What is the 'Leandro Plan?'

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What is the Leandro Plan?

The Leandro plan is the plan the plaintiffs and defendants – the school boards and the state -- agreed to and submitted to state Superior Court in March 2021, with the intent fix what the court said was broken with the state’s education system. It’s known in court as the “comprehensive remedial plan.”

It’s meant to provide North Carolina’s 1.5 million public school students with a “sound basic education” – a term coined by the North Carolina Supreme Court to describe the type of education promised in the state’s Constitution.

The parties developed the plan primarily using extensive analysis and recommendations from education consultant WestEd, a California-based group that worked with the Learning Policy Institute and the North Carolina State University Friday Institute. They also consulted a report from Gov. Roy Cooper’s Committee on a Sound Basic Education.

The parties added recommendations of their own, as well, such as workforce and college readiness goals.

In January 2020, Superior Court Judge W. David Lee ordered a comprehensive remedial plan that, based on what the parties had stated in court, included seven focus areas: teacher development and recruitment, principal development and recruitment, an improved finance system, an improved assessment and accountability system, better assistance and turnaround for low-performing schools, expanded pre-kindergarten and early childhood education, and alignment of high school to post-secondary career and education expectations.

Some of those are expansions on the original ideas of what constituted a “sound basic education” in earlier court orders, issued by other judges. The North Carolina Supreme Court in 2004 rejected including pre-kindergarten expansion among the state’s responsibilities, noting it wasn’t needed at the time while General Assembly leaders appeared to be moving toward expansion.

What does the North Carolina Constitution say?

Section 15 of the state Constitution states “The people have a right to the privilege of education, and it is the duty of the State to guard and maintain that right.”

Article IX, Sections 1-7, are dedicated to K-12 education.

Section 2 states, “The General Assembly shall provide by taxation and otherwise for a general and uniform system of free public schools, which shall be maintained at least nine months in every year, and wherein equal opportunities shall be provided for all students.”

State laws have expanded on the guarantees of the state’s public K-12 education system.

What is a “sound basic education?”

Although the North Carolina Supreme Court has determined the state is not providing a “sound basic education,” courts have been somewhat vague on what would constitute a “sound basic education.”

The different courts have provided two different ideas of what a “sound basic education” would look like.

• North Carolina Supreme Court (1997): The court said a “sound basic education” is one that provides all students with “sufficient” levels of: literacy and speech skills, knowledge of math and physical science, skills for post-high school education and career training, skills that allow students to compete on an equal basis in post-high school education or work. The court hesitated to define it with too much specificity and stated its definition was the minimum of what a “sound basic education” is. The court wrote the General Assembly is responsible for expanding on that idea.
• State Superior Court (2002): Superior Court Judge Howard Manning said a “sound basic education” has three components: a high-quality teacher in every classroom, a well-prepared and competent principal in every school and adequate resources.

Manning also provided a benchmark of 90% of students scoring proficiently on their standardized tests as evidence the requirement was being meant.

The North Carolina State Board of Education, in federally required academic planning documents, has set its own goals of two-thirds to three-quarters of students testing proficiently, depending on the test, by 2027. Those goals were set as a part of the federal Every Student Succeeds Act and not necessarily in the context of the Leandro lawsuit.

What’s in the "Leandro Plan?"

Top annual expenditures in each category and major policy changes:

A Well Prepared, High Quality, and Supported Teacher in Every Classroom:

1. $61.7 million for the NC New Teacher Support Program. The program is for beginning teachers in low-performing, high-poverty schools.
2. $41.1 million for supporting 1,500 North Carolina Teaching Fellows
3. $30 million for high quality teacher preparation residency programs in high need rural and urban districts

A Well Prepared, High Quality, and Supported Principal in Every School:

1. $14.7 million for 300 North Carolina Principal Fellows
2. To be determined: Implementing a School Leadership Academy and a state grant program “to encourage well-qualified school leaders to work in high need schools.”
3. $0. Most items are policy changes and don’t require financial investments.

Finance System that Provides Adequate, Equitable, and Efficient Resources:

1. $1.2 billion for increasing funding for disadvantaged and “at-risk” students.
2. $743.2 million for additional student support professionals, such as school psychologists, counselors and nurses.
3. $561.8 million for additional special education funding
4. To be determined: A bond for school capital expenses and increases to teacher, principal and assistant principal salaries

An Assessment and Accountability System that Reliably Assesses Multiple Measures of Student Performance:

1. $0: All changes would be to policies

An Assistance and Turnaround Function that Provides Necessary Support to Low-Performing Schools and Districts:

1. $65.5 million for high-poverty schools to use evidence-based approaches that address students learning barriers stemming from out-of-school issues
2. $19 million for a regional support model that works directly with low-performing and high-poverty schools
3. $3.9 million for covering the rest of the cost of lunch for students receiving only a reduced-price lunch.
4. To be determined: Adopting core curriculum resources at the state level and further expansion of free school meals

A System of Early Education that Provides Access to High-Quality Prekindergarten and Other Early Childhood Learning Opportunities:

1. $532 million more for Smart Start
2. $421 million to expand NC Pre-K
3. $216.7 million to provide Birth-to-3 services for 10,000 children
4. To be determined: Improving and increasing childcare subsidies, professional development for educators working on transition plans from pre-kindergarten to kindergarten, establishing an early childhood advisory team

Alignment of High School to Postsecondary and Career Expectations for All Students:

1. $106.6 million for career development coordinators working with 6th grade through 12th grade students
2. $20 million to help more low-wealth school districts participate in North Carolina Virtual Public School
3. $18 million to expand opportunities for students to receive credentials through their career and technical education
4. To be determined: Funding to add three more Cooperative and Innovative High Schools every year, funding to help more economically disadvantaged students participate in dual enrollment courses with colleges

How did they come up with the "Leandro Plan?"

The WestEd researchers visited schools across the state, conducted focus groups, surveyed hundreds of principals and hundreds more teachers, analyzed numerous datasets, reviewed research and reviewed North Carolina laws and policies.

The report, released in 2019, focuses on two action ideas. The first: Fix funding inequities occurring now through temporary adjustments. The second: Then implement permanent solutions intended to maintain progress, set benchmarks for success, and turn around schools falling short of those benchmarks.

Currently, the state does not have benchmarks for success in complying with Leandro or in ensuring schools are providing the education they should be. The state does have goals for student progress outlined in federal reporting.

The report has a heavy emphasis on closing achievement and opportunity gaps between different student groups.

The Leandro lawsuit doesn’t center around equity among students, although Manning found the state was not providing a “sound basic education” in part because students “at risk” of failure were scoring so poorly on exams.

The report offers multiple scenarios for the state to either meet its 2027 goals for statewide exam passage under its federal Every Students Succeeds Act plan or more strict requirements outlined in a Superior Court Judge Howard Manning order. It offers both short-term plans and ongoing plans for reaching those goals and maintaining attainment of them.

Researchers built models that estimated the costs of getting enough North Carolina students to meet either Manning’s goal of 90% testing proficiently on exams or the state’s goal of two-thirds to three-quarters of students testing proficiently on exams.

The details are not necessarily clear on how the researchers built models that estimated funding recommendations. They did note that for some, previous researchers had determined actual costs of providing those services.

The plan proposed and approved in court does not select any scenario in its entirety.

The parties’ plan submitted to court includes efforts to improve career and college readiness, which are not explored in the WestEd report.