Parents of children attending New York’s public elementary schools get countless letters from the Department of Education. Below is a letter folks like us should receive but never will.

Dear Parent,

Please be advised that, owing to a pesky little thing we call “mismanagement,” the NYC Department of Education will be re-doing the advisory vote for the 2011 Community and Citywide Education Council elections. This means the hour you spent logging on to some obscure web site, sifting through unfamiliar names and studying candidate biographies — all so you could cast an advisory vote for an advisory panel — will have to be repeated. Please accept our apologies.

Oh, and we hope you didn’t throw away the letter we sent home containing your child’s OSIS number, which you’ll need to re-cast your vote. If you did, then we suggest … well, at this point you’re probably saying “To hell with this,” or something even less civil. And who can blame you?

While we’re issuing apologies, we’d also like to express regret for what promises to be a nasty round of teacher layoffs that will directly affect your child’s education. We’d like to think this is the fault of state budget writers, but the fact is New York’s Department of Education hasn’t built a strong case proving every single one of the billions of dollars spent in city schools is put to good use. Rather, we’ve given folks the impression we’re so awash in waste and mismanagement (there’s that word again) that great wads of public cash are regularly flushed down a giant hole. We regret that the DOE has contributed to this perception.

We’d also like to apologize for the acronym “DOE.” Makes us sound like a cute little deer, doesn’t it? Well, we’re not

Please also accept our apologies for overcrowded classrooms, poor building maintenance, leaky soccer balls, the G&T admission process, icky lunches, outdated textbooks, “toxic” principals, Cathie Black, ammonia-scented floor cleaner, PCBs in light fixtures, playground bullies, and that funky smell in most school gyms. We also regret the fact that, should a school want a librarian or an art teacher, then some turbo-charged parent association must hold a black-tie auction. We’re also sorry we routinely cave in to union bosses and condominium developers, and that we let Eva Moskowitz open one of her charter schools any damn place she wants. We regret any inconvenience our actions may have caused.

In closing, let us acknowledge that virtually no parent ever reads to the end of a letter from the DOE. So, for the one or two of you still paying attention, please know that the winning lottery numbers in Wednesday’s Take 5 game will be 8, 12, 15, 23 and 35. Don’t ask us how we know this. Let’s just say: If parents knew everything we knew, then we’d have even more to apologize for.