To the editor:

As one who is in the business of piano service, let me respond to the governor’s comment about Sumner Academy’s new grand piano. The fact is that, under budget pressure, our public schools have for years been phasing pianos out of their music programs, replacing them with electronic keyboards, which are inferior and far cheaper, and hanging on to one performance-quality piano for each high school auditorium, to be used in rehearsals and public events.

The use these pianos receive goes well beyond the demands placed on the typical home piano. Better quality is truly cost-effective. Sumner’s new piano replaced a 50-year-old instrument, and the cost was within the fair market price for a better, though not extravagant, performance-grade grand piano.

This is just a guess, but I somehow doubt that the governor would view a similar outlay on high quality equipment for math, science or even physical education as an extravagance. Regardless, there should be no doubt about the place art education holds in his new economic vision for Kansas.

I for one am grateful my children’s public school experience in Lawrence included a first-rate arts curriculum and, yes, a suitably equipped auditorium. Incidentally, the children are now in the process of deciding where they will look for jobs, settle and begin building their futures. I hope they will find Kansas, including its schools, as culturally fluent as other places they might consider.  If they conclude otherwise, it’s an economic problem for Kansas.