Sir, - Permit me to question the use of the term "second-chance" which crept into an otherwise excellent article in E & L (May 26th). To refer to those mature students who return to education as "second-chance scholars" is, it seems to me, patronising and inaccurate. My experience teaching in adult education has shown that many of the students never had a first chance to begin with - so the idea of a second one is misplaced. Early marriage, late development, financial hardship, troubled family life; the reasons why many left education at an early age are almost endless. To call adult learners "second-chance scholars" suggests they had the same opportunities as everyone else but failed to take advantage of them. This is surely not the case. Chris Lawn,
Enniskeane,
Co Cork.