Ebonics

Re “U.S. Senate Panel Grills Officials on Ebonics Policy,” Jan. 24: Your report included an opinion by Amos C. Brown: “ ‘Low achievement does not reside in their genes,’ Brown said of black youth, suggesting that they turn off television at night and focus more on homework.”

He might also have added that if students can understand what they see on television (and in movies) they can certainly understand a teacher in the classroom, regardless of how they may communicate with each other. Whether they can comprehend the material is another matter.

The Oakland Unified School District has no case, unless it can prove that underachieving black students are so handicapped by Ebonics that they cannot even understand what they see on television.

JILL RENTON

Santa Monica