LETTERS: STEREOTYPES IN STORY

To the editor:

I am a student at the Alternative Education Center. I am 17 years of age, married with no children. My lowest grade was a 90 percent, and I plan on going to college after I graduate. I'm not here because I'm a gang member or a teen-age mother but because I can't afford to go to school full-time, work part-time and still be able to pay the bills.

There are a lot of student in this program with high goals set for their futures and a lot of student who were displeased with the article on our school in the paper. There are no real gang members here and very few teen-age mothers, and all are very capable of going to college some day.

I just felt like we were stereotyped, even though I now Heidi Nieland didn't intentionally want to insult us in any way. Thank you for your time.

JENNIFER TALL

Cape Girardeau

EDITOR'S NOTE: Jennifer Tall is one of eight students who wrote letters about Heidi Nieland's story concerning the first graduate of the Cape Girardeau School District's new Alternative Education Center at the Salvation Army building. The letters were written as part of a class assignment. Nieland is a tutor at the center.