Throughout North Carolina, every local school board is wrestling with how to manage maintaining safety and reopening school buildings trying to balance what resources they have with the needs of communities while anticipating how this pandemic will continue to play out. They are having to rush to give answers to questions that are fueled by … Continue reading 2020 Is Showing Us That Local School Board Elections Are That Important For Every NC School System

I work in a school system that has over 80 schools, 50,000+ students, and around 6200 teachers. There are around 1000 substitute teachers on the official sub list in the county. That does not mean that there are 1000 people ready to go to any school on any day for any amount of time. Those … Continue reading So, How Many Substitute Teachers Does Your School System Really Have?

Simply put, there is really no positive thing that Lt. Gov. Dan Forest has done for North Carolina public education. He may tout “hooking” up all schools with high-speed internet, but then he will not stop that from being an avenue for replacing teachers with computerized instruction. He may tout “school choice,” but his record … Continue reading DAN Can’t See The FOREST For The Trees – The Lt. Gov. Intentionally Looking At Public Education With Blinders On

From the Atlanta Journal-Constitution in my native state of Georgia this past summer: Gov. Brian Kemp and state school Superintendent Richard Woods are asking the federal government to waive the public school testing requirement for another school year. And there was more. Georgia will also look to not use a school grading system next year that is … Continue reading NC Needs To Elect A State Superintendent Who Will Do This For Our Public Schools

It is perfectly lawful to donate to a political campaign, and with the Citizens United case decision from the Supreme Court a few years back, it is now lawful for corporations to donate money through political action committees (PACs) and Super PACs. However, while it is lawful, it doesn’t mean that some interesting ethical questions … Continue reading ALEC, SAS, EVAAS, And Charter School Chains – Looking At The Campaign Contributions For Catherine Truitt

Still over two months left in this term. And the only thing we have heard from him in the past couple of months is that we might get some money that he didn't fight for. This lack of leadership is what this state has dealt with for almost four years.

One of the most overused electioneering blurbs used by many multi-termed lawmakers in North Carolina in the 2018 election cycle was that our state has given the highest percentage “average” pay raise to teachers in the last few years. It was echoed by Rep. Jeffrey Elmore (a teacher) in a misguided EdNC.org op-ed in the … Continue reading North Carolina Already Had A Deliberately Created Severe Teacher Candidate Shortage – Why We Should Vote Pro-Public Education in November

That's the title of a feature article on EdNC.org on Sept. 20th. She was mostly answering questions about charter schools, but the notion that politics should not be in the "conversation" is rather odd coming from someone who has been to some rather high profile "political events." There was that press conference on 9/16 in … Continue reading The Hypocrisy Of Trump’s “Shout Out” To Catherine Truitt

Tonight in the only gubernatorial debate of this election year, Lt. Gov. Dan Forest made the claim about teacher pay being increased by 20%. Listen for yourself. https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=344758496628431 Go about 32 minutes into it. Now, if you believe that Dan Forest is correct, then please explain the following. Imagine a room of 17 teachers. All … Continue reading Speaking Out Of His A** – What Dan Forest Said About Teacher Pay Raises In Tonight’s Debate

In October of 2019,  Rob Schofield published a piece on NC Policy Watch explaining the negative effects of the budget that Sen. Phil Berger and others in the NCGA were at that time pushing. The second dealt with public education. #2 – Further undermining the state’s desperately underfunded public schools – As veteran education policy analyst Kris Nordstrom … Continue reading What NC Is Spending For Public Schools – 2008-2009 Versus 2019-2020