Archives for category: North Carolina
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »

North Carolina: Public Education in Peril

By dianeravitch
July 25, 2013 //
22

Dr. June Atkinson, the state superintendent of instruction in North Carolina, said, ““For the first time in my career of more than 30 years in public education, I am truly worried about students in our care.”

Lindsay Wagner summarizes the damage done to public education by the North Carolina legislature:

It cut more than $500 million from the state’s public schools.

It passed a voucher program to allow students to take public money to private and religious schools.

And more:

The 2013-15 biennial budget introduces a raft of spending cuts to public schools that will result in no raises for teachers, larger class sizes, fewer teacher assistants, little support for instructional supplies or professional development, and what could amount to the dismantling of the North Carolina Teaching Fellows program. Teachers can also say goodbye to tenure and supplemental pay for advanced degrees.

Wagner asks, “Is this the beginning of the end for public education in North Carolina?”

The privatization movement is in full swing in North Carolina. What was once the most progressive state in the South is now leading the attack on public education. For the first time since Reconstruction, the governorship and both houses of the Legislature are in the hands of Republicans, and these are not moderate Republicans who want to preserve a strong public education system. These are radical privatizers who want to send public monies to private schools, religious schools, and entrepreneurs.

The governor’s education advisor, Eric Guckian, is a Teach for America alum. TFA won $5.1 million in the new budget.

Categories Budget Cuts, Class size, Education Industry, For-Profit, North Carolina, Privatization, Teacher Tenure, Teachers and Teaching, Vouchers

This Post Went Viral Today

By dianeravitch
July 23, 2013 //
7

Congratulations to Yevonne Brannan, whose post about the legislative attack on public education in North Carolina went viral today. Nearly 30,000 people read her post. That is amazing!

Congratulations, Yevonne, and forgive me for misspelling your first name in the post.

Yevonne is one of the leaders of Public Schools First NC.

She and other devoted parents, teachers, and citizens will win this battle. Not today, not this year, maybe not next year, but they will win.

Here is the announcement of the formation of her group of brave fighters for the common good. They got started only last February. They are determined. They will take back NC from the cultural vandals. It will happen. They have just begun to fight.

Public Schools First NC Forms to Champion Public Education

We are pleased to let you know that a a new statewide, non-partisan, grassroots advocacy group committed to high-quality public schools for North Carolina has formed. Public Schools First NC is a group of citizens, parents, teachers, businesses and organizations joining together out of a deep concern about the growing threat to privatize and weaken North Carolina’s public schools.

Public Schools First NC’s common sense agenda includes:
Adequate, equitable funding reflecting at least the national average for North Carolina’s school district
A limited number of truly innovative charter schools designed to work with local school districts, managed with careful local and state oversight.
Excellent educational environments that are partnerships between schools, families, teachers and the community.
Increased support for pre-school, because high quality, early childhood education is a wise investment for communities and has lifelong, positive results for children.
Programs that encourage the training and retention of professional experienced teachers and principals.
Take the next step for public education in NC!

Join Public Schools First NC to receive news, information, and important action alerts: http://www.publicschoolsfirstnc.org/join-us/
Like Public Schools First NC on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/publicschoolsfirstnc
Follow Public Schools First NC on Twitter: http://twitter.com/ps1nc
_________________________________________________________________________________

Categories North Carolina, Vouchers

North Carolina: A First Look at the Destruction of Public Education

By dianeravitch
July 22, 2013 //
22

Lindsay Wagner is an excellent journalist at NC Policy Watch. She covers the legislature.

Here is her summary of the slash-and-burn policies that the legislature applied to public education:

1. Vouchers. $10 million set aside. This week, legislators will consider vouchers for students with disabilities. This is an ALEC priority, but ironically students with disabilities have greater rights and protection in public schools than in private schools.

