I read this last night at our school board meeting. I also crossposted it at the CFA site.

Ladies and Gentleman of the board—thank you for giving me this opportunity to say some words.

Words: developed from language because we, as people, thought that conveying information was valuable. Words, which I wrote (and am now reading) because we have assigned value to the process and product of transcribed language: information conveyed textually.

Reading and writing, as you know, was not always valuable. We can thank Hammurabi, Moses (or God) for informing our estimation of that value.

But with the rise of logical positivism, only that which can be quantified has been assigned value while that which elevates quality has been pushed aside as optional, unimportant, or an ideal. That philosophy collapsed when she couldn’t be quantified—yet her jaded ghost haunts our current decisions.

I’m here, therefore, asking several things:

• First,  that the administration and the school board assign value—real value—to the arts and music program here in the Chambersburg Area School District.  Not because of some peripheral statistics but to enrich our students, schools, and society. At this point in history we wouldn’t dream of going back to a pre-literate world. In like manner, in an increasingly flat world, the arts are one of the few currencies that are globally accepted, transcending language barriers and cultural differences: we dare not see them as an optional ideal.
• Second, that you lead the charge in stopping the slippage. I believe Chambersburg is slipping into the grip of that aforementioned philosophical failure. A class of 9 students might be just as valuable as a class of 30.
• Third, that the school board revokes their request to “curtail” the unified arts program.
• Fourth, that the school board and administration fill all positions of arts and music faculty who leave their positions with fulltime, appropriately certified professionals.
• Fifth, that the Chambersburg Administration examine curricula like Saccardi’s Art in Story which integrates English, history, math, science, art, dance, music, and social studies.
• And last, that the School Board takes a heavy look at other areas for fat-trimming. Maybe responsibility doubling. Maybe administration. Who knows? One of the earliest hits at my last job was management. It worked for them; it might work here.

Thank you.

Rey Reynoso