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It is a terrible indictment of parents and society that they “have to” choose a private school for their child to attend, during high school years in particular (“Sarah felt she had years to pick a high school. By year 3, kids were leaving”, March 8). Anything will decline if the people do not support it, and the public education system will too. Sadly, if the system is lacking, people blame the teachers. It is not the teachers’ fault. It is those political decisions made in the past about funding private education and cutting huge resources from the public system by simply insufficient increases in funding and so suppressing their budgets. It is about not listening to those at the coal-face but sowing seeds of distrust in public school teachers through putting more and more stringent demands on them in the way of programming, assessment and the minutiae of tedious record keeping. It is about loading the curriculum with so many extras. It is about not backing up teachers but somehow making them the scapegoats for society’s ills when in reality it is society. It is about cutting teachers, particularly support staff. It is sad that despite NSW now putting more money into public schools, they are still not seen as being equal to the private system where the parents have to pay for everything. It is sad for all the great teachers who have fought so hard for better funding and conditions for not just themselves but for their students. It is sad that programs such as The Schools Spectacular and the PSSA will not run if public schools can no longer support them. It is sad as all teachers have to meet the same accreditation standards. Just who will educate all those students who come from families where income cannot pay for the costs of private education? Ask what will happen if it is no longer there? Augusta Monro, Dural
The answer to why parents send their children, especially girls, to a private school is always “money” (they can afford it, so they do). The focus is on an economic divide, and while ever this remains the case, the real reasons will never be addressed and nothing will change to stop the trend or, indeed, make our public education a valued system. Jenny Greenwood, Hunters Hill
Day to remember
Every International Women’s Day, Parnell Palme McGuinness (“The Big Lie women tell other women”, March 8) comes up with her hyperbolic attacks on what she portrays as the feminist movement’s agenda to convince women, through lies, that babies, motherhood and monogamy should be shunned. She uses a few quotes from decades ago to prop up her vision of true feminism but no evidence that contemporary feminist writers uphold a model that teaches us to override an evolutionary purpose and desire to have children. Instead of being “enraged” by women freezing their eggs, she might look to other, more pertinent aspects of our society that International Women’s Day addresses, such as gender violence which takes the life of a woman on an almost weekly basis. Jennifer McKay, Ashbury
Being a stay-at-home mother of two in the early ’70s, I believed I didn’t fit the Women’s Lib criteria to be a feminist (which seemed to be: get a job, ditch the husband and the kids), but Germaine Greer’s The Female Eunuch had set alight a fire for women’s equality that burns to this day, though now it’s for much more – the Indigenous, the migrant, the disadvantaged. Betsy Brennan, Wahroonga
Central casting a pall
Your correspondent writes of the disgusting space that is the current Town Hall precinct (Letters, March 8). He could as well have criticised the Central end of George Street, which these days resembles nothing so much as a red-light district. Ian Usman Lewis, Armidale
Garden goodness
I agree about gardens (“My memory garden, the best therapy money can buy”, March 8). I have enjoyed getting dirt under my fingernails and learning about, looking at and enjoying the exquisite beauty Mother Nature gifts us through plants and trees since I was very young. It is true that gardens really are a tapestry of a life, full of lasting memories. Other benefits come from sharing the love of gardening and stories with grandchildren, helping the climate and gifting cuttings and plants to friends to remember special times and people. What’s not to love. Merilyn McClung, Forestville
What century is this?
Forget the science and urgent need to reduce carbon emissions so that future generations can have a liveable planet (“One Nation picks Farrer byelection candidate”, March 8). Barnaby Joyce, “The cheapest energy we used to have, the coal-fired power stations, are back. Nuclear energy starts.” John Cotterill, Kingsford
In for the krill
First there was the bloody harpoon made more “effective” with exploding tips (“Krill wars: The fight to keep food on the table for whales”, March 8). Then there came the less obvious but just as deadly persistent pesticides, microplastics, acidifying waters, warming seas and, now, the “vacuuming” of the base food of many a whale, krill. The mighty, magnificent marvels that are the whales have swum this planet’s oceans for some 50 million years. Will our great grand children recount the tale of their passing into memory? Steve Dillon, Thirroul
Eat krill. Starve a whale. Is there no end to human rapaciousness? Lawrence Pope, Carlton North (Vic)
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