To the Editor:

The RSD #17 Board of Education should be more careful what they teach.

Individual rights lie at the core of our democracy and all its institutions, including our schools.

Any parent may remove their child from a particular lesson or activity. However, when the exercise of that right by a few is allowed to dictate public policy for all, it undermines the very institutions we rely on to preserve all our rights.

Regrettably, that is exactly what happened when students were offered the option of not viewing the upcoming address by President Obama and attending an organized, school-sanctioned alternative instead.

Superintendent Gary Mala should never have been forced to respond to factional pressure with a decision affecting the entire community. That responsibility should properly have fallen to the community-elected representatives who serve on the Board to set educational policy. Their failure to address the issue left Mr. Mala in the untenable position of arbiter in an unnecessarily politicized debate.

The “civics” lesson being taught here is that elected representatives can avoid their responsibility; respect for the authority of our nation’s institutions – including the Office of the President – is optional; and it is somehow acceptable that personal opinion alone guide public policy.

When our children are told they do not have to listen to the President of the United States, is it any wonder they may not listen to their parents, teachers, or anyone else?

 Gwenne Lally