first-choice school. When you have parents enrolling their students a week before school starts or on the first day of school, chances are they won't receive their first choice but will be given their second- or third-choice school. These parents are then put on a waiting list for their first choice and are called when openings occur. If they so desire, they may then move their child to their first-choice school. Enrollment is never stable. The [student] population changes yearly. It seems to me that the River Glen neighborhood was already very established, and most of those children had already gone through the school system; hence, the initial closure of that school. After that closure, an Alzheimer's center was put in for a time. The dual-immersion program was originally housed at Washington Elementary School until it outgrew that site. It was at this time that the program was moved to River Glen; hence, its original name--Washington at River Glen. River Glen is a bilingual dual-immersion school that only works with the right ratio of Spanish-speaking to non-Spanish-speaking students. The school is not just for Spanish-speakers, as Mouber's letter stated. River Glen's program has been recognized statewide and nationally. How ironic that the front-page article in The Resident that same week was about Rosa Molina, River Glen's former principal. With regard to Broadway High School, some students do better in alternative programs. All children deserve the right to learn, and if they can be accommodated and also learn to care for their infants, how wonderful that these students aren't on the streets or welfare but are being educated. We should be thanking the staff at Broadway, who are able to reach these students. Diana Bernal Second Street An access road is not a racetrack Complaints have been flowing in about the closing of the connector driveway between the Dry Creek Shopping Center and the Safeway/Rite-Aid parking lot. OK, folks, I concede. You can have your driveway, with one slight modification: There should be large speed bumps at the entrance and exit of this driveway, and a few strategically spaced out along the middle. I grew mighty tired of having to do panic stops while turning from Rite-Aid onto the Safeway exit corridor. If you folks--particularly the new menace on the road, the young female driver--want to do 35-45 mph down a driveway, then I insist that you be slowed down, period. Robert L. Smith Cottle Avenue Vote for Lungren for school choice Dan Lungren is for school choice, Gray Davis is for the status quo. Dan Lungren wants the parents to be able to choose which schools their children should attend, whether parochial, private or with vouchers, as well as public schools. It is a well-known fact that competition in business results in better quality as well as lower prices. And so it would be with schools. Monitoring the quality of teachers, giving bonuses to the best teachers, eliminating the poor teachers and making sure that the teachers teach only in the subjects that they have been prepared to teach by their education is only common sense. The lack of these criteria has dropped the California schools to the bottom of the curve. The various teachers unions are in a large part the reason for this dismal fact. Yet Gray Davis is backed by these organizations. That means no improvement in our schools if he is elected. And that is an occurrence we cannot afford, especially in Silicon Valley, where the students must get the best education in order to be hired by the high-tech companies we are so proud of. If you want your children to receive the best education possible, then vote for Dan Lungren. Alma Taylor Gardendale Drive Wolfe is the best choice for trustee How fortunate we are that Don Wolfe is a candidate for the West Valley-Mission College Board of Trustees. He has committed his life to public service and opening doors of opportunity for young people in our communities. Don is a guest lecturer at the university level and has first-hand knowledge of our college needs. He is completing his term as Mayor of Saratoga and has demonstrated community leadership and financial management that are so critical to the growth of our highly valued Silicon Valley community college system. Many educators, community leaders and legislators endorse Don, including Ron Adolphson, board president of the Los Gatos-Saratoga Joint Union High School District, and Dr. Leo Chavez, former president of the West Valley College. State Assemblyman Jim Cunneen and Ted Lempert, the chairman of the State Assembly Committee on Higher Education, also support Don. Your vote for Don Wolfe on Nov. 3 for trustee will assure excellence for the West Valley-Mission Community College District. Frank Jewett Huxley Court [ Back to Contents Page | Willow Glen Resident Home Page | Archives ] This article appeared in the Willow Glen Resident, October 28, 1998. ©1998 Metro Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved.