Insufficient child care is costing North Carolina about $5.65 billion each year, from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation estimates.

The report, released in partnership with the and , looked at the ways a lack of child care access hurts the state’s economy. Employers lose $4.29 billion a year because of job disruptions and turnover related to child care, and the state loses another $1.36 billion in tax revenue, the report found.

“When we couple the immediate needs of employers with the long-term workforce projections in the state, we simply cannot afford to leave people on the sidelines — and that is where access to affordable, quality child care is so critical,” Meredith Archie, president of the NC Chamber Foundation, said at a news conference Wednesday.

Twenty-five percent of parents recently experienced a job disruption due to child care issues, based on a representative survey of 517 parents with children under 6 years old. Thirty-five percent of those parents reported leaving the workforce.

Fifteen percent of surveyed parents said they expected to leave their jobs in the following year, with 37% of those parents citing insufficient child care as the reason.

“It’s a top issue for our workforce,” said Gary Salamido, president and CEO of the NC Chamber, at the event Wednesday. “It’s a top issue for people. At the end of the day, we can get everything else right and be competitive, and we are, and we’re winning. Now it’s about workforce. Now it’s about people.”

North Carolina the top state for business for two years in a row by CNBC. Yet the labor market is “historically tight,” Archie said.

“We have more job openings than people available to take those jobs, and as we look ahead, we know we have an aging population here in the state, and so labor constraints are only going to get tighter,” she said.

Danielle Stilwell, HR development and recruitment manager at Columbia Forest Products, said she did not find the numbers surprising based on her experience with her company’s employees, in terms of both participation and productivity.

“We have found when our employees’ needs are not met, they are not truly engaged in the workforce,” Stilwell said.

The report is part of a series from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation called ” which studies the economic impacts of insufficient child care at the state level.

“The child care challenge that we have right now is akin to quicksand,” said Aaron Merchen, senior director of policy and programs in early childhood education for the U.S. Chamber Foundation. “If you notice you’re in quicksand right away, you can take a low-level intervention and get out of that situation. The longer you wait, the more serious the situation becomes, the harder it gets to get out of that quicksand.”

“So how can we use this report to look at the situation that we’re in, and how can we use this report for employers, policymakers, providers, and working parents to work together to find a solution that works for North Carolina?” Merchen said.

The report’s release comes less than three weeks before the expiration of federal funds propping up the state’s child care industry. Early childhood advocates are pushing for the state to step in to extend that funding during this legislative session.

Without intervention, predicts the state will lose an estimated 20% of its child care programs within a year, and about a third of its programs at some point after the funds end. Most programs have reported expecting to raise prices for parents to sustain their businesses and retain their teachers.

Cost was the top factor parents in the survey considered when choosing child care arrangements, and the report found high-income parents were more likely to be able to choose based on other factors such as quality and reputation.

“For an infant in center-based care in North Carolina, the cost is nearly as high as the average cost of a mortgage, and when you look at families with two or more children, it often far exceeds that cost,” said Erica Palmer Smith, executive director of NC Child. “And so what we see is an incredible need to address this issue as a state so that parents are able to work and provide for their families.”

The report does not include policy recommendations, but Salamido said the state chamber and its foundation have plans to “reimagine child care” in its delivery, in how parents access it, and in how it’s paid for. He brought up both public and private entities playing a role in taking on the cost of child care.

“It’s a long-term priority for us,” Salamido said. “This is not something that’s going to change overnight. This is not a click, and all of a sudden we solve the problem. It’s multidimensional.”

Workforce participation for parents is only one side of the child care coin, Palmer Smith said. It’s also about children’s learning and long-term well-being.

“Children who have access to early learning opportunities in those first five years of life, we know that they are more likely to read at grade level in school,” she said. “We know that they are more likely to develop strong coping skills, to be able to be resilient to all of the things that life is going to grow at them. We know that they’re more likely to graduate from high school, and even as we look into adulthood, we know that they’re more likely to be employed, to earn a higher wage, and even to be healthier.”

This first appeared on and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

As North Carolina celebrates the for K-3 teachers and literacy gains for young students, nearly half of of early-grade students are still below grade-level benchmarks.

Part of the solution, told the State Board of Education last week, is high-dosage tutoring, an evidence-based intervention for learning loss. Ed Corps was launched in 2020 at the start of the pandemic and during remote learning and is aligned with state-level standards for literacy.

