Feedback from Dick Askey (1/29/99): About your opinion piece about it not mattering how poorly we did on TIMSS since we have a high but small peak, let me remind you that much of the width of this peak comes from people like you who were educated in other countries. A vast majority of our last 30 tenure hires or promotions were to people who received at least their schooling in other countries, often their undergraduate education, and sometimes a Ph.D. Don't forget that even if one is not going to go on and use mathematics seriously, one can profit from knowing more mathematics, just as one can profit from knowing more about painting, music and many other things. We have cheated far too many of our students. Dick ----------------------- Feedback from Herb Wilf (10/24/99): I was just looking at opinion 21. It's great. The last part "Luckily, the contempt of the average American to the computer-math-science nerd is far deeper than race-religion prejudice. Let's hope that we nerds would NEVER become COOL. " is already outdated, though. American admire the rich. Through the dot.com's of the internet the nerds are showing the way to easy riches. Ergo, the nerds are already cool. Too late, Doron. ---------------------