Letters to the editor: Feb. 29

Save garden? Make it about race

As sympathetic as I am to University of Kentucky student Ryan Lark’s impassioned plea for UK to save Mathews Garden from development, I had to shake my head at his youthful, idealistic optimism.

Lark’s Feb. 9 commentary spelled out carefully and logically the educational benefits of Mathews Garden for teaching students about native Kentucky plant life.

Silly boy. Does he really think the UK administration cares more about enhancing undergraduate education than enrollment growth, endless construction and external grant funding?

No, if Lark and others want Mathews Garden to be saved, here’s what they should do: Enlist the aid of the members of the Black Student Union, LGBT association, women’s studies or any other group purporting to represent oppressed minorities on campus.

Have them march loudly through campus, demanding that the garden be saved, as it is their “safe space” where they can go to be protected against micro-aggressions, artwork from the 1930s and offensive comments.

UK President Eli Capilouto will have no choice but to cave and leave Mathews Garden pristine. Problem solved.

Gift to university, city

Many thanks to Ryan Lark for his commentary concerning the University of Kentucky’s Mathews Garden. I am a 1962 graduate of Henry Clay High School and had the good fortune to be in one of Ruth Mathews’ English classes there.

Mathews was an amazing and delightful teacher and invited our class over one day to the Mathews house and gave us a tour of it and her beloved garden. I will never forget her or the house and garden.

As a 1973 graduate of UK Law School, the house and garden were pleasant and peaceful daily sights for me for several years. I implore the law school and UK officials to save these invaluable treasures and live up to its mission statement to “improve peoples’ lives through excellence in education.”

This story was originally published February 28, 2016 at 11:09 AM with the headline "Letters to the editor: Feb. 29."