Letters are posted as we receive them during the week, and before they are printed in the paper, so check back frequently to see new letters. If you'd like to send a letter to the editor, use this postmarks submission form, or email your letter directly to [email protected]. Thanks for your patience.

Dear Editor,
    Thank you for your well researched, and important 4/15/22 article, "Out of Reach." AISD, and Gramercy Specialty Clinic, faces so many challenges, and your article might lead the wider community to see and attend to AISD's need for help in serving the mental health needs of its students.
    There is bright spot, though, for which AISD deserves our praise. For 40 years, the PALS (Peer Assistance, Leadership, and Service) program has trained students how to mentor and simply be friends with younger students. Just ask AISD counselors and teachers how valuable the PALS program has been in empowering students to serve each other, not to mention how much the program helps counselors, in an appropriate and supervised way, reduce their formidable workload by having kids help kids. Sometimes all a student needs is an older buddy.
    At very low cost and very high value, PALS, which is often the most meaningful and memorable class students' recall from their time at AISD, has enabled students to serve (which they want to do) as mentors and be served as mentees.

Dear Editor,
    The state climatologist John Nielson-Gammon said that Texas can expect the average number of triple digit days to nearly double by 2036. In contrast Texas Senate Bill 13, which is now law, is designed to punish companies who divest from fossil fuels by banning them from contracting with the State. The current Texas legislature is more concerned with protecting fossil fuel interests than protecting Texans from global warming.

Dear Editor,
    Thank you for your article about the distressing lack of mental health services for AISD students since the district switched to Gramercy as a provider. [“Out of Reach,” News, April 15] This reflects my experience trying to get help for a vulnerable 9th grade student with severe mental health concerns who is frequently contemplating suicide, through AISD and Gramercy. Though I have been working with her parents to request mental health services for her for six months straight via AISD, she has yet to be contacted by a counselor. The many promises made of counseling, and the hopes dashed, have worsened her mental health. One problem with the new model of electronic forms is that it requires parents to be highly computer literate to approve and request services. Her parents are not – which is the case for many students. The need to follow up with a phone call after submitting electronic forms was not communicated to me and is not communicated in the process online. The barriers to services are so high that even a family with a dogged, dedicated advocate cannot get treatment for a student who has been in crisis for over a year. AISD should cancel the contract with Gramercy and reinstate VIDA Clinic, which did actually give students mental health care – not just broken promises.