State CSAPs arepoor benchmarks
The reports in the July 30 edition of The Daily Sentinel regarding District 51’s Colorado Student Assessment Program 2008 scores are nothing short of appalling, and two threshold issues immediately capture our attention:
3 Comparison to state student score averages is not an appropriate benchmark for District 51 performance when those state averages show 50 percent proficiency in third-grade writing, 44 percent proficiency in fifth-grade science and 30 percent proficiency in 10th-grade math. Those state averages simply demonstrate that over half the schools in Colorado are substandard and need prompt corrective attention.
Those averages are hardly the measures of success that any district should target for its own performance. The fact that District 51’s scores are below even those wretched statewide averages means it has even more work to do than the average substandard district in the state.3 In the resulting discussions of District 51’s plans for remediation of this poor performance, which appears to extend across many grades and subjects, one has yet to hear that perhaps the district intends to raise performance standards for the teachers it employs.
Back in the day, one would expect a district that demonstrated systemwide failure to look first to its frontline educators as a significant part of the problem.
Perhaps today that is unrealistic, when the teachers are shielded by unions. If so, then the battle is already lost, because teachers who cannot be held accountable for their own teaching results are hardly likely to teach accountability to students.
JOHN CALDWELL
Loma
Fruita residents shouldsay ‘No’ to new tax plan
It’s time for all Fruita citizens, regardless of their position on the recreation center, to urge the City Council not to put this community through another divisive election. The last election showed what a dividing issue this is, and to feed that division will only fracture our community further.
Our City Council has  more vital issues to handle and needs a united city to manage them. This issue is not critical enough to cause factional wars.
Please write or call your council members and tell them it is a bad and harmful idea. It is important to make yourselves heard on this as the council will be deciding on whether to call for another vote soon. The council is being pushed very hard by the group that lost the last election, which resulted in a remarkable tie vote. Without a counter effort it will get an unequal measure of the community’s desires.
O. BRUCE JONES
Fruita

Delta shows rec centeris a community asset
This summer, I had the opportunity to hear Wilma Erven, the director of Culture and Recreation for the city of Delta, tell how the Bill Heddles Recreation Center in Delta is used by many people in their community.
Wilma is an extraordinary person, who clearly equates having a community center with providing a better quality of life for area citizens. She provided numerous examples of how the community center is used by the citizens supporting its existence.
“Having a center gives everyone an opportunity to attend for socializing, for fun times and for healthy exercise and activities,” she said. “A community center is about life, not machines.”
She also commented on how important it is to get out the correct information. For instance, someone said building a center would take away from Fruita needs such as police and fire protection. Police services are funded through the general fund, The Lower Valley Fire District is funded through a mill levy and impact fees. A community center would be funded by a 1 cent sales tax and user fee, not from the general fund or any property tax.
I hope the current Fruita City Council values the work done in the feasibility study by professional consultants and community members, including previous councils and staff, which provide the design, scope and financing of a proposed community center and also values the quality of life such a center can bring to generations of citizens.  I urge the Fruita City Council to place the Community Recreation Center on the Nov. 4 ballot.
DAVE KARISNY
Fruita

This entry was posted on Friday, August 1st, 2008 at 4:33 pm and is filed under Printed letters. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.