When did kindergarten become first grade?
My grandson is in kindergarten at Marshall Elementary. He leaves at 8:15 a.m. and returns at 3:45. He has homework to do most nights, and if it isn’t completed risks detention. Kindergarten should be a class for young children to develop basic skills and social behavior through games, toys, simple handcrafts.
Schools should either provide kindergarten or call it first grade.
Mary Ann Smith
Uniontown
Political speech suppressed?
The people of Carmichaels are to be commended for their commitment to their continuing recognition of an industry that helped them build and sustain a community that enabled men, women and children to live in a free society.
It is unfortunate, however, that apparently certain elements of those involved in the annual King Coal event have deemed it necessary to suppress the First Amendment right of free speech by suppressing an exhibition, distribution and/or discussion of political affairs.
The reported chastisement of a local businessman for providing a service to a candidate, the covert threatening of a volunteer campaign worker distributing information to the public, as well as specific instruction regarding “allowable” paraphernalia on personal attire should cause any freedom loving American to bristle.
The personal affairs and opinions within any organization are not in question, but those affairs and opinions cannot supersede the rights of citizens in a public forum. Similar issues by a former king resulted in a revolution.
Chuck Swope
Spraggs
State Senate can quickly help seniors
Tens of thousands of parents and grandparents struggle to “make it” month to month, trying in vain to swallow rapidly increasing prescription drug costs. Every month some seniors make decisions between life-sustaining medication or housing and food. Real people are suffering for no reason other than a surreal delay in legislative action.
The state Legislature could end this uncertainty for more than 100,000 older Pennsylvanians. Gov. Edward Rendell’s bipartisan plan to expand PACE and PACENET unanimously passed the state House and now awaits action in the Senate. The plan doesn’t require any tax increase, in fact, it doesn’t use tax dollars at all. The funds needed to begin the expansion in eligibility are available right now. State lottery revenues have never been stronger. Record lottery sales of $2.13 billion last year topped previous records by 10.3 percent; the largest annual sales increase in 19 years. PowerBall game sales alone brought in over $292 million. Moreover, the cost-saving measures needed to buttress the PACE and PACENET expansion are also available immediately.
Congress has been talking about creating a comprehensive prescription drug benefit for years, but hasn’t produced anything. Older adults need to know that we don’t have to wait for Congress; we can act now to expand our state prescription drug programs.
Passing legislation in September will allow the Department of Aging three months to conduct outreach to eligible older adults so that 100,000 additional people can enroll in PACE and PACENET by the beginning of next year. We will be able to tell many of the seniors that their wait and uncertainty are finally over.
We have the responsibility to provide older Pennsylvanians with the support they need to thrive, just as they have for us. Haven’t they waited long enough for help with prescription drug costs?
Let’s expand PACE and PACENET and give peace of mind to our seniors now.
Nora Dowd Eisenhower
Secretary, Pennsylvania Department of Aging