Keith Ensminger: Don’t blame suffering children for poor test scores
Re “Good attendance is critical for success” (Page 7B, Oct. 29): School attendance is important, but I’m sorry Merced City Schools’ Brian Meisenheimer thinks, “There really is no good absence.” We live in one of the worst polluted air basins in the country where childhood asthma is epidemic. There is absolutely nothing more important to an asthmatic child than breath and life. Asthmatic children might spend days and weeks in bed struggling to breath only to be told by teachers to “make up” what they missed while struggling to survive. That’s child abuse.
Children will grow into productive adults despite Meisenheimer’s belief there is no good absence, or school systems that blame disabled children and their families for district test scores.
Keith Ensminger, Merced
This story was originally published October 31, 2016 at 1:31 PM with the headline "Keith Ensminger: Don’t blame suffering children for poor test scores."