October 18, 2003

Dear Parents:

On behalf of the faculty and administration, I hope you’re enjoying Columbus Day Month and the extra time this supplemental vacation is allowing you to spend with your young scholars. Already, CDM has saved our school—your school—thousands of dollars in utility costs alone. But the fact remains: we simply do not have the funds or infrastructure to cope with our disastrously overcrowded classrooms. We can chip away at the problem only so much by relaxing immunization standards. The challenge is daunting, but everyone involved in education must take on some of this burden. With that in mind, here’s a look at what you can expect in the near future:

  • In an effort to streamline our extracurricular offerings, all groups and teams will be pooled into a holistic Activities Club. Members will learn about Spanish culture, perform Romeo and Juliet, and take a helmet to the spine while catching a pass on a crossing pattern. When asked at a college interview what he or she did outside of class, your child can say, “Gosh, what didn’t I do?”
  • Students will be eligible to withdraw from school at age fourteen; they will be pressured to do so at age sixteen.
  • We’ve upgraded our technology centers with the next generation in Apple computers: the Apple II.
  • With protective goggles in short supply, all students in courses with a lab component will be tested for eye dominance and provided with a safety monocle.
  • Nonessential courses and students will be taught in alternative classrooms. These portable scholastic environments, or “tarps,” will allow for a more intimate educational experience, one that takes place without the distracting roar of heating systems or any of the myriad health hazards commonly associated with walls.
  • Counselors on hand to help struggling students with their academic and personal problems will be replaced by a folder with Sbarro employment applications and a shoebox of barbiturates.
  • Finally, something of an embarrassing correction to last month’s bulletin. In the third paragraph, it was erroneously suggested that euthanized pets would be incorporated into the school’s hot-lunch program. In fact, these meals will be served cold.

We eagerly await the return of students to campus on November 1. We value your continued support because children really are our future. But we can’t spell “future” without “u.” Twice.

Sincerely,
Thomas Goodwin, Principal

Note: Please retain this letter. It now represents the entirety of the English curriculum for grades five through nine.