Letters for July 1

July 03, 2009

Letter to Editor

Alpha affair waste of education dollars

Re: Court restores Alpha’s school board seat (June 24)

Many thanks to B.C. Supreme Court Justice Robert Metzger for his fair and just ruling in favour of Greater Victoria School District trustee Catherine Alpha.

I have watched with dismay the actions of the board majority (McEvoy, Pitre, Ferris, Holland and Leonard) toward trustee Alpha.

As a former trustee and board chair for the Victoria school district, and as a taxpayer and elector in the district, I expect the board to compensate Catherine for her legal costs.

Moreover, I believe that the electorate and Catherine deserve an apology for the lack of fairness and competence in the handling of this matter.

Unnecessary expenditures on an unnecessary by-election in a time of school district deficits are an unacceptable waste of our education dollars.

Carol Pickup

Saanich

Fraser Institute research fails to impress reader

I am nonplussed by our local media’s insatiable urge to rush into print every pontification belched forth by the Fraser Institute.

This body is usually referred to as a ‘right-wing think tank.’ I certainly concur with the ‘right-wing’ designation, but balk at the use of the term ‘think,’ as its fatally flawed ‘research’ would inevitably earn a failing grade for any first-year demographics or statistics student.

The Institute’s most recent nonsensical publication is its annual evaluation of B.C. secondary schools.

The first requirement for any statistical research is to ensure that all sampling be completely random.

Failure to conform to this caveat will result in the basic invalidating error of selection bias.

For instance, I am a Catholic; if I stood outside the exit of the cathedral after mass and sampled emerging parishioners regarding their views on abortion, I would obtain a result which would please me, but I could hardly fob it off as valid statistics.

Similarly, the Fraser Institute fails to allow for the fact private schools are selectively discriminatory, and affordable only to upscale families much more likely to be stable, genetically advantaged intellectually and in a position to provide rich, ongoing mental stimuli to their children.

A teacher in an inner-city school, whose students include immigrant, special needs and single-parent children, may well achieve much more than his private school counterpart simply by guiding his students through high school graduation or qualification for a skilled trade.

John Simpson

Oak Bay

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Letters for July 1

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