Many substitutes have excellent credentials
To the editor:
The June 16 Review-Journal included a front-page story on the teacher shortage in our city. The article stated that if the positions are not filled by a licensed schoolteacher, the Clark County School District will fill these vacancies with substitute teachers.
The executive director of the Clark County Education Association, John Jasonek, is quoted saying it's "a foregone conclusion that you're not going to get the same quality of education with a substitute as a permanent teacher." He also states that the quality of education will suffer if hundreds of substitutes are needed in the fall.
The Greek philosopher Socrates points out that it is easy to lead people through persuasive rhetoric and distorted images -- and this is what Mr. Jasonek has accomplished.
His statement is a generalization that our local substitute teachers are not educated individuals. Mr. Jasonek needs to avoid unwarranted assumptions.
I am one of those substitutes who he stated will offer students a subpar education if I am called upon to help out amid the teacher shortage. Don't assume that all subs are only educated up to 62 college credits. Look at the subs who are retired schoolteachers and college students who are obtaining their bachelor's degrees in education, as I am, and many retired college-educated individuals who just want to supplement their income.
Mr. Jasonek needs to be reminded that a substitute teacher has to, among other things, take the Praxis 1 teacher assessment test, which tests an individual on essay writing, grammar skills and math (algebra and geometry). If a substitute does not pass this test, her license is revoked.
It is unfortunate that Mr. Jasonek has such a low opinion of the district's substitutes. His unwarranted assumptions do not take into account that many of the substitutes have exceptional credentials
Melanie Underwood
LAS VEGAS
Hillary landslide
To the editor:
As a former upstate New Yorker, I read with interest Pamela Tette's implication that upstate New York is not particularly enamored of Hillary Clinton (Tuesday letter).
This belief is belied by the 2006 Senate election results, in which Sen. Clinton prevailed in 49 of 53 upstate counties (north of Rockland and Westchester) and won all but one county north of Albany.
Although more conservative than downstate folk, the political attitude of upstate New Yorkers is generally more moderate than, say, the Southern religious right or Western libertarians.
Christopher A. Kearney
HENDERSON
A bonus
To the editor:
Your Sunday editorial, "In case you didn't see this one coming: Greens use Endangered Species Act in attempt to torpedo water plan" was amusing. I didn't know that the Goshute Tribe and Trout Unlimited (both signers on the "least chub" listing petition) were "agents of environmental extremism." Nor did I realize that if people want to try to shut down some sort of development they don't like, all they have to do is "make up threats to obscure fish in another state."
But, ah, that's where you're wrong. Turns out there are only six wild populations of least chub left on the planet -- with almost 130 separate sites surveyed so far, it's not for lack of looking -- and transplant efforts have proved to be mostly unsuccessful.
Thus, the solid majority of scientists who expert peer-reviewed the status review felt that a federal listing petition was in order at some point for this species. (I should know, I'm the Utah biologist who wrote the status review.)
So if you'd bother to check any facts on the ground, you would know that listing of this species is warranted. If it just so happens that it also helps slow down or prevent the Snake Valley water pumping ... well, that's just a bonus.
ALLISON JONES
MURRAY, UTAH
The way it is
To the editor:
In response to Bradley Kuhns' Monday letter about Nevada's voter-approved smoking ban:
Mr. Kuhns must be living under a rock somewhere. Government tells most business owners on every level that there are rules they must follow. While I may agree with his statement that the "business owner should have the freedom and inalienable right to say who he lets into his establishment," that just isn't the way it is. The government intrudes in most people's businesses.
Maybe if smokers had not been so annoying for so many years because it was their "right" to smoke, this would not have happened. I can't wait for the day it happens in casinos, too. When do we vote?
Marcia Romano
LAS VEGAS
