Re your magazine’s November 2018 issue (“A Taste of College”):

Are we sure DUAL ENROLLMENT PROGRAMS are a good idea? If students are receiving credits that only transfer as core credit at community and junior colleges but that four-year colleges only accept as electives, we are SETTING STUDENTS UP TO FAIL. A student with 28 dual enrollment credits has now used up all of his or her elective courses for their entire degree. They also have exhausted a significant portion of their Pell Grant eligibility. As university freshmen, they will be forced to take a heavy course load, increasing the likelihood they will not complete their degree.

Another question that ought to be asked: Is greater reliance on dual enrollment programs a de facto movement away from free quality public education at the secondary level? What happens when the community college is offering remedial courses to high school students as prerequisites for credit-bearing courses? Yes, it can happen if you aren’t being hypervigilant. Tuition ends up being paid for courses that are offered at the high school level, courses being taught by high school teachers at the high school.

These courses carry with them tuition costs that are paid by the student or by the high school. Schools relying on dual enrollment will see their non-dual enrollment HONORS PROGRAMS WITHER. Schools will end up in a situation where they no longer provide four-year college-bound students with college-prep courses outside dual enrollment. In essence, YOU HAVE PRIVATIZED the last two years of secondary education.

SEAN RICKERT
SUPERINTENDENT,
PIMA UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT,
PIMA, ARIZ.


Valuable Legal Counsel
Re “Restricting Visitors From School Property” (December 2018):

I find Joy Baskin’s contributions to School Administrator’s Legal Brief section to be so valuable.

Having been in the school business for 52 years, I have seen a lot of issues. The current questions we have to answer are light years away from the questions I faced my first year of teaching in 1967. I am convinced that, between social media and litigious parents, the schools are in for more rocky roads in the future than we ever were in the past. Her columns are always insightful and informative.

PEACHES MCCROSKEY
DEPUTY SUPERINTENDENT FOR HUMAN RESOURCES,
DEER PARK INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DISTRICT,
DEER PARK, TEXAS


Civility Attention
This is a belated fan letter — and a request for permission to reprint two articles (“Media Literacy Takes on the Digital Morass” and “Better Citizens Through Critical Thinking”) relating to civility in the classroom and community appearing in your April 2018 issue. We’d like to use these in our association’s School Leader magazine and on our website.

This issue was terrific. It tackled an issue that seems to have grown in importance even since it was published last spring and did so in a way that was compelling and full of actionable suggestions. My compliments to all involved.

We look forward to sharing these excellent articles with our readers. JANET BAMFORD
MANAGER OF COMMUNICATIONS AND PUBLICATIONS,
NEW JERSEY SCHOOL BOARDS ASSOCIATION,
TRENTON, N.J.