To the editor:

Congratulations to the board of education and Supt. Weseman for taking the high road on the issue of private building-specific fund raising in response to budget cuts. This courageous stance reminds me why I am a proud product of the Lawrence schools.

This spring, five Shawnee Mission schools raised almost as much as the Shawnee Mission Education Foundation awarded in grants during the past nine years. Fund raising continues in other buildings. Personnel and programs will be retained in more affluent neighborhood schools, but denied in others. Parents are busily blurring the line between their roles as parents and PTA members in order to manipulate questionable allocations of PTA monies to bolster these fund-raising drives. Teachers worry about functioning as independent professionals knowing students’ parents have paid their salaries. This is embarrassing.

It is the role of the public schools to equitably provide an education for all students. Shawnee Mission elected instead to convert some buildings into semi-private institutions. Last week, our school board unanimously voted to accept these “gifts” without a moment’s discussion.

How more powerful would the message have been if parents had united districtwide to pool available resources for a real gift to the district unrestricted operating support for all of our children, rather than economic discrimination sanctioned by district leaders and elected officials.

Debbie Doud,

Leawood