lettertoeditor2

                                                                                                                      January 24th, 2001
Dear Editor,
     Being born and raised the majority of my life in the capitol of Kansas, I grew up with many of the typical stereotypes that are in our world today. As I grew, I learned many falsehoods about the poor, farmers, and the upper class. The main stereotype that struck me the hardest though, was the one that farmers and their children were not good at anything but farming. Things such as academics and sports were not something that, in my mind, farming type families excelled at. What caused me to notice this, even more so than before, was a recent article printed in the features section of your online newspaper. It was about professional athletes that were teased by not only their teammates but by the announcers as well, for being from a rural upbringing.
   This stereotype struck me the hardest because of the fact that when I was sixteen years old, I moved with my parents out to the central part of Kansas, with the nearest big city being Salina. We lived, virtually in the middle of nowhere, were surrounded by farms, and had to decide which of the two small schools we wanted to go to. The bigger of the two schools only had about two hundred students and at that time in my life, seemed like it would teach me nothing at all. The first year I was there, the majority of conversation I heard was about farming and hunting. Yet, as I continued my school there, I learned that my previous stereotype of farming families was completely wrong. Sure, they were good at farming and hunting, as well as they liked to talk about it. However, they were also very academically and athletically inclined. Some of the students that I interacted with were much smarter than any student in a big city school. I also saw some of best athletes I had ever seen.
    My point is this; I agree with Jim Suber and his article �Farm Kids Face Unfair Ridicule in Athletic World.� Just because I was raised to believe the typical stereotype about farm kids and their families, didn�t mean that it was true. In fact, just by experiencing living and interacting with those kinds of people did I find that falsehood to be utterly wrong. They are people just like us, and do not deserve to be treated differently than the rest. Sure they grew up in a rural environment, but they still make a worthy contribution to everyday society.
    Not everyone can learn the truth about these stereotypes as I have, nor can we force everyone to change the views that they already have. The only thing that can be done to change this is to start with the young kids. Teach them as young as they are able, that just because people grow up in different places, doesn�t mean they are inferior or less academically and athletically inclined than the rest of us. I know that when I have kids, in the way distant future, that I will teach them things the right way, and they will not grow up with the stereotypes that I learned as a child.
                                                        Christine L. Watkins
                                                          PSU Sophomore