2. Elimination of teacher tenure. Teachers now become temporary employees.

3. Teacher pay. NC teachers are among the worst paid in the nation. This legislation won’t help. “Teacher pay: no raises for teachers, who have only seen a 1% pay increase in the past five years. Supplemental pay for teachers who have master’s degrees is gone, with the exception of those whose jobs require advanced degrees. A scheme for merit pay is included, with highly performing teachers getting bonuses in the second year.”

4. Funding for teacher assistants was cut.

5. Class size limits were removed. Class sizes will grow.

6. Virtual charters: the state board is urged to give them another look.

The North Carolina legislature and governor are systematically dismantling the teaching profession and privatizing public education. These people are cultural vandals.

Categories Budget Cuts, Charter Schools, North Carolina, Teacher Tenure, Vouchers

NC Legislature: $5.1 Million for TFA

By dianeravitch
July 21, 2013 //
22

As reported earlier, the far-right North Carolina legislature voted to start vouchers and to end teacher tenure.

But there was good news for TFA: the far-right Republican majority allocated $5.1 million for Teach for America. The governor’s education advisor Eric Guckian is an alum of TFA.

TFA presents itself as passionately devoted to equity, but its major funding comes from the far-right Walton Family Foundation and it is very popular with reactionary legislatures. Maybe it is because they see TFA as a ready source of low-wage teachers who won’t stay for many years and will never expect a pension.

Categories North Carolina, Teach for America TFA

Breaking News: NC Legislature Approves Vouchers, Ends Teacher Tenure

By dianeravitch
July 21, 2013 //
46

The North Carolina legislature reached agreement on a budget that initiates vouchers in 2014 and ends teacher tenure.

The Republican leadership hailed the budget deal as a huge improvement for public education, which of course it is not. Vouchers are terrible public policy that will harm the public education system by draining dollars from it to fund religious schools. No voucher experiment in the past 20 years has shown that vouchers produce better education.

As for ending teacher tenure, it guarantees an end to academic freedom for teachers. Will any teacher dare to teach a controversial book or discuss evolution?

North Carolina was once hailed as one of the most progressive southern states. Now its governor and both houses of the legislature are members of the same party, and they are extremist in their determination to crush teachers and privatize public education. Teachers’ salaries in the state are among the lowest in the nation.

A critic said this about the budget deal:

“Lawmakers chose to drain available revenues by $524 million over the next two years through an ill-advised series of tax cuts that primarily benefit the wealthy and profitable corporations,” wrote Alexandra Forter Sirota, director of the North Carolina Budget and Tax Center, which has been critical of the Republican-led legislature. “This revenue loss isn’t just a number on a piece of paper—it means fewer teachers in more crowded classrooms, higher tuition rates and elevated debt load for families, scarcer economic development opportunities for distressed communities, and longer waiting lists for senior services.”

Categories North Carolina, Teacher Tenure, Vouchers

Will North Carolina Abandon Public Education?

By dianeravitch
July 17, 2013 //
30

June Atkinson, the state superintendent in North Carolina, can’t remember a worse time for public education or a te when teachers were so disrespected.

NC ranks 46th in the nation in teachers’ salaries. Teachers must teach 15 years to reach $40,000 a year. What a disgrace!

It started, she says, 3-4 years ago at the national level. Let’s see, that would coincide with the launch of Race to Top. This is a bipartisan disaster.

Categories Budget Cuts, North Carolina, Teachers and Teaching

NY Times: The Destruction of North Carolina’s Progressive Legacy

By dianeravitch
July 10, 2013 //
17

The New York Times wrote a searing critique of the slash-and-burn policies of North Carolina’s governor and legislature. What was once one of the south’s most forward-looking states is rapidly being decimated into a hard, mean backwater.

As we have learned over recent months, the legislature has imposed deep budget cuts on public schools, is taking away salary raises from teachers who get advanced degrees, has abolished tenure, and is doing whatever it can to advance privatization and demolish teacher professionalism. Of course, while cutting the budget the legislators found $5 million for TFA, and they are hoping to expand charters.

