My suggestion wasn't just "shove a telescope at a kid", it was to put one in the hands of very particular, hand-picked students who would be trained by the teacher in the use of the scope. The teacher would have to be a SLAS member, of course, and would be responsible for the telescope- so they would have to be very certain of the student's aptitude and seriousness of interest. The problem, as I read it, was that the teachers lacked the time to conduct as many star-parties as are usually needed, and I can certainly understand that. How many of you would like to essentially go back to work one night a week after you've already worked a full day at the office? That's what a teacher faces when conducting a viewing session. And they don't even get paid for it. So I just made a suggestion as to a possible mechanism to "teach a man to fish", instead of "giving him a fish", which is what a star-party does. When I was in high-school, the school owned some nice hardware, such as a Helium-Neon laser, and certain hand-picked students were allowed to check it out for the weekend. My telescope idea was based on that program. For the three years I was there, the laser was never lost, stolen, or damaged. If SLAS has had bad experiences with loaner scopes in the past, I would suggest that it was probably due to an overly generous attitude, nothing to be ashamed about. Not every kid who asks for a scope should get one. Essentially we are talking about stepping-up to fill a void that the school districts themselves have created, by underfunding science programs. Instead of beefing up loaner programs, perhaps those interested should be attending school board meetings. I was also struck by the fact that any member of the public can get everything that the Clark program offers from SLAS by attending a star-party or two, and nobody has to write a juried essay to attend, so kudos to SLAS for that.