You should have checked your facts before running the editorial headlined "Diplomas must be earned" on April 23-24. This is a particularly offensive example of the news media trying to create bad feelings where none exist so that their "news" will be more appealing to small minds.
I quote: "The mother of a home-schooled student who believes her daughter should be able to participate in the school's commencement even though the young woman falls far short of graduation requirements has something to learn about the concept of meeting educational standards." Let's get specific here: The mother is Kristen Randle of Provo, the home-schooled student is her daughter, Ginna, and "the school" is Provo High. The facts are:1. Kristen Randle is not single-handedly trying to bulldoze her daughter's way into Provo High's commencement exercises. On the contrary, Provo principal Patti Harrington and Provo District home-school liaison officer Drew Bolander both encouraged the Randles to request permission for Ginna to be recognized at Provo High's graduation because they wanted the board to establish a district policy for cases like Ginna's - of which there are a growing number.
2. Ginna Randle does not "fall far short of graduation requirements," an assertion that conjures up images of a lazy, ignorant teenager (or worse: a lazy, ignorant, home-schooling mother) demanding something for nothing. Ginna took AP classes at Provo High, scored 29 on the ACT and has been accepted at BYU for fall semester. Furthermore, neither Kristen nor Ginna ever expected the school to award a diploma that hadn't been "earned." That was a Deseret News fabrication.
3. All brands of diplomas aside, had your editorial-page editor, your reporter or the Provo School Board bothered to check, they'd have discovered that other school districts in Utah have already set the precedent of allowing part-time students to be recognized with their graduating classes, some without receiving any sort of diploma, as long ago as 1989 in Granite District. This is not a radical new idea promoted by a fanatic fringe group, nor is it going to start a stampede of illiterates demanding diplomas. (I'll refrain from asking how many Provo High graduates who have received diplomas are actually literate.)
4. When the Provo School Board declined Ginna's request (at a meeting Kristen would have attended had she known the subject was going to be discussed), the Randles were disappointed but not angry. Then came Sharon Haddock's article headed "Graduation Plea Rejected in Provo" (page B1, April 17) in which she quoted Ken Matheson of the Provo School Board as saying the Randles "seem to be saying we don't want much to do with your process but we want to be included in the finalization" and board President Gerry Williams as pointing out that "the Randles had been given opportunity to meet Provo High School's requirements but had not taken advantage of that option."
Kristen Randle, having worked with public school authorities for many years in cooperation and (she thought) mutual respect, suddenly felt betrayed. She felt she'd "been set up to look like a fool" by people who knew better. Hey, presto. The first bad feelings have entered the scene, right on the heels of the Deseret News.
5. This apparently not being enough, you then printed a follow-up editorial that was purely insulting, written (and unsigned) by someone who doesn't even know what the original issue was. After admitting that Ginna could not be as uneducated as many other high school graduates (having the hard fact of her ACT score in front of him), he says "her accomplishments don't change the fact that her friends who are graduating have done some things that she has not done."
What a double meaning there. "She has not taken course work and passed tests that provide the credits necessary for graduation." This, at least, is inarguable. Ginna has not had to sit through hour after hour of classes geared to the level of the most apathetic student and has never had to cram for a test (which, for some in-explicable reason, didn't keep her from doing better than average on the ACT).
Instead, she's kept her love of learning and has a real desire to continue her education far beyond the day when her classmates will throw their caps in the air and shout "It's over."
Most of the 40 school districts in Utah do all they can to support home-schoolers, and the Utah Home Education Association works just as hard to maintain a friendly relationship with the public schools. There is no power struggle here.
Kristen Randle herself says "the problem isn't with the schools." The problem is with the news media trying to manufacture news. Your readers have a right to expect better than this from a major Salt Lake paper. Next time leave your own political agenda out of it, and you might also try doing your homework.