Education (PreK-12)

During the 2005 session, state lawmakers are expected to take up the issue of how to comply with court rulings in the Leandro case. It is important to discard widespread misperceptions. First, Leandro does not require taxpayers to spend more money on public education. Second, public-school funding does not differ significantly across counties when all spending is included. Third, the small gap that remains is shrinking, not growing, and is unlikely to explain differences in student outcomes. Finally, local funds are a reasonable way to compensate for elevated labor costs in counties with high housing prices.

A recent report published by the NC Center for Public Policy Research concludes that North Carolina is facing a crisis in teacher recruitment and retention. But neither the data on projected student enrollment growth nor teacher retention rates justify such a harsh assessment. Clearly teacher recruitment and retention is a challenge that will always have to be met. The best approach is to reward those teachers who best foster achievement and to differentiate salaries among teachers according to supply and demand conditions in different disciplines.

From statehouses to corporate boardrooms to community centers, Americans are nearly universally aligned in support of transforming public education. Dismayed by overcrowding, low test scores, and high dropout rates, many people advocate overhauling the educational system in our country. Yet, however unified Americans may be on the need for educational reform, their perspectives diverge greatly on how to achieve it. Recent proposals have ranged from increasing federal funding, to requiring more stringent teacher accreditation, to lengthening school days and terms. Despite more than a decade of discussion, legislative proposals, and counterproposals, many problems remain. Yet, as public debate rages on, a group of concerned parents and educators, advocating freedom and change, is already quietly revolutionizing public education. The persistence of these reformers has resulted in a compelling alternative to traditional public schools — charter schools.

Most Americans agree that public education is in trouble. While legislators and educators have tried to fix failing schools by increasing funding, expanding regulations, or intensifying requirements for teachers, these changes have only served to patch a broken system. Public education in America needs radical reinvention, and charter schools provide an effective and powerful way to transform the educational system.

As the 2004-05 budget process continues, policymakers should use regional and historical benchmarks to identify where to look for savings. Among major budget items, North Carolina spending on K-12 education and law enforcement is at the regional average but its Medicaid and higher-education expenses are higher than in comparable states. Reasonable restraint would save enough money to repeal last year’s tax hikes and catch up on deferred repairs and renovations.

A 2003 report from JLF and the NC Education Alliance looked at the availability and use of parental choice in the state. In 69 of 117 districts, parents had no public-school choice options. Eighty-seven percent of students in grades 3 to 8 attended public schools, with about 15 percent of all 3-8 students were enrolled in a public school of choice (including charters). About 6 percent of 3rd to 8th grade students were home schooled, and another 7 percent attended a private school outside the home.

It‘s been a decade since a contentious merger of three Guilford school districts, and now merger disputes are underway in Orange and Cleveland counties. Unfortunately for merger advocates, the evidence is thin that creating larger school districts improves efficiency or learning. Indeed, some studies suggest that district mergers result in more non-instructional spending and actually hurt student achievement, particularly for those in lower-income communities.

Defining and protecting intellectual property, generally referred to as patents and copyrights, and trademarks have been legal and political endeavors for at least the last several hundred years. In the United States, protections of intellectual property are enshrined in the Constitution. This paper discusses the concept of intellectual property from an economic perspective.

The North Carolina Justice and Community Development Center released a report in May that purported to demonstrate that 60 percent of North Carolina families with children were not receiving enough income to meet a “living-income” standard. This startling statistic was the result of gross exaggerations of cost and undercounts of income, including no accounting for child support payments. Moreover, the Center’s proposed solutions would increase poverty.

This fifth annual report on schools from the North Carolina Education Alliance shows that many school districts in the state made progress in 2001-02. It also shows that many of the failing school systems from 2000-01 were still performing in the failing range again last year. Official results of statewide testing are reported annually in the Department of Public Instruction’s ABCs of Public Education. End-of-grade tests for elementary students and end-of-course tests for high school students are the only exams administered statewide each year. As such, information about public schools is focused on the results of these exams. Grading Our Schools offers a different lens for studying test results and other performance data. As an additional information tool, we hope it will allow parents and taxpayers to better evaluate student performance in North Carolina’s public schools.