Mark Twain once said, “The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated.” The same could be said for the open classroom magnet at Conejo Elementary School in Thousand Oaks.

There are some fascinating rumors suggesting such demise.

My daughter, “Miss Jennifer,” is a K-1 teacher in open classroom.

A misconception in some quarters suggests that open classroom teachers are chosen on seniority. The criterion for teacher selection is for a match in the program. Proof is the present teacher staff. Further, Jennifer was a first-year teacher in the district when she started teaching in open classroom.

The Conejo School administration continues to demonstrate the highest regard for the “whole child” and supports open classroom enthusiastically.

The school district strongly supports open classroom with a memorandum of understanding which includes teacher training, marketing support and a vision committee that plans for the continuation of open classroom at Conejo School.

It’s been suggested that open classroom students don’t perform well in middle school.

In fact, many open classroom grads are middle school leaders. Open classroom has produced a high school valedictorian. Currently, a high school senior has chosen to complete a senior project working in Miss Jennifer’s K-1 classroom. One senior invited her former K-1 teacher to her graduation.

Loyalty to the program runs deep. Students from the program have moved on to elite universities, including University of California Berkeley and Yale.

Test scores of open classroom students attest to its excellence year after year.

Open classroom is alive, healthy and striding forward. Bill Jackson Simi Valley