“You’ve heard the phrase that it takes a village — we are working to equip the village beyond educators, specifically as high-impact tutors,” NC Ed Corps Executive Director John-Paul Smith told the Board. “For students who are starting behind coming into school, what they need is not only strong core instruction, but they also need some additional intervention, supplemental support. So that’s what the high-impact tutors are helping to provide.”

Since 2021-22, Ed Corps has placed and supported nearly 1,300 corps members who have tutored more than 22,000 K-5 graders across 32 counties. This was supported through a mix of Covid-relief and private funds.

Ed Corps is important, Smith said, because it is difficult for districts to implement high-dosage tutoring at scale alone. Finding high-impact tutors, training coaching paraprofessionals, tracking sessions, and identifying funds to pay for the tutoring all present a challenge.

“With your support, NC Education Corps is addressing these challenges, in alignment with high-impact tutoring best practices and the MTSS framework,” Smith’s presentation to the Board said.

Ed Corps started as an initiative of the Board, along with the Office of the Governor, in September 2020. Today, it operates as a 501(c)(3).

Here’s a look at some of the main components of Ed Corps’ model.

• Frequency: Tutors meet with students for at least three sessions each week, 30 minutes per session.
• Measurement: Schools use data to tailor instruction and ensure consistency.
• Small groups: Tutors work with 1-4 students to provide structured, targeted instruction and relationship-based support.
• Curriculum: Tutors use curriculum to reinforce foundational skills.
• Trained personnel: Tutors gain knowledge and skills needed to improve student outcomes, and receive professional development and coaching support.

Dr. Paula Wilkins, chief academic officer at , spoke about the impact of the program in the district. During the 2023-24 school year, 432 students from 10 schools were served by 23 tutors in literacy skills.

“This is only one piece in a bigger, larger puzzle for our district, but we need more,” Wilkins said. “We need more help, and we need more funding to help… This work takes funding and support and intention.”

In addition to the , Smith said the expansion of private school vouchers and the upcoming election also increase financial uncertainty for districts.

In light of the reality that many districts will have less money to fund high-dosage tutoring, Smith said Ed Corps will be working to secure more funding from the state.

According to Smith’s presentation, the program costs roughly $1,200 per student to implement. Schools pay about $650 per student, primarily to pay for the tutoring wages. Ed Corps pays about $550 per student, which covers recruitment, training, coaching, and evaluation.

“We need your help in communicating that high-impact tutoring is not just ‘a nice to have.’ It’s really ‘a need to have’ if we truly do want all students to have the support that they need, starting early on, to succeed,” Smith said. “We need to continue to communicate that it’s going to take a while to see gains. Students are starting pretty far behind, and the gains that they’re making take a little while to show up on the academic assessment — we need to be patient.”

More on high-dosage tutoring model

According to Ed Corps’ website, high-impact tutoring “has been proven to provide significant learning gains for students in need.”

Ed Corps tutors work in Title I and/or low-performing schools, with students scoring below grade-level in reading and/or math. Based on served by tutors in 2022-23, 70.3% of students were identified as socioeconomically disadvantaged,
38.9% Black, 30.6% white, 20.8% Hispanic, 7.7% mixed race, and 0.3% American Indian.

“Tutors are working with high-need students in high-need schools to help them establish foundational literacy and math skills that are so critical to student success in school and future careers,” .

Literacy tutors are recruited, trained, and coached by Ed Corps. The tutors then work as part-time employees at partnering school districts, who pay for tutor time. Most tutors work 15 hours per week, but tutors can work up to 30 hours a week.

Tutors work with students during the school day — either joining them in the classroom or pulling them out of class for a session, depending on the school’s preference.

The vast majority of tutors are retired educators, Smith said, along with parents, community college students, and other retirees.

“High-dosage tutors are not simply providing homework help or reading aloud to students on an irregular basis,” the . “They provide personalized instructional support to students as extensions of school instructional teams in alignment with multi-tiered systems of student support and as a supplement to core instruction.”

During the 2023-24 school year, Ed Corps launched K-5 math tutoring in Ashe, Chatham, Orange, and New Hanover counties.

Moving forward, Smith said they want to expand high-dosage tutoring to more schools, including math tutoring, based on school demand and funding availability.

