UTC should have stood up to pressure
Usually I’m proud to have taught at UTC. I believe that it has helped, and continues to help, countless people, many of modest means, to become better-informed, more competent and more prosperous citizens.
However, I join my retiree colleague, Fouad Maughrabi, in expressing disappointment in UTC’s decision to fire a novice reporter for WUTC. While I agree that she should have verbally identified herself as a reporter while covering high school students’ conversations with state Reps. Mike Bell and Kevin Brooks, firing her seems heavy handed and appears to have been a response to political pressure.
Universities have, I believe, a responsibility to seek truth and resist pressures to suppress it. To my knowledge, neither Rep. Bell nor Rep. Brooks has denied the truth of the WUTC story. But the UTC administration has removed the story from the UTC website. If you look for it there, all you get is the message: “Access Denied.”
George Helton
Hixson
What we need is more government
“Let Obamacare explode” ranks with “Let them eat cake” for callousness. Trump has said he “plays on people’s fantasies.” After years of FOX and hate radio spewing fake crises, the average person bought into the fantasy that Trump cared about our daily struggles. Look at his Cabinet picks and his budget. Watch the tax cuts that will benefit his resorts, luxurious tower and hotel clients while undermining health care subsidies and Medicaid.
Corporations prioritize profits to the disadvantage of labor, unwary customers and our natural resources. Governments represent the citizen’s interests. That buffer is being destroyed.
A great nation is a healthy, educated population living in an unpolluted environment with clean air and water. It is a nation that respects and funds science and art and provides its people with unbiased broadcasting, not controlled by corporations, because the airwaves should belong to all of us and voters need to be genuinely informed, not propagandized.
We came close to that greatness.
Lucy W. Taylor
Bigham would serve schools well as leader
Can we all – school board members, caring citizens, teachers, parents, grandparents and great grandparents – urge Dr. Jared Bigham to be the next superintendent of our schools?
Dr. Bigham is a leader, an educator, an innovator who has demonstrated his interest and commitment to our students and community. If Dr. Bigham could be persuaded to be the leader, he could begin leading quickly – no time required to get acquainted or assess the situation. Time is valuable. Students are priceless.
Joanne Phillips
Hixson