Letters

Hornstine wrong to sue against sharing valedictorian
honor

I was dismayed to read Maytal Nissim’s endorsement of
Blair Hornstine’s lawsuit against her school
(“Character cannot replace good grades, hard work,” May
13). This piece exemplifies the worst of the grade-grubbing that we
teaching assistants see here at UCLA.

Life is not a ladder of competitive struggles to achieve
numerical validation from persons of authority. University
admission cannot and should not be merely based upon one or two
numerical indicia. If I were Harvard’s admissions officer, I
would revoke Hornstine’s offer of admission. Frankly, a
rejection may be the best thing that could ever happen to her.

The valedictorian position was traditionally given as an honor
to the most outstanding student who would make the farewell
(valedictory) address at graduation. Although GPA has become a
primary means of determining who would receive this honor, nobody
has a “right” to be named valedictorian.

Many schools still decide this by a combination of grades,
activities and recommendations of coaches and teachers. Blair
Hornstine had a GPA just a smidgen higher than two other excellent
students. They were not excused from gym classes, as Hornstine was,
and this negatively affected their GPAs, because no honors points
are possible for gym class. Hornstine did not outperform the other
two; she worked the system. Congratulations to Hornstine’s
high school for seeing past the numbers to the real
achievement!

A person of character, knowing that her other two classmates
worked equally hard, would have graciously shared the honor.

Darrel C. Menthe

Graduate student, political science

Bruin Walk graffiti disgusting; messages are
uninformed

I was disgusted by the new round of graffiti on Bruin Walk that
assailed me on my way to class Tuesday morning. The graffiti
included: “F— Capitalism!,” “Regents Work For
US!,” “Education Is a Right!,” and “Poor
Children Deserve to Go to School Too!.”

First off, how much is it going to cost to remove the tagging
and who is going to pay? Secondly, I would like to address the
author of these uninformed slogans. Why would you want to screw
capitalism? It seems to be working out pretty well here, and nobody
has a gun to your head, forcing you to stay in this country. You
could always move to North Korea or Cuba.

In response to the last two slogans, who said that education is
not a right? My parents have been paying taxes their entire lives
so that every poor child in this state will have the opportunity to
attend public school. Once again, these displays show that radical
banter should never be taken seriously. What’s next,
“Education not Devastation?” Hey, at least it
rhymes.

Russell Powell

Second-year, biology