Next school year, Ed Corps will partner with , a national organization that supports various tutoring models that improve student outcomes. Accelerate is also “supporting promising tutoring initiatives in Arkansas, Colorado, Delaware, Louisiana, and Ohio,” according

They are also working to strengthen data collection and accountability measures, Smith said, “to assess more precisely tutor impact on skills tutored.”

N.C. State University’s Friday Institute and the Duke Social Science Research Institute started conducting a three-year mixed-methods evaluation of Ed Corps in spring 2021. You can read more about that evaluation on page 11 of the organization’s

Finally, the team is also working to deepen and diversify its funding. Ed Corps is asking North Carolina lawmakers to convert non-recurring state funding to recurring funds in order to secure the continuation of tutoring sessions into the 2025-26 school year.

“We appreciate the state’s support for our partnership with NC Education Corps and need it to fund in-person high-impact tutoring on a recurring basis to close opportunity gaps and set up all students for success in school and life,” New Hanover County Schools Superintendent Dr. Charles Foust said, as quoted in Ed Corps’ presentation.

To learn more about partnering or tutoring with NC Education Corps, you can visit

This first appeared on and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

Federal child care relief funding runs out in less than seven weeks. Hundreds of providers, parents, and advocates showed up at the North Carolina legislature Thursday to call for emergency funding to replace it.

Without intervention, about 20% of the state’s child care facilities are at risk of closing within a year afterward, of providers in February found.

Advocates are asking for a one-time $300 million allocation to extend grants that providers have been receiving through federal funding since 2021 and that end on June 30. , a coalition of organizations, child care program owners and administrators, and educators across the state, hosted the event.

“That’s just enough to keep our doors open at the end of June, until we can figure out a better plan,” said Emma Biggs, director of Pathway Preschool Center in Charlotte and a member of the National Domestic Workers Alliance (NDWA).

The funding is running out across the country, and facilities are struggling to survive the post-pandemic realities of providing child care. Some states have stepped in to create public funding streams or extend stabilization funding. In states that have not, care has become .

In North Carolina, almost 30% of providers responding to the same survey in February said they expect to close at some point after that funding ends, which the survey estimates will affect more than 90,000 children. Almost 90% of respondents said they expect to increase tuition.

“We want spaces for children,” Courtney Alexander, a child care fellow with NDWA and a provider in Charlotte, told the crowd on Thursday. “We want spaces for families. We want a fair living wage. Behind every statistic about program closures and cutbacks are real stories of care workers forced to choose between a career they love and their financial stability.”

‘A mass exodus’

Laterria Lassiter, a former owner of a home-based child care program in Charlotte, is one of those workers who felt she had to leave the industry.

“I don’t want anyone to have to go through what I had to go through when I closed,” Lassiter said.

She said she shut her doors because she could not make the finances work. During the first year of operating her program, she said, she expected to lose some money. “I saw it as a start-up,” she said. “Any business, you’re going to have a loss and a small profit for the first year, but it continued like that. It never changed.”

Most child care providers are operating on less than a 1% profit margin, according to economists at the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. They are stuck between reducing costs and raising fees with the knowledge that teachers won’t stay for less and families can’t afford more.

“I could see that the parents were struggling themselves, and I just didn’t know how to make that balance, with making them pay, when everybody was going through a crisis,” Lassiter said.

Most programs used the federal stabilization grants to increase teacher compensation so they could keep their staff. The median child care teacher wage was $13.99 an hour in May 2023, . As the grants run out, providers are left with a gap in their budgets.

“If we go back on pay, we know we’re gonna have a mass exodus of educators,” Biggs said.

‘If we don’t have child care, then we can’t work’

Many of the signs and speeches at the rally referenced the economic impacts of child care.

“We the people are asking for a sustainable infrastructure, the backbone of the economy,” said Marilyn Bernabe, director of strategic initiatives at Rockingham County Partnership for Children. “The infrastructure in place is not working. The government should step up and do everything they can to save this industry because it is a cornerstone in this country’s economy.”

Luke Stockhausen, a parent who came to the rally from Durham, said he and his wife started looking for a child care slot during the first trimester of his wife’s pregnancy.

“It didn’t make sense for my wife and I to not work, and it was a struggle,” Stockhausen said. “If we don’t have good child care, you’re gonna lose a percentage of the workforce.”

He showed up to support the teachers of the program his son attends, Branches Community School in Durham, he said.

