A request for SDPC board members

Dear Editor,

A few years ago, the board of the School District of Pickens County decided to no longer give the school children in Pickens County Presidents’ Day off as a holiday, and instead began choosing a random day off either the week before (Feb. 13 this year) or the week of (in 2016, the proposed day off is the Friday after Presidents’ Day). The school districts in Oconee, Anderson and Greenville counties continue to recognize Presidents’ Day as a holiday. As a United States citizen, a patriot and a parent, I am apalled the school board of Pickens County has chosen to no longer recognize this important national and state holiday.

This holiday honors the men who worked to establish this great nation and continue to govern it on a daily basis. As a patriot, it is disconcerting that the board would choose to no longer recognize this holiday that celebrates the leaders of our nation. To honor other great Americans (Martin Luther King Jr., for example) and not honor our nation’s presidents is wrong. If it were not for the vision, sacrifice and leadership of General George Washington, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln, to name a few, this nation in all probability would not exist. How can we not honor them? Why has the board chosen to do this?

Furthermore, as a working parent who gets very few days off during the year, it is significantly inconvenient and expensive to arrange child care for my children within the same week when, if the School District chose to honor this holiday, I would be available to care for and spend precious time with my children. I would hope we can all agree that parents spending time with their children is a good thing, and the school district should make efforts to do this whenever possible. If the board wants to continue to use Presidents’ Day as a work day for school personnel, I would have no objection to that, and offer that as an option for the board to consider instead of giving the students the next Friday off. It really comes across as a slap in the face to our nation and the men who have so honorably tried to serve it to have students take Friday off in the same week, or the Friday before, when most of our nation’s citizens are celebrating an actual holiday that recognizes the leaders of our nation.

Therefore, I respectfully ask the board of the School District of Pickens County to reinstate Presidents’ Day as an annual holiday for the students of Pickens County schools.

Cindy Wolthuis

Clemson