To the editor:

Regarding aspersions in a recent letter: I have never said that 600 is an ideal elementary school enrollment. A recent LJW article quoted me (accurately) as saying that I think that 300 seems to be an educationally sound minimum enrollment for an elementary building if we are interested in eliminating combination classes. This year, there is only one combination classroom in all our schools with 300 or more students.

Many teachers and parents are very critical of combination classrooms. Our curriculum for each grade level has a great quantity of material to be covered, a difficult task to accomplish if your classroom has students from two grades and both curricula must be presented. The emphasis on assessment at state and national levels does not allow much flexibility in these areas.

In a different LJW article, I was quoted as saying that Riverside is not an adequate facility for the modern educational program. This opinion reflects my belief that, ideally, an elementary school building would include office/clinic spaces, a library-media center, technology areas and music and art classrooms, special education resources rooms, a gymnasium, a separate cafeteria and kitchen, teacher workroom space, storage areas, itinerant teacher offices and conference spaces and classrooms for kindergarten through sixth grades. Riverside (as well as several of our facilities) lacks some of these areas within its 1950s-era building. The Riverside campus, at less than 3 acres, is too small for a building expansion.

I did not vote to close Riverside in 1997.

Mary Loveland,

Lawrence