“We’re here to support the teachers,” he said. “We’re here to support making sure that good child care is accessible to everyone. We think that it should be a priority for society overall to take care for our young ones.”

Mary Ryan, another parent from Durham, described a similar experience finding child care, adding her son to multiple waitlists and feeling lucky to access care as her maternity leave ended.

“If we don’t have child care, then we can’t work,” Ryan said.

She took off work to attend the rally with the staff of Kate’s Korner, where her son is now enrolled.

“It’s only one day,” Ryan said. “What’s going to happen if there isn’t consistent child care? What will that mean for my ability to keep my job? My husband’s ability to keep his job? It’s important for me to be here.”

‘I don’t feel seen’

Advocates asked for the same amount, $300 million, during last year’s legislative session, .

Instead, legislators allocated recurring funds ($32 million in the first year of the biennium and $43 million in the second) to raise the rates child care programs receive to participate in the subsidy program.

Legislators also gave $900,000 for each year of a two-year pilot in 14 counties called Tri-Share, a program that splits the cost of child care between participating employers, eligible employees, and the state.

At the rally Thursday, advocates asked for immediate action.

“Don’t waste a dozen years like you did with Medicaid expansion,” said Steve Luking, a physician from Rockingham County who is also running for the state Senate seat in District 26, currently occupied by Senate leader Phil Berger. “Our families cannot wait that long. Our child care workers need improved wages. Our families need more affordable services. And our owners and operators need the financial support of the state to survive this crisis. It’s all a matter of priorities.”

Lassiter, the provider from Charlotte who had to close her program, has moved on to an advocacy role at MDC, a nonprofit research firm in Durham. She is coordinating advocacy among providers from across the state.

She feels lucky, she said, to have found another way to support her seven children. But she still wishes she could be providing care.

“It was never my desire to close,” she said. “I still get emotional about it.”

She said she showed up Thursday with a hope that others can stay in the field. She remembers when a licensing consultant told her all of the information about her facility will be taken down from the state’s database, she said.

“When I look, there’s no record of me ever being there,” she said. “I don’t feel seen.”

This first appeared on and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

During the 2023-24 school year, 169 of the state’s 210 charter schools reported having a waitlist, according .

Together, the waitlist totals more than 85,000 students. However, that number could include duplicate students on multiple waitlists, Ashley Baquero, DPI’s director of the Office of Charter Schools, told the State Board of Education during its May meeting.

“We report on the current status in the past academic year of charter schools every year at this time,” Baquero told the Board during on DPI’s annual charter school report. “For the 2022-23 school year, 10% of enrollment was in North Carolina charter schools, serving over 145,000 students.”

DPI collects waitlist data from charter schools across the state every year, she said.

This year’s waitlist increased by more than 8,000 students from the year before — up from 77,000 students.

Nearly one in five charter schools (37) had a waitlist of 700 students or more. Nearly 40% (83 schools) had a waitlist of 200 students or more.

Gov. Roy Cooper announced this week as National Charter School Week in North Carolina, saying that “charter schools are public schools that increase learning opportunities for all students and provide parents and students with expanded opportunities within the public school system.”

From 2019 to 2022, charter school enrollment in North Carolina  — the fifth highest growth rate in the nation, according to DPI’s 2022 report to the General Assembly.

At the same time, North Carolina Republican lawmakers have recently expanded school choice, through both private schools and charters, which are public schools with more flexibility than traditional public schools. While charter schools demonstrate some of the choice already available in the public school system, traditional public schools  for most of the state’s students.

During her report, Baquero noted the impact of recent legislation on charter schools in North Carolina.

“Since last year’s report, the charter sector has experience significant legislative changes,” she said.

First, Baquero noted legislation that created the Charter School Review Board (CSRB) — granting the review board sole authority to approve or deny charter applications, renewals, and material changes.

Before that law was passed, charter school applications were reviewed by the Charter School Advisory Board (CSAB), which recommended to the State Board of Education which applications should be approved or denied. The CSAB no longer exists.

“This action will make the application process more efficient, more cost-effective, and much more streamlined for all stakeholders involved,” , a primary sponsor of the bill, previously said of .

Other legislation passed last year impacting charter schools includes:

• The review Board no longer considers impact statements from school districts regarding the impact of a charter school opening in the area.
• Charter schools that are not low-performing can now set their enrollment each year. Previously, this cap had to be approved by the State Board of Education if it exceeded a 30% growth rate. Low-performing charter schools can now ask the state Board to grow more than 20%.
• The 2023 budget also laid out a process for charter schools to offer remote academies, which you can view .

