The just-announced alteration in California school policy may have profound implications for us all: classroom size, in some sections of the state, will be expanded from 20 pupils ? to 30! Surprised? Consider: In 1900 there were a paltry one billion of us on the planet; it had taken 200,000 years to creep to that number; today, 100 years later, we have leaped to seven billion! Is it any wonder kindergartens have ballooned? What”ll we do (please don”t be shy!) in 50 years, when, as the scientific community predicts, our planetary “family” will exceed 15 billion?
We already have dire shortages in crucial areas (food, for instance, and water); there does not appear to be a slow-down to our pollution and more scary than all this (on a globe that has shown an acceptance for two worldwide conflicts) lots of us (some more short-tempered than others) on this ever more crowded, distressed sphere ? are acquiring, testing and refining nuclear bombs ? explosive devices that could wipe out a million or more (and set off civilization-ending war) in one angry plop.
Along with some teachers receiving “pink slips,” the rest of us might take this class size increase as a call to active cooperation, on a world scale, to dramatically reduce our numbers before something totally, irreversibly catastrophic overwhelms us!
Norman Fleishman
Lakeport
