N&R’s Doug Clark —in response to JLF’s Terry Stoops’ column disputing the notion that North Carolina teachers are dissatisfied — asks if anyone has seen an angry mob of teachers around here? Then what does Clark do? He turns around and eggs on the angry mob.
Fair enough, nobody in their right mind would describe the Guilford County Board of Education as an angry mob — to the contrary, many of wish the board would show a little emotion from time to time. Indeed— as the Rhino reports — discussion and debate before the informal vote to disregard state law on teacher tenure was ‘driven by emotion’:
Practical details weren’t really involved in the school board’s vote to violate the tenure law, which was driven by emotion.
School board member Jeff Belton apologized profusely to the handful of teachers who were present for the “dehumanizing” prospect of losing tenure and having to work under the protection of a contract.
“I don’t know whether to be mad or sad,” Belton said. “It’s heartbreaking.”
School board member Darlene Garrett called the new tenure law is reckless and wrong and compared violating it to the actions of the four North Carolina A&T State University students whose 1960 sit-in at the South Elm Street Woolworth lunch counter helped desegregate public accommodations in the United States.
Comparing the defense of the only industry in the United States that grants lifetime tenure after four years to pioneers of desegregation was an overstatement, and perhaps a tad tasteless coming shortly after the Jan. 9 death of Franklin McCain, one of the four.
The Rhino also probes another aspect of the debate —you guessed it —money:
School board members asked if the school board could challenge having to pick 25 percent of teachers – the school board is horrified at the idea of even implying that some teachers are better than others – and school board attorney Jill Wilson said that would only prevent Guilford County Schools from getting $491,000 from the state for the first year’s bonuses. The school system would get $4,910,000 from the state for bonuses over four years. The bonuses compound every year.
Wilson said the school board should just consider the $491,000 a pot of money and hope the state loses the NCAE lawsuit. She said the General Assembly would be unlikely to have time to defund that amount, so Guilford County Schools would get $491,000 in free money. She said, “There is no reason to be ahead of the curve on this.”
Wilson, in essence, was telling the school board to take the bonus money under false pretenses. She said, “There are ways to use this money to benefit the system.”
The board is scheduled to formally vote on whether or not to disregard state law at Tuesday night’s meeting. Should they vote to do so, the only honest thing to do would be formally vote to disregard the money that comes with state law.
