MELISSA BLOCK, host: Getting into college is a very competitive business, and yesterday we heard about one school that's trying to ease the pressure on students by eliminating AP classes. That was the subject of some of your letters, and we'll get to those now.</s>MICHELE NORRIS, host: Those advanced placement courses put college-level workloads on high school students. And we heard from Peter Gow, an administrator at Beaver Country Day School in Massachusetts.</s>Mr. PETER GOW (Administrator, Beaver Country Day School): I think that pressure to make sure that you had that trophy on your transcript was something that we felt wasn't necessarily that healthy for kids. It didn't seem appropriate to be playing into that.</s>MELISSA BLOCK, host: Hey, don't blame the classes, writes Chris Harlan of Woodland Hills, California. He continues, getting rid of AP classes because some students are overtaxed is like getting rid of track and field because not everyone can run less than a four-minute mile or shutting down the basketball team because no one on it is headed to the NBA.</s>MICHELE NORRIS, host: Well, last week we heard about your memories of bad holiday food. Lutefisk was on that list. Art professor John Anderson described it.</s>Mr. JOHN ANDERSON (Art Professor): Lutefisk is a dried whitefish soaked in lye, and as the song goes, oh lutefisk, it looks like glue and tastes like a shoe.</s>MICHELE NORRIS, host: Well, MacArthur Eld of Parma, Idaho, wrote in defense. He says, hey, give lutefisk a break. It's good. You do have to acquire a taste for it, but the same holds for most any non-usual food, like broccoli. My family has enjoyed lutefisk soup for 40 years at its annual Christmas party.</s>MELISSA BLOCK, host: There's a ringing endorsement for you. You can send your endorsements or criticisms. Go to npr.org and click on contact us at the bottom of the page.
NPR's Melissa Block and Michele Norris read from listeners' e-mails and online comments about efforts to ease the pressure on students to take AP classes, and one of the bad holiday foods we discussed last week — lutefisk.