There are three new charters scheduled to open in fall 2024, Baquero said — down from 12 schools originally approved to open. Since then, many schools have asked for delays. There are 16 charter schools scheduled to open in 2025, she said.

This year’s charter school application period opened on Jan. 26 and closed on April 26. DPI received 14 applications during the cycle, Baquero told the Board.

Charter school attendance and performance

Historically, some critics of charter schools have said that  than traditional public schools.

North Carolina charter schools are more white than traditional public schools, the report shows — 47% versus 43%.

“You can see that over the years, we’ve seen the (local education agency’s) ethnic and racial data fairly aligned to charter schools,” Baquero told the Board last June. “The biggest difference we always see is with the Hispanic population.”

A new published by the Civil Rights Project at UCLA found that North Carolina public schools are becoming increasingly segregated by race — and at a larger rate in charter schools. In North Carolina, charter schools had the largest share of public schools where students of color make up 99% or more of the student body, according to the report.

“North Carolina’s public school enrollment is increasingly multiracial, and the expansion of school choice means that a growing share of students attend charters and private schools, both of which tend to be more segregated than traditional public schools,” the report says.

According to DPI’s presentation, charters enrolled a larger share of Asian, Black, and white students in 2023 compared to all public schools, but fewer Hispanic students.

DPI data also show that traditional public schools consistently enroll a larger share of students with disabilities, English learners, and economically disadvantaged students. Traditional public schools enroll twice the amount of English learners that charter schools do.

There has been an increase in the number of economically disadvantaged students at charters in the state, Baquero said, but there is still a gap. In 2023, 51% of all public school students were economically disadvantaged, compared to 38% of all charter schools.

Several factors play into this gap, including transportation, the National School Lunch Program, federal Medicaid direct certification, and charter reporting.

In North Carolina, state statute  that charter schools are supposed to develop a plan to ensure “that transportation is not a barrier to any student.” However, unlike traditional public schools, charters are not required to offer formal transportation and busing services for students. Charters are also not required to provide free and reduced school lunches, though the number that do has risen in North Carolina in recent years.

“The state legislature should strengthen its charter school regulation by holding charter schools accountable for diverse student enrollment practices and require that charter schools offer transportation and free or reduced-price lunch to qualifying students,” the UCLA report says.

Baquero said more than 70 charter schools have been approved to offer weighted lotteries, “give additional weight to individual students who are identified as part of a specified set of students falling under the educationally disadvantaged definition.” This could include students who are economically disadvantaged, students with disabilities, migrant students, immigrant students, English learners, and homeless or unaccompanied youth.

As charter schools increase services to provide access, Baquero said schools must make sure parents and students know about such services.

“Charters are driven by demand and choice, so school leaders and boards must understand how everything from how you market and communicate to parents to communicating admissions procedures and school services are critical for parents to understand accessibility,” she said.

DPI data also show that charter schools and traditional public schools , based on school performance grades and school growth.

Here’s a look at comparison data of low-performing (LP) and continually low-performing (CLP) schools, at the charter and district level. You can see the percentage for both markers was similar in 2023 among charters and traditional public schools (27% LP & 25% CLP in charters, compared to 29% LP & 26% in traditional public schools).

You can view DPI’s full 2023 report on charter schools .

This first appeared on and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

This Friday, May 17, marks the 70th anniversary — the landmark United States Supreme Court ruling that ordered an end to racial segregation in American public schools. And while resistance to desegregation never went away, there was a window of time – particularly in the late 20th and early 21st Century — in which many states and localities, including North Carolina and several of its counties, made enormous headway in building much more diverse and better integrated public school systems.

As a new report from researchers at NC State makes clear, however, that momentum in our state has waned and now things are trending strongly in the opposite direction.

The report is entitled . It was published earlier this month by the , and recently NC Newsline interviewed one of the authors, NC State professor of education, Jennifer Ayscue.

According to Ayscue, the gist of what she and her colleagues, Victor Cadilla, Mary Kathryn Oyaga, and Cassandra Rubinstein found is that while overall public school enrollment in North Carolina has steadily become more diverse, patterns of segregation in individual schools have greatly intensified.

