March 26, 1974

Dear Members of the Princeton Regional Board of Education:

It has come to my attention that you have decided not to reappoint and grant tenure to my colleague and house partner, Bud Rue. I feel professionally impelled to react to this decision!

I have worked closely with Bud since this time last year when we decided to work together and began to make plans for our students. When one is a member of a two-man team, one spends endless hours talking, planning, disagreeing, compromising, laughing, crying, growing, and getting to know one another extremely well. I feel that I know Bud Rue very well! I have found much to admire in this man. He is a competent teacher who is skilled in his discipline and in the ability to relate it to students. He is a human being who by his actions, words, and deeds conveys two oft-forgotten theses:

Children are people.

Schools are for children.

Contemporary critics of our schools often complain that they are cold inhuman places where young people come like empty vessels to be filled by adult wells of knowledge. Such is not the case with Bud Rue. He attempts to understand and deal with students in their totality. He has the ability to strike a healthy balance between the cognitive and affective domains of education. He is equally concerned with the development of the mind and the spirit. I have personally benefitted from my relationship with him this year and feel that I have grown in this important area.

Our students this year, although sometimes complaining about the amount of math homework they received, respect Bud for his sincere concern for them as individual people. They appreciate the empathetic manner with which he deals with their problems both social and academic.

In this day of increased concern about human relations, and teacher-student rapport, we can not afford to cast from our midst a man of Bud Rue's calibre. In his dealings with young people, I have found him to be flexible, fair, firm, and friendly! These are human qualities in short supply in our schools.

I know not what reasons led you to your decision, but I ask that you reconsider this decision very carefully. I ask that you permit Bud Rue to continue to teach and guide and direct the young of our community.

Very truly yours, Raymond Hunt