Editorial: Purposeful efforts to diminish N.C. public education must stop

CBC Editorial: Wednesday, April 10, 2024; #8922

The following is the opinion of Capitol Broadcasting Company

It takes a determined effort to drop from 19th in average teacher pay nationally to 47th in about a decade and then settling in at the bottom half in the nation and a basement hugging 46th in average starting teacher pay.

Similarly, it takes some hard work to descend from 34th in per-student spending to near the basement. In the last year public school spending dropped $500 per-student accounting for inflation (from 2021-22 year to 2022-23).

That hard work has paid off – but not to the benefit of students, their parents, their teachers, or the schools.

Headlines, all within the last week, tell the story but shouldn’t be a surprise to legislative leaders.

• N.C. teacher turnover hits highest mark in decades
• Few N.C. students with learning disabilities are passing
• N.C.’s teachers leaving in droves
• Asheville City Schools have highest rate of teachers quitting in N.C.
• State, local districts report higher teacher turnover rates
• State data show teacher turnover, vacancies continue to rise
• N.C. teachers are leaving the profession

With lagging teacher pay and the legislature’s efforts to discourage teaching as a profession – illustrated by the abolition in 2010 and then half-hearted renewal in 2017 of the successful and effective Teaching Fellows Program – enrollment in education degrees has taken a nose-dive dropping by 44% between 2010 and 2022.

Teachers are fleeing, fewer students are studying to enter the profession, substitutes are leading more classrooms and the shortage of supervisors has increased the number of students per classroom.

On top of that, failure to provide financing to expand the number of classrooms and modernize facilities, has teachers and students under resourced.

Neglect of North Carolina public schools over the last decade has been purposeful. Frustrated teachers and school administrators know it. Reluctantly, but left with little support and faced with unnecessary and burdensome bureaucracy like the oxymoronically-named “Parents’ Bill of Rights,” they’re left with little choice but to leave the profession.

As the 20th century ended and the 21st century began North Carolina finally seemed to be making a dedicated effort – reinforced by the critical N.C. Supreme Court Leandro decisions – to fulfill the state constitutional right that EVERY child has access to a quality education.

But the unrelenting efforts of legislative leaders like Sen. Phil Berger and Tim Moore to block a consensus program to improve instruction, upgrade classroom resources, support for students physical and mental health have demonstrably taken their toll.

Berger, Moore and their followers in the General Assembly own the diminishment of North Carolina public schools.

In the coming months, voters should demand candidates for the state legislature acknowledge the dire situation, promise to adopt the Comprehensive Remedial Plan in the Leandro rulings that provides a clear program to provide quality public education and vote out those have ignored the needs of our public schools for over 10 years.

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