Oh, and wouldn’t you know that a graduate of TFA, Eric Guckian, is advising the governor on his harsh education policy. Remember, these are the people who bring excellence everywhere.

But that’s not all. Since the far right took control of the state, writes the Times,

“… state government has become a demolition derby, tearing down years of progress in public education, tax policy, racial equality in the courtroom and access to the ballot.

“The cruelest decision by lawmakers went into effect last week: ending federal unemployment benefits for 70,000 residents. Another 100,000 will lose their checks in a few months. Those still receiving benefits will find that they have been cut by a third, to a maximum of $350 weekly from $535, and the length of time they can receive benefits has been slashed from 26 weeks to as few as 12 weeks.

“The state has the fifth-highest unemployment rate in the country, and many Republicans insulted workers by blaming their joblessness on generous benefits. In fact, though, North Carolina is the only state that has lost long-term federal benefits, because it did not want to pay back $2.5 billion it owed to Washington for the program. The State Chamber of Commerce argued that cutting weekly benefits would be better than forcing businesses to pay more in taxes to pay off the debt, and lawmakers blindly went along, dropping out of the federal program.”

NC CAN, part of a national organization devoted to privatization and high-stakes testing, has declared this to be the “year of the teacher.” Apparently NC CAN has a sense of humor since the legislature works overtime to beat up on teachers and remove any benefits it can think of. Let’s see if NC CAN campaigns to raise teachers’ salaries or to protect academic freedom.

Categories Budget Cuts, North Carolina, Privatization

A Correction: NC Rep. Pittman Explains Why Certification is Not Necessary

By dianeravitch
June 27, 2013 //
8

Yesterday I posted a story from North Carolina about tweaks to the charter bill SB 337.

This is a correction sent to me by the reporter.

Originally the bill said that those who teach in charter schools did not need any certification.

At present, 75 percent of charter teachers in grades K-5 must be certified teachers, but the revised bill will drop that proportion to 50 percent, not zero.

One of those who was critical of certification requirements was Rep. Larry Pittman. He said he was misquoted in the original post, so the reporter dutifully printed his remarks in full.

Rep. Larry Pittman and his wife were disappointed in the public schools, so they home-schooled their children, who are doing well in college, which apparently goes to prove that no training or preparation or certification is necessary for teachers. Anyone can teach, right?

The link reminds me of the adage attributed to Abraham Lincoln: “Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and to remove all doubt.”

 

Categories North Carolina

NC Teaching Fellows Program Killed, TFA Thrives

By dianeravitch
June 26, 2013 //
19

A reader in North Carolina writes about the legislature’s decision to kill the NC Teaching Fellows program while spending millions more to hire TFA recruits with five weeks of training:

“My daughter is in the last cohort of the NC Teaching Fellows. I am really scared for her and her associates. I told her to teach her required 4 years in NC then leave the state. I am seriously considering doing the same. It is a sad state of affairs when ill-trained college graduates are recruited to teach in public schools.”

Categories North Carolina, Teach for America TFA

North Carolina Cuts Public Schools, Invests Millions in TFA

By dianeravitch
June 26, 2013 //
12

North Carolina has been cutting the budget of public schools, but there is always plenty for Teach for America in states with a rightwing legislature and governor. The state is increasing class sizes and eliminating the NC Teaching Fellows program, among many other cuts.

A reader sends this comment:

“In North Carolina, the state has invested four million dollars in TFA despite getting rid of teacher assistants, cutting supplements for teachers for advanced degrees, eliminating class caps, and other misguided policies that will spell disaster for public schools. From Senate Bill 402

“Teach For America
$5,100,000

Current state support is $900,000. State support to increase by $5,100,000 to establish a TFA program in the Triad region, grow in the southeastern region, targeted subject specific recruitment and the assumption of management responsibilities for the NC Teacher Corps beginning 2014-15.”

Click to access summary-sb-402-2013.pdf

Categories Budget Cuts, North Carolina, Teach for America TFA
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »