Hitler assignment: Give N.J. teachers more guidance | Letters – NJ.com

I read the recent article, “N.J. teacher resigns after student’s Hitler assignment,” about an unnamed elementary teacher in Tenafly whose student prepared an essay from Adolf Hitler’s point of view. The essay was posted in a school hallway and later on social media.

As a now-retired history teacher of 60 years in New Jersey parochial and public schools, I can testify to the pressures of teaching the Holocaust and the Black experience. And, I had specialized training in these topics. Still, I faced threats from parents, students and administrators when “touchy” subjects came up in class.

State mandates for teaching the Holocaust and Black history have been in place for decades. Yet, there are no reliable standards, uniform training or widely accepted sources of guidance on how to do this. This is a recipe for more problems and mediocre efforts.

At a minimum, I suggest the state Department of Education design a test for new social studies teachers to gauge their training and knowledge of sensitive topics. There should be another test for students to assess their understanding of the levels of discrimination and its consequences.

A task force of teachers and civil rights advocates should develop these meaningful evaluative tools, which would be very valuable to teachers and students.

Joel M. Glazer, Elizabeth

Laud Ciattarelli for LGBTQ remarks

Concerning “In Gov. race, anti-LGBTQ talk draws fire,” on the front page of the July 15 Star-Ledger:

Jack Ciattarelli, the Republican nominee, has the courage to use the word “sodomy” in connection with the LGBTQ populace. While not polite, Ciattarelli was not lying.

Only a dedicated Christian politician would stick his neck out that far, knowing that public reprisals would abound. In the article, Ciattarelli speaks to the indoctrination of public grade-schoolers to the LGBTQ agenda.

While Ciattarelli doesn’t state this in the article, parents are the first and primary teachers on matters of morality to children. Public school systems have no right to teach on matters of a moral nature to youngsters. Public schools are meant to teach grade-school children the three R’s: reading, writing and ‘rithmetic. These skills are specifically mentioned in “St. Augustine’s Confessions.”

As a dedicated Christian citizen, I will vote for Jack Ciattarelli for governor of New Jersey.

Dan Pryor, Belvidere

Detainee’s plight should spark action

About the recent op-ed article, “I’m locked up and miles away from my family. I am desperate,” which told the story of a man who is on a hunger strike while being detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement for almost two years:

Reading this story and learning of the struggles of Marvin Reyes Ventura’s life made me realize how broken the current immigration system is in the United States. U.S. Sens. Bob Menendez and Cory Booker, both D-N.J., support changing this system, but the Democrat-led Congress and White House have not been able to come up with bipartisan immigration reform.

Reforming the immigration system should not be a partisan issue, and compromises need to be made to help this man and thousands of others who are just looking to return to their families, wherever they may be. (In December, Venutra was transferred from the Essex County Jail to an ICE facility in Florida.) This issue is about more than how Republicans or Democrats feel.

I am an intern with The Borgen Project, a nonprofit organization that advocates for global poverty legislation to be at the forefront of American foreign policy. However, our own federal government is causing people to live in conditions similar to or worse than some situations seen elsewhere in the world.

The government needs to put partisan issues aside and work to help people like this man.

Kristina Pelano, Howell

Electric car convert, and loving it

Thanks to the Star-Ledger for keeping us updated on rebates for electric vehicles. It is terrific that the state Board of Public Utilities is offering a $5,000 rebate (article, July 8) to go along with a federal tax credit of up to $7,500.

Your report also discusses a main concern people have when considering an electric vehicle: charging. Can I charge at home? Will I be able to charge when I travel?

I know that was the hitch for me. I dithered for a couple of years.

But June was such a horrific month of climate crisis — killer heat in the Pacific Northwest; the deadly condo collapse in Florida where rising seas may be implicated — that my husband and I felt we simply had to stop burning the gasoline that contributes to greenhouse gases.

Now, we can plug our car into an outlet in our garage, get the charge we need for local trips, and take comfort that much of that electricity is provided by our solar panels.

Recently, we drove to New Hampshire and had no problem finding supercharging stations along the way. Charging, bathroom and coffee stops didn’t take much longer than gassing up. And, AirBnb hosts were glad to let us plug in.

Diane Simmons, Maplewood

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