TEACHERS' LETTER BOMB

Courageous teachers at a Brooklyn high school - fed up with unprepared and even illiterate students - made an impassioned plea to Schools Chancellor Joel Klein yesterday to end social promotion.

The teachers at Clara Barton HS sent Klein a plaintive letter - signed by half of the 120-member faculty - saying it's impossible to educate students who were allowed to graduate from elementary or middle schools without having learned the basics.

The result: the teens have a dismal future because they can't pass state Regents exams to earn a diploma and are prime candidates to drop out - or worse.

IMO teachers are being proactive not reactive.