Now I think I’ve heard it all. Orange County Schools Superintendent Shirley Carraway engages in intellectual contortions to try and defend the system’s request — yet again — for more money. She has told anyone who would listen that if the system doesn’t get its funding request — what she calls “full funding,” there will be cuts. However, in today’s News & Observer Q&A, she plays a ridiculous game in which she redefines the word “cut.” Here it is, and the emphasis is mine:
We have not threatened to cut existing personnel or programs in the past, and we haven’t had to make such cuts. However, with increasing demands and ever-higher targets to meet, school districts never just tread water. We’re either moving forward, or we’re falling behind. Not adding personnel or programs that are necessary to move forward amounts essentially to the same thing as making cuts.
Too bad Ms. Carraway doesn’t have the same concern for those in her community who are forced to pay for more and more each year for an education system that is never satisified, no matter how much money it receives. “Full” funding of Carraway’s budget request would require a 7.6 cent tax hike.
