Testimonial: Gymnastics

Mr. Siegfried Gerstung
Gerstung Inter-Sport, Inc.
1400 Coppermine Terrace
Baltimore, MD, 21209

Dear Mr. Gerstung,

I felt that I just had to sit down and write this letter. I hope you will forgive me if it seems a little rambling, but it is important to me that I express my views to you at this time.

My daughter, Michele, has just completed her very first semester of gymnastics at Gerstung, and I cannot express strongly enough my gratitude to you and your excellent staff of teachers for the job that you are doing. I am not a wealthy young matron who has enrolled her child in Gerstung because it happens to be the “in” thing to do. I am the sole support of a family of five, and it creates a bit of a hardship for us to get the tuition money together. However, it is important to me that my daughter be allowed to develop whatever ability she might have and to learn that only through dedication and hard work can you ever achieve your goals, not only in sports but also in life.

I am certainly aware that all children are different and they all have different things at which they excel. Not everyone can be a “Nadia Comanechi”, but I want my daughter to understand that she can have pride in her accomplishments, no matter at what level that may be. I am so disgusted with parents whose arrogance and inflated egos will not allow them to consider the possibility that their child may be “average” in any one particular field of endeavor. I can only feel pity for the children of parents like that, for they will grow up with no sense of values at all, but with the feeling that the world owes them, with little or no effort on their part. I for one was very grateful for the semester report, for it gave my daughter and I a chance to evaluate her progress and to decided where she could go from here. She would rather do gymnastics than eat or sleep, and from your report we were able to decide that we should increase her class time to include dance as well as gymnastics. However, if we had discovered that was not progressing well, she was prepared to continue working at whatever level she belonged.

I have taken up far too much of your valuable time with this letter, but I did want to give you my vote of confidence to let you know that I most certainly will want to receive periodic progress reports. Although I am only third generation German, I grew up with German grandparents who instilled in me the belief that the good things in life only come from hard work and from belief and dedication to your goals. I do not happen to think that is a bad set of values to instill in our children, and, again, I would like to express my appreciation to you and your staff for endeavoring at all times to keep the quality of your teaching at the highest level.

Very truly yours,

Ms. S.A. Fisher