South St. Louis County News

St. Louis Call Newspapers

South St. Louis County News

St. Louis Call Newspapers

South St. Louis County News

St. Louis Call Newspapers

‘Appalled’ by response to Mehlville decision

To the editor:

I am appalled by the response given by Mr. Tim Hudwalker on the Mehlville School District ending the transfer program.

Diversity or diverse is defined as differing from one another. I don’t see how living in a white, middle-class, Protestant or Catholic community in the south county suburbs is diverse. As I drive along the main arteries of south county such as Telegraph, Lemay Ferry or Lindbergh, I do not see a temple or synagogue for the Muslim or Jewish religion.

As a 2003 graduate of Parkway Central High School who was brought up earlier in our south county environment, I was initially in a diversity of culture shock with a school over half Jewish just for starters. I found that diversity is in the culture and religion of each individual. And yes the Lindbergh superintendent is right, “diversity is essential to the quality of a good school district.”

I learned invaluable lessons by having the opportunity to live five years with opportunities to go to bat mitzvahs or attend a Jewish synagogue, or pal around with my city transfer students, giving them a place to stay while waiting for an evening school event so they wouldn’t have to travel back home by bus or taxi, or to have Asian friends still fluent in their native language and customs. Some of us had big homes, some of us lived in small apartments. My friends were truly black, white, yellow and brown — from the very rich to the struggling single mother. It was wonderful. That same environment I believe enriched my mother as well, who was also able to meet and learn from others and their cultures, well outside the white, middle-class conservatives she grew up with.

We moved back to south county for family reasons. If there would be one thing my mother would change, she would have kept my younger sister and brother in that district, if for no other reason, to have them in that fully diverse environment, which she felt gave our family a whole new perspective on differences in people and cultures that to this day is not in your local south county neighborhoods.

Kudos to any district or individuals who will strive in any way to move forward and continue beyond bigotry and prejudices — a lesson that goes well beyond any math class I attended.

Stephanie Enger

Green Park

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