'Diversity' causing harm to heritage, traditions
After reading "Candidates learn from immigrants" in the Sunday, April 15, newspaper, it appears immigrants are demanding this and that, to include our politicians signing a pledge to place a foreign language in their political ads and to defend those who are illegally in our country. I find this appalling -- also some of our mayors, clergy and politicians calling for more diversity.
Folks, we have diversity running out of our ears. Many of our schools are 60 to 70 percent Latino or foreign nationals, or their parents are. It's difficult to go anywhere in Northwest Arkansas that people aren't around you speaking a foreign language.
[I'm a] Northwest Arkansas native of five generations and for 77-plus years of working the fields, factories and businesses to make this area a wonderful place to raise and educate our children, but what I'm seeing is our heritage, culture and traditions being destroyed by so-called diversity. Check out your daily police reports on felony crime; that's your diversity at work. Many of these crimes are committed by illegal immigrants but they won't show that on the daily news report. Why? Because it's not politically correct.
Most of these immigrants are from third-world countries, and [for] those who have gone through legal procedure, I commend them and wish them the best in getting their families settled. However, they should blend with our culture and traditions, and speak our language in public places, and obey our laws.
The undocumented need to return to their native countries and get in line the correct way to come to the United States.
If we continue down the path of allowing thousands and thousands of people from third-world countries to sneak into our country, it won't take long before we become a third-world country.
I do believe in, and support, modest immigration and always have, but there must be numbers balanced to ensure our laws are followed and that the numbers of people can be supported by the community.
By the way, I or any of my family would never vote for a politician who would sign a pledge to support undocumented aliens, or the local politicians who scream more, more diversity.
Herb Marshall
Hindsville
School report shows region must improve
I opened the April 15 newspaper to see an accountability report of Arkansas schools and was simply horrified at the reported scores for our school district. We are ranked below average for the state except in the fifth and sixth grades.
Our city is doing everything possible to recruit new business, attract new families, provide new outdoor activities for all, and the one thing I feel is the most critical enticement is extremely poor. If I were thinking of moving my company or my family to Northwest Arkansas, schools would be the first thing I would check on. No matter how beautiful or fun it is to live here, and I do feel this, I would be looking elsewhere! Gentry, Prairie Grove, Farmington all score better than Siloam!
Now, what are we going to do about this? We have a fine Education Department at John Brown University and the Department of Education for Arkansas offers free resources to work with these under-performing schools. Can we immediately jump in with these sources to remedy this problem? My husband and I would be glad to help in any way as would so many others, I'm sure.
People, we need to jump on this very embarrassing situation ASAP. We are not going to feel good about contributing to any more city efforts to improve life in our precious town when our schools are ranked below the Arkansas state average let alone the averages of the rest of the country?
There is simply no excuse for this dismal report. Our children are just as smart as the rest of this country. So what IS the problem?
Susie Gilbert
Siloam Springs
Commentary on 04/20/2018