My wife and I no longer have children in the West Hempstead Public Schools. The oldest is pursuing a rigorous course of graduate study; the youngest is completing her freshman year at a prominent university.

We wistfully look at the public school calendar these days - back-to-school night, PTSA meetings, parent-teacher conferences, college planning sessions, and sundry, seemingly daily occasions to gulp down a quick dinner after a long day's work with barely time to catch our breath, before heading over to the school - and offer a mutual sigh of relief, as if to say, "We don't miss that!"

True, we do miss the concerts, plays, honor society inductions, achievement dinners, class nights, and that close connection that accompanies the sometimes frenetic pace of school days, when our lives revolved more around our kids than ourselves.

Yet, there is one thing we surely will not miss, and never have - the opportunity to vote (and to vote "Yes") on the school budget.

Our children may have "graduated" from the public schools well prepared for the challenges of higher education that succeeded the conferring of high school diplomas, but our commitment to the education of all of our children is ongoing.

As learning is a lifetime experience for all of us, so too must be our continuing commitment to the education of every child, the future of this community, and the hope of this nation.

On Tuesday, May 20, residents will be called upon once again to support the endeavors of our schools, to show up and lend a hand as our children take the next step toward a responsible adulthood, and to renew their commitment to education as the very foundation of community itself.

Truly, this is an opportunity not to be missed!

Seth D. Bykofsky

West Hempstead