Letters to the Editor
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‘Albany, Adams and Payne’
Regarding your March 24, 2006, editorial, “Albany, Adams and Payne,” we were puzzled why you erroneously led your readers to believe that taxpayer money was used to pay for Standard & Poor’s Educational Resource Management Study, which was published for the New York State Commission on Education Reform in 2004.
Your own paper reported on January 22, 2004, that state funding would not be used for this study [“Budget Contains ‘Wal-Mart Rule,’ ” William F. Hammond Jr., New York].
When Standard & Poor’s subsequently decided that the need for an impartial analysis of the state’s education finance system was important enough to conduct the study without compensation, this page published a February 10, 2004, editorial that stated, “We’re happy to see the work going forward. But it’s still worth noticing that it’s only going forward because of one company’s unusual willingness to take a risk and work for free …” [“The Hevesi Hold-Up”].
At the end of the day, Standard & Poor’s independent study, transparent analysis, and rigorous findings were provided to the state free of charge, and were cited repeatedly in the State Supreme Court Appellate Division’s March 23, 2006, ruling on one of New York’s most important policy decisions: adequate funding for the education of its schoolchildren.
THOMAS SHERIDAN
Vice President
Standard & Poor’s School Evaluation Services
Manhattan
‘Friedman Set To Unleash Power’
Milton Friedman’s advocacy of school vouchers, and ultimately of replacing the public school system with one in which government is not involved, is persuasive except for the questions it leaves unanswered:
Where will the money come from to build schools, pay teachers’ salaries, provide books and materials [“Friedman, 93, Set To Unleash Power of Choice,” Josh Gerstein, Page 1, March 22, 2006]?
What would be the consequences of schools having to be profit-making businesses unless endowed by religious institutions or the occasional philanthropist?
And wouldn’t government still have to be involved in setting basic standards for curriculum and requiring national testing to ensure those standards were being met by all children?
RITA KRAMER
Manhattan
Mrs. Kramer is the author of “Ed School Follies: The Miseducation of America’s Teachers.”
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