And this, she says, is worrisome news since, as was noted in the release accompanying the report, “…segregated schools are systematically linked to unequal educational opportunities and outcomes, while desegregated schools are associated with numerous short-term, long-term, academic, and nonacademic outcomes for individuals and society.”

In addition to chronicling the resegregation of North Carolina schools, the report points to several potential tools and tactics for policymakers to employ in combating this trend – though almost all would buck recent trends at the state legislature and in the Department of Public Instruction. These include:

• School districts should design voluntary school desegregation policies that could include student reassignment, controlled-choice attendance and the development of more magnet schools.
• DPI should provide incentives to districts and schools via grants and technical assistance.
• State lawmakers should enact stronger charter school regulations that require the provision of transportation and free school meals, while also amending the state voucher program to include civil rights protections and greater transparency and accountability.

It should be noted that the report does not address segregation in private schools and that a) private school enrollment in North Carolina has , and b) that private schools are generally more segregated than public schools.

The following numbers are from :

41% – growth in overall North Carolina public school enrollment from 1989-90 to 2021-22 (from 1,074,120 to 1,517,300)

45% White, 25% Black, 20% Hispanic, 5% Multiracial, 4% Asian, and 1% American Indian – racial/ethnic breakdown of students in 2021-22

67% White, 30% Black, 1% Hispanic, 2% all others – racial/ethnic breakdown in 1989-90

13.5% – share of all North Carolina public schools in 2021-22 that were “intensely segregated schools of color” (schools that enroll 90-100% students of color)

3.5% – share that were intensely segregated in 1989-90

0.9% – share of North Carolina public schools in 2021-22 that were “hyper-segregated schools of color” (schools that enroll 99-100% students of color)

0.7% – share that were hyper-segregated in 1989-90

23.5% – share of charter schools in 2021-22 that were intensely segregated

6.0% – share of charter schools in 2021-22 that were hyper-segregated

1 out of 4 – share of Black student who attend intensely segregated schools

1 out of 5 – share of Hispanic students

82.6% – of the students attending intensely segregated schools of color, the share who were recipients of free or reduced-price lunch, indicating a double segregation of students by race and poverty

61.3% and 55.3%, respectively – percentage of low-income students in schools attended by typical Black and Hispanic students

38.0% and 29.4%, respectively – percentage of low-income students in schools attended by typical White and Asian students

58.9% ­– the typical White student attended a school where 58.9% of the students were White, even though White students only comprised 45% of the total state enrollment

41.2% – the typical Black student attended a school where 41.2% of the students were Black, even though Black students accounted for 25% of the state’s enrollment

28.3% – the percentage of White students at a school attended by the typical Black student

68.6% – despite accounting for less than half of the state’s enrollment in 2021-22, 68.6% of White students attended majority White schools

to explore the report.

is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. NC Newsline maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Rob Schofield for questions: info@ncnewsline.com. Follow NC Newsline on and .

More licensed child care programs in North Carolina are closing their doors as the state approaches the expiration of pandemic-era stabilization funding.

According to provided by the NC Child Care Resource and Referral Council (CCR&R) in partnership with the NC Division of Child Development and Early Education (DCDEE), the state has experienced a net loss of almost 5% of programs since February 2020.

Closures of licensed child care programs have been outpacing the opening of new programs since at least June 2023 — and now the rate of that trend appears to be increasing.

Between June and December 2023, the state had a net loss of 34 programs. But in just the first three months of 2024, the net loss was 41.

This pattern reflects what many experts — — have been anticipating since last year, when state lawmakers declined to provide additional funding that would continue stabilizing the precarious child care system beyond June 2024.

House Speaker Tim Moore, R-Cleveland, has said addressing the child care crisis is a “priority” during this year’s legislative session, but has not yet announced a plan for doing so.

Urban and suburban trends

Combining data from CCR&R, DCDEE, and the , EdNC analyzed the percentage change in the number of licensed child care programs across the state’s urban, suburban, and rural counties since February 2020.

Each of the state’s six urban counties has experienced a net loss of licensed child care programs. Durham and New Hanover had the greatest net losses of 14.3% and 13.2%, respectively. All of the urban counties combined had a net loss of 6.3%

The state’s 16 suburban counties have fared somewhat better, with a net loss of 2.8%. Nine counties had a net loss, Gaston and Union had no change, and five counties had a net gain.

