Education...Naturally!
In his Insights column March 14, Joe Sullivan points out that the Southern Regional Education Board reports that Tennessee spends less money in school funding than surrounding states such as Georgia.
What he fails to mention is that the same report shows that Tennessee beats Georgia when it comes to academic achievement. Put another way, Georgia has a lottery, an income tax, a sales tax and huge car tax, but Tennessee kids achieve more when it comes to education despite being outspent.
Why? Because the three main factors that account for how a student will do in school—natural intelligence, involved parents and a willingness to learn—cannot be bought with massive tax increases, but must come from the individuals and families themselves.
Tennessee has doubled the amount of money spent on K-12 and test scores went nowhere.
If Mr. Sullivan really wants to improve education, and I believe he does, he should use his column to push for educational reforms that encourage, and demand, parental involvement, such as charter schools and school choice. He should also advocate reforms that make it easier for teachers to teach, such as removing some of the suffocating mandates and removing unruly children to alternative classrooms, so those who love to teach and love to learn can do so.
Taxpayers do not want to keep pouring money into the old way of doing things, and I can't say that I blame them.
State Rep. Bill Dunn
Knoxville
Walkways, Not Beltways
When will Knoxville recognize itself for the natural gem it is and choose to embrace the concept of alternative transportation as a way of conserving all that makes it beautiful to live here? This region is screaming for alternative transportation, including a regional bike path system. We have enough natural beauty in this area that we could promote ourselves as a bike touring center much in the same way that Vermont does, which has a much shorter warm weather season than us. With enough planning we could build more greenways and on-road bike lanes to support a tourist and a commuter population. But instead, "progress" deems that we build more roadways or beltways and bury more of our natural wonder under asphalt, only to turn the surrounding areas into interstate blight zones where no one wants to live. The 4th and Gill neighborhood is just now recovering from its interstate assault that happened 40 years ago.
What does progress really mean? Bigger roads leading to a worsened air quality? Widening every small road? Dissecting every nice neighborhood with a large road, such as the proposed South Knox connector? Our car culture has turned us into a nation where obesity is at 20 percent and diabetes is epidemic. Fifteen-year-olds are acquiring this disease, which until the early 1990s was not seen until a person was in the mid-40s. Children (who are also overweight) no longer walk or bicycle to school. It's pathetic that we actually have to organize a "Walk to School Day." More than 40 percent of car trips are less than two miles long and cause the most air pollution. We spend 20 percent of our income on automobiles and at least an hour behind the wheel daily, more if you have kids.
Transportation planners believe we do not have the population mass for a light rail system, but we can easily promote bicycling as a means of transportation. Bicycling is an excellent approach to improving air quality, combating obesity and diabetes, and decreasing traffic congestion. It is also a whole lot cheaper to maintain a bike than a car, you can always find a parking place and no historic homes need to be leveled to accommodate a bicycle rack. We need safe passages for bicyclists, and pedestrians for that matter, so that perhaps we can allow children the fun of walking or bicycling to school. We need a transportation change in Knoxville.
Sadly, we have plenty of money for road building, but none for schools and none for state parks. Where will we all live once East Tennessee is nothing but large roadways? We need TDOT to come up with solutions other than more roads. Many low-income residents cannot even afford automobiles and are forced to risk their lives on large roads with no pedestrian or bicycling access. Building bicycling pathways would at least allow people a choice. The first roads were built for bicycles and roads were once built with sidewalks. We need to re-think that model. We need to build bikeways and walkways rather than beltways.
Tina Rosling
Knoxville
'Powerless' Point
Jack Neely's mean-spirited little article in favor (?) of tearing down the J. Allen Smith house smacks of socialistic reverse snobbery. Some of us "powerless people" who happen to live on Lyons View and never ate nor slept (why should that be a criteria) in the Smith house are adamantly opposed to tearing it down. Teaching the powerful a lesson is not the point here. It's the Architecture, Stupid!
Helen Powell McNabb
Knoxville
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