Last week it became state-wide news when a school board member in Cabarrus County used a slur on a video conference for all to hear. Her apology given in the form of a letter did not suffice for this teacher who has a child with intellectual disabilities and cognitive delays. It seemed more like an … Continue reading Censuring Was Not Good Enough For This School Board Member

In the summer of 2017, BEST NC released an op-ed on EdNC.org about Shamrock Gardens Elementary School and their use of “advanced roles” for educators. And the piece made reference to BEST NC’s Education Innovation Plan, a bit of which is outlined below. Advanced roles have been a hot topic before and has come back into the … Continue reading Actually Most Every Teacher Already Has An “Advanced Role” – The NCGA Forced Them On Us

Remember when Mark Johnson talked about how the teacher starting salary in NC was really good? January 26, 2018: During a question-and-answer session Thursday at the N.C. School Boards Association’s policy conference in Raleigh, Johnson said that the base state starting salary of $35,000 for North Carolina teachers was “good money” and “a lot of … Continue reading This Combover Could Pay Two Teachers

In 2013, the NC General Assembly took away graduate degree pay raises for new teacher hires. Pat McCrory was the governor of NC at that time. Candidate for the office of state superintendent Catherine Truitt was for a time a senior education advisor for then Gov. McCrory. Apparently her ideas on how to "improve" education … Continue reading This Candidate Needs To Clarify Her Stance On Graduate Degree Pay For Teachers (Because Her “University” Is Saying Something Else)

What happened last week during a virtual meeting of the Cabarrus County Board of Education has already made many headlines across the state. Yet, if you have not heard about it, a member, Laura Blackwell, responded to another board member with a derogatory term that is considered offensive without turning off her audio feed. From … Continue reading About That Apology From The School Board Member Who Used The “R” Word

This is not the kind of person who needs to be on the State Board of Education. As a teacher in a public school, I am bound to keep my classroom as free of prejudice, racism, and other forms of discrimination as humanly possible. I would expect that from an elected official who was to … Continue reading If This Man Is Elected, He Will Be On The State Board Of Education For Public Schools

Remember the bathroom bill constructed by then state legislator Dan Bishop called HB2? One of the nebulous things about that bill was how gender would be determined if it needed to be checked on the spot. Not many people carried around birth certificates on their person. Maybe the bill needed to have had a provision … Continue reading An Actual GOP Bill That May Allow “Genital Checks” For High School Female Sports

Funny to think that based on the research that Kris Nordstrom posts about here that there is a distinctive timeline that Catherine Truitt seems to ignore. In a debate last week Truitt claimed that in the last 30 years "we haven't moved the needle on student achievement." Let's look at the last 30 years. That … Continue reading This Person Claims In The Last 30 Years “We Haven’t Moved The Needle On Student Achievement.” Well…

This one billboard says a lot about our current state of polarization. And it communicates some very Schools are not closed. School buildings are closed and campuses shut down for convening physical classes. But "school" is going on. 2. Teachers do not want to always stay in Plan C. Teachers want school buildings open. They … Continue reading Seven Truths About Teachers & This Pandemic That Are Intentionally Ignored

Yesterday both Jen Mangrum and Catherine Truitt provided insights to the editorial board of the News & Observer during an interview for each. Below are two tweets from the education reporter for the N&O. She threw Mark Johnson under the bus. Said he was not the person for the job. She also was the person … Continue reading For Once I Agree With Catherine Truitt, But She Said Something In August 2019…