North Carolina offers a harrowing preview of what American classrooms might look like under President Trump
By Jeff Bryant / AlterNet December 2, 2016If the American Dream is still alive – the one that includes a good job and a house with a yard, kids, and a two-car garage – you can see it taking shape in Wake County in the heart of the state of North Carolina. Signs of surging prosperity are everywhere this morning as I make my way to West Lake Middle School in Apex, NC, on the outskirts of Raleigh.
What were once sleepy two-lane country roads are now teaming with impatient commuters, school busses, and mini-vans. New housing developments, shopping centers, and office buildings are transforming the rolling Piedmont landscape.
Wake County is home to five of the fastest growing cities in the Tar Heel State, which is the state with the nation's fastest growth in economic output in 2015 at 13.4 percent.
At West Lake Middle this morning, cars and busses in the drop-off lane back up out to the main road, where commuter traffic pushes impatiently to get by. I angle my car to a visitor spot because I'm not here to drop off a child. I'm here for a protest rally.
The protest is happening because the rising tide of North Carolina's economic resurgence has yet to raise all boats. Outside the school's entrance, a gathering of students, parents, and teachers, many carrying signs declaring they are "All In for Public Schools," listen to a speaker from the state teachers' association call for better funding for local schools.
Another speaker, National Education Association President Lily Eskelsen Garcia exhorts the crowd to "stand up for the needs of our students, our educators, communities, and public schools.”
In a conversation with me after the event, she explains, “When you come to a school and see how hard the teachers and staff work to address the challenges they face – the increasing class sizes, the students struggling with poverty, the lack of textbooks and basic supplies – you have to wonder why our political leaders are not working as hard to make sure schools and teachers have what they need.”
North Carolina is one of the many states providing public schools less funding per student than in 2008, according to the most recent analysis conducted by the Center on Policy and Budget Priorities. Schools remain below 2008 funding levels despite having to educate nearly 76,000 more students, according to a recent analysis by left-leaning advocacy group NC Policy Watch. The author of that analysis, Lindsay Wagner, finds that many schools have responded to budget hits by cutting textbooks, school supplies, and instruction in non-core subjects such as art and music.
A nationwide study on "school funding fairness" conducted by the Education Law Center finds North Carolina is one of the least fair states in the nation, earning a grade of "F" for its education spending in relation to the state’s economic productivity.
While the schools struggle with under-funding, they also face increased competition for funds. As Wagner reports, Republicans, who took control of the state legislature in 2010 and the governorship in 2012, are intent on expanding education options in the state by providing some parents with school vouchers to transfer their children to private schools and by increasing the number of charter schools in the state.
Charter schools – publically funded but privately operated schools generally free of most state regulations – are a favorite cause of Republican state lawmakers, and some Democrats. Former State Assembly House Majority Leader Paul Stam, who represented Apex until 2016, has said his "'dream' is that every public school will someday be a charter school," according to Bob Geary of The Indy, an independent news outlet that covers the central region of the state.
What's unclear is how a state hell-bent on financial austerity can afford to create what is essentially a new parallel school system of taxpayer supported charter schools.
Charter schools take a sizeable cut from the funding pie for education in the Tar Heel state. According to the NC Law Project, local spending on charters exceeds traditional public schools by $215 per student. The study calculates, "If local funds were truly shared equally, charter schools would have sent $3 million to local school districts in FY 14-15."
In my travels around North Carolina – to the state's three largest school districts – I ask school board members, legal and education experts, and charter advocates to explain how a state that doesn't seem to adequately fund its existing public school system can afford to add a competitive new one.
Complicating the matter is the presence of a rising new sector of for-profit charter schools, many coming to North Carolina from out of state. Few North Carolinians I talk to can explain how these schools make a profit. And if the schools do, it begs the question of whether it is ethical or legal for private interests to profit from education while many schools in the existing system can't afford adequate learning materials and instructional staff.
Read more
http://www.alternet.org/education/north-carolinas-charter-school-industry-slowly-gutting-public-education
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