To the editor:

In Robert McColl’s letter of Nov. 2, he asks “where are the promised results” of our public schools? Look around, Mr. McColl, the results are everywhere!

The U.S. literacy rate is 97 percent. Seven of the 13 Nobel Prize winners in 2002 were American. America has produced the strongest, most productive economy in history. The United States is the acknowledged leader in technology, scientific research and innovation. More Americans are going to college than ever before. More high school students are taking “elite” classes such as physics and calculus. Disaggregated SAT scores show student achievement has either been steady or increasing in the past 18 years. Reading scores on national tests for students of all ages were higher in 1996 than in 1971. Kansas eighth-graders ranked in the top three in the nation on math test scores and in the top 10 in reading. All this while the United States ranks only ninth among 16 industrialized nations on per-pupil spending on K-12 education.

These achievements do not just magically happen. They require an educated population. Where did this education come from? From our public schools, Mr. McColl, from our public schools.

Bob Stewart,

Lawrence