The severe snowstorm that blanketed the city of Auburn on the weekend of Dec. 7 also blanketed any hopes of a second production of “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum” by the drama club of Edward Little High School.

For whatever reason, the youngsters were not permitted to showcase their talents. Unlike athletic teams who can perform on a number of occasions and therefore can demonstrate their improvements, drama students must depend on two final productions as a culmination of their season.

The disappointment of the youngsters and of the prospective spectators points out again the appalling lack of a performing arts center for the young people at Edward Little High School. For far too long, plays have been held in either drafty gyms or at the whim of other groups. Concerts have been presented either in gyms not appropriate for logistics and acoustics or in another city not even related to the high school.

The public school, that great bastion of democracy, has as its mission to welcome and nurture all students, athletic as well as non-athletic. There needs to be a performing arts center so that the player on the stage is supported as well as the player on the ice, the debater of rhetoric is affirmed as well as the dribbler of basketball, and the follower of Brahms and Beethoven is confirmed as well as the follower of Paterno and Rockne.

Hopefully, the disappointment of this past December will result in the renewal of a fight for a performing arts center.

Cynthia J. Peters, Lewiston