Letters: Education and Captain Fatty's Adventures
Guest Host Ari Shapiro reads letters from listeners reacting to our month-long education series and to Cruising World magazine editor Captain Fatty Goodlander's summer adventures at sea. We also have a clarification about our interview with World War II veteran James Shiels about the Dachau concentration camp.
ARI SHAPIRO, host:
We've gotten a lot of letters about our education series this month. A number of you wrote to us about our story featuring a Seattle teacher who refuses to give his students standardized tests. Pat Nester of Santa Cruz, California, wrote: As a teacher, I hate that teachers would spend classroom time teaching test-taking strategies. However, one good, high-stakes test given each year can give the public a fair indication of how students are progressing.
Listener Bart Binning of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, thinks the real problem is unqualified teachers. He wrote: Standardized testing is a necessity because of tenure. Incompetent teachers are not fired, and students taught by incompetent teachers do not learn the elementary requirements needed to be successful. Come up with a way to get rid of bad teachers, he said, and the reason for standardized testing disappears.
You had a range of reactions to our segment about HIV/AIDS education and abstinence programs in the schools. Marie Wiesenberger of Ashville, North Carolina, wrote: I can't believe you let someone spout the nonsense that abstinence education actually works. She went on: The rate of STDs in this country among teens is an all-time high. It does not work, and we need real sex education in this country. Grow up, America.
Bill Morris of Jackson, Mississippi, had a completely different take on the issue. School is not the best place to teach HIV awareness; the home is, he said. But because the children in D.C. schools come from mostly single- parent, non-functioning families, the schools become the next best place for dissemination of this kind of information. Very sad but true. With NPR, he said, it is always a political issue, never one about personal responsibility and the consequences of moral choice.
We have a clarification on our story about the 75th anniversary of the opening of the Dachau concentration camp. Our interview with World War II veteran James Shields should have made clear that his Army unit was not part of the forces that liberated the main Dachau camp. His unit helped liberate Dachau's subcamps.
And finally, reactions to Captain Fatty Goodlander's summer adventure. The editor-at-large of Cruising World magazine will be coasting us through the long, hot summer months with essays about his nautical adventures and exotic locales.
Dan Hayes of Lake Forest, California, is looking forward to more of Captain Fatty's adventures.
Mr. DAN HAYES (Caller): In these times of resource shortages and conspicuous consumption, Fatty Goodlander lives simply and richly on a hurricane-salvaged boat, wandering the world and meeting new friends around the world, living by his wits and almost no money. He's living proof that you don't need to be wealthy to live well and have a great time doing it. Thanks so much for sharing Fatty with all of us.
SHAPIRO: Well, if we've driven you to put on a sailor suit and take a sabbatical, or if we make you want to dump a bucket of water on our heads, let us know. Visit our Web page, NPR.org, and click on the link that says Contact Us.
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