Opinion

THE POSTSCRIPT, Carrie Classon

I have never minded getting advice.

My husband, Peter, is good about giving advice, and one of the things I regularly need advice on is food, specifically if I should eat food that I already know I should not.

I hate throwing away food. I was not raised during the Depression, so I have no idea where this aversion comes from, but nothing makes me more sad than seeing food that looks perfectly fine getting tossed out.

L&T Publisher Earl Watt

When the founders gathered to create a more perfect union, most were devout Christians. But they didn’t fall into the trap of creating a theocracy or Christian nation, and we are much better for it.

The Church of England was the backdrop of this concept, and the religious persecution that took place was a foundational reason many left England and headed to the New World.

Founders made statements similar to John Adams who said, “The general principles on which the fathers achieved independence were the general principles of Christianity.”

GUEST COLUMN, Dave Trabert, Kansas Policy Institute

The 2024 state assessment indicates that more than 150,000 Kansas students suffer from what is officially described as having a “limited ability to understand and use English language arts skills and knowledge to be academically successful for postsecondary success.”  This closely aligns with what is commonly referred to as being ‘functionally illiterate,’ which  Dictionary.com defines as “falling short of a minimum standard of literacy or whose reading and writing skills are inadequate to everyday needs.” While not a clinical or official term used by KSDE, ‘functionally illiterate’ captures the real-world implications of students being unable to read at a level necessary for everyday success.

This is not a criticism of teachers or students but of top leadership, as explained below.

MY PERSPECTIVE, Gary Damron

Our local church has experienced two tragic losses in a week's time. As I filled the pulpit Sunday, there was a heavy awareness and sensitivity to many who are struggling.  In times of darkness, we need at least two things: a source of light, and an experienced Guide.

An illustration from my earlier years reminded me of a great darkness, literal, inside a cave in Colorado. When our second son graduated from high school, he invited three friends to go with us on a backpacking trip. I'd made some treks into the mountains, one a part of a graduate class, and decided we could incorporate a cave into the outing. The entrance was little more than a vertical culvert, with a ladder and a rope at the bottom, from which we dropped to the cave floor. I'd been in - and out of - that cave several times before, but that day, after venturing further than before, it was with great relief that we found the entrance as our lights went dim.