To the Editor:
Re “Being a College Teacher Is Strange Right Now,” by Frank Bruni (Opinion, April 8):
I sympathize with Mr. Bruni’s challenges as a college teacher today, as well as the challenges facing his students. I hope Mr. Bruni doesn’t forget to remind students that for most of the last couple of centuries, a liberal arts education was looked upon not as job training but rather as a chance to explore the legacy provided by the generations of scientists, artists and scholars who preceded them.
The world of the future may not need many coders, but there will always be both need and room for poets, artists, historians and philosophers.
Francis Schrag Madison, Wis.
To the Editor:
As I read Frank Bruni’s piece and thought about the medical students I teach, I could feel myself nodding in agreement.
Medical students, even in their first year, feel the deep uncertainty of our current moment: staggering levels of burnout, corporatization of health care, funding cuts and the rise of A.I., all in the setting of political and social unpredictability and climate change.
When faced with a challenging patient scenario, I often encourage my students to “name the problem.” So, I’d like to name this problem for myself and my students: It is difficult to be the best mentor I can be, because I worry that right now, I cannot envision your futures after four years of rigorous work and enormous financial cost. But I will work to foster your curiosity, empathy and flexibility, all of which have served me well in my career as a doctor and as a human, and which I know will undoubtedly help your future patients.
Bevin Kenney Boston The writer is an internist and an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School.
To the Editor:
Reading Frank Bruni’s piece reminded me of the 1970s. There was a recession and a war, and gas was expensive. I was taking evening courses at the School of Visual Arts in New York to augment my bachelor’s degree.
The school had a series of posters designed by Milton Glaser that hung in the subway system. One of them had the slogan “Our times call for multiple careers.” I always took that advice seriously, and when I became a teacher, I encouraged my students to find and nurture additional skills and have them at the ready.
There was other advice I gave my students that comes from Patti Smith: Take care of your teeth — especially if you don’t yet have a job with benefits.
Linda Lindroth New Haven, Conn. The writer is an artist.
To the Editor:
As I head toward 40 years of college teaching, I can tell you this: The minute you walk into the classroom, you set the temperature. Your students are a captive audience who have given up their valuable time to be in class.
I’m going to rap some knuckles here among some of my high-on-their-horses colleagues: As teachers, you owe your students an engaging lecture free from your politics, your woes and the world’s present woes (which, as a historian, I can attest are always present). Instead, your job is to inspire, challenge and listen to them. And sprinkle in some words of encouragement and positivity for good measure.
There’s a saying (usually attributed to the Nobel laureate physicist Richard Feynman) that includes an important truth: Students don’t need a perfect teacher; they need a happy teacher, someone who makes them excited to come to school and develop a love for learning.
Arthur C. Verge Torrance, Calif. The writer is a professor of history at El Camino College.
An Arch Near Arlington
To the Editor:
Re “As Triumphal Arch Keeps Getting Bigger, So Does the Backlash” (front page, April 17):
My father, Kenneth T. Stevens, who served this country for 33 years and saw combat in World War II and the Korean War, is buried at Arlington National Cemetery. He was a modest man, as were nearly all the soldiers whom I met over the years.
I think President Trump’s arch, near the cemetery, would appall them. It is the antithesis of who they were and are in memory.
Let the service members buried there lie in peace in the tranquillity and beauty that are Arlington.
Robin C. Stevens New York
Don’t Cut Mental Health Programs. Lives Are at Stake.
To the Editor:
Re “Idaho Cut a Program for the Mentally Ill. Then the Deaths Began,” by Ellen Barry (news article, April 9):
As president of the American Psychiatric Association, I read Ms. Barry’s article with deep concern. The lesson is clear: When intensive, community-based supports for people with serious mental illness are withdrawn, they face heightened risk of crisis, hospitalization and death.
Further, these costs do not disappear. They only increase, shifting into psychiatric crisis units or inpatient units, emergency rooms, jails — and, most tragically, into preventable loss of life.
As Idaho discovered, programs like assertive community treatment are essential. These programs are evidence-based and provide continuous, coordinated care that stabilizes individuals and reduces strain on higher levels of care.
Eliminating such programs does not achieve meaningful savings; rather, it creates the illusion of cost reduction while driving greater clinical and economic harm. This approach is both clinically unsound and fiscally shortsighted, at the expense of our most vulnerable populations.
Idaho’s experience is a stark warning of a broader failure unfolding across the country: the failure to treat mental health care as critical public health infrastructure. Policymakers must recognize that sustained investment in community-based care is a public health necessity, not an option.
When these services are cut, the human and economic costs grow exponentially. Lives depend on it.
Theresa M. Miskimen Rivera Millstone Township, N.J.
Transformed in Prison
To the Editor:
Re “What Do You Do When a Family Member Commits a Terrible Crime?” (The Opinions, nytimes.com, April 2):
Harriet Clark, in her conversation with M. Gessen, observes that accountability is a long process, not an ultimatum. She is right. I know because I’ve spent more than 20 years watching hundreds of people take accountability and transform their lives.
I represent people serving life sentences at parole hearings. Many have been incarcerated for 30 to 40 years. They have done decades of the work Ms. Clark describes. They’ve rebuilt family bonds from behind glass, mentored younger people inside and confronted the harm they caused with painful honesty.
But they too often sit before parole boards that treat this kind of transformation as irrelevant. Ms. Clark names something I see frequently: The boards conclude that a person is dangerous because of the fears and outrage survivors express, not because the person is an actual current threat. Letting the person come home would cost something politically.
The people I work with have something to offer the communities waiting for them. They mentor young people, counsel others struggling with addiction and trauma, and show up for their families in ways most people would never expect from people who have spent most of their youth in prison.
We can keep choosing punishment long after it has stopped serving anyone. Or we can build a system that recognizes what people are capable of becoming.
Keith Wattley Oakland, Calif. The writer is the founder and executive director of UnCommon Law.
The post Times Are Hard. What’s a Teacher to Do? appeared first on New York Times.