Buncombe is one of those suburban counties that had a net increase in the number of licensed child care programs since February 2020.

The Buncombe County Board of Commissioners established an in 2018 to “ensure that every child in Buncombe County has an equal opportunity to thrive during their first 2,000 days.” The county is also home to the , which was convened by the in 2021, and envisions every child age 5 and under having access to high-quality, affordable early care and education.

Such local initiatives might help explain why Buncombe has gained child care programs while most other urban and suburban counties have stayed the same or lost programs without additional investment from the state.

Rural trends

The vast majority of North Carolina’s counties (78 of 100) are designated as rural. Combined, these counties had a net loss of 4.3% of licensed child care programs since February 2020, closely matching the overall state trend of 4.7%.

Of our 78 rural counties, the majority (44) experienced a net loss. In some counties, the loss of a single licensed child care program can have an outsized impact.

For example, Camden and Graham had the largest negative percentage change from February 2020 through March 2024. Both came in at -25%. In each county, that’s the result of just one program closing its doors.

Among the 34 rural counties that did not have a net loss of child care programs, 17 were stable, and 17 had net gains.

Among rural counties, there’s wide geographic variability to whether a county has gained, stabilized, or lost licensed child care programs.

Rural counties with net gains range from Person in the north, to Robeson in the south.

Rural counties with the same number of licensed child care programs in the first quarter of 2024 as they had before the pandemic include Mitchell in the mountains, Rockingham in the Piedmont, and Hyde on the coast.

Rural counties with net losses include Caldwell and Cleveland to the west, and Carteret and Craven to the east.

The overall net loss of licensed child care programs statewide — whether urban, suburban, or rural — could jeopardize North Carolina’s economic future.

Studies show investment in early care and education for our youngest residents not only enables their parents to fully participate in the labor force, but also improves children’s health outcomes, reduces their likelihood of being incarcerated, and provides the foundation for their educational and economic futures.

We’ll get a report on the second quarter in June 2024 — right before the arrival of the funding cliff that experts predict will cause a continued wave of not only program closures, but classroom closures, without additional stabilization funding from the legislature.

This first appeared on and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

The N.C. Community College System’s (NCCCS) primary legislative request this short session is money for Propel NC, . The request includes a nearly $100 million price tag for Fiscal Year (FY) 2024-25.

The State Board of Community Colleges unanimously approved the new plan in February, five months after the system officially began work in August to revise its funding model. The NCCCS’ current state funding model was created in 2010 and last updated in 2013.

“This is labor-market driven and where we need to be,” Finance Committee Chair Lisa Estep “It’s a much needed shift.”

The vast majority of funding for the state’s 58 community colleges comes from state appropriations.

The system’s current funding model allocates resources to the colleges in proportion to the number of full-time equivalent (FTE) students they enroll in each of their programs. Certain courses receive more state funds than others based on a four-tier funding model.

Propel NC would shift the current FTE funding tiers to “workforce sectors,” with courses ranked and valued by statewide salary job demand data every three years. All curriculum and continuing education (CE) courses would reside in the same workforce sector. The NCCCS this shift “prioritizes connecting students to high-demand, high-wage jobs.”

The anticipated cost of this component of the model is approximately $68.6 million, .

“The change from tiers to workforce sectors does more than bring in new dollars and simplify our categories,” Richmond Community College President Dr. Dale McInnis “It changes our business model at the college level. We will be able to make program and course decisions based on the quantified labor market value that education brings to the student as recognized by our state’s employers. The choice of offering a degree or short-term certificate will be driven by the value proposition for the student and the needs of the employers.”

Propel NC includes a $93 million recurring ask to lawmakers, according to  outlining the model. There is a $99 million ask for FY 2024-25.

Here are the other components of the plan:

• Increase in base funding. The plan calls to increase the base allocation for instructional and academic support funds 5.8%, “which closes the gap to actual spending patterns and account for inflation,” per the NCCCS document. “This modification would also increase the enrollment allotment above 750 FTE based on this increase in other costs funding.” The anticipated cost for this request is about $24.4 million.
• Enrollment increase reserve. The current enrollment growth reserve was implemented in 2010 in response to the large number of students enrolling in community colleges after the Great Recession. The system wants to request $6 million in non-recurring funds for a fixed per-FTE amount for any colleges that go over the enrollment threshold set by their FTE for the fiscal year. The system would then like to build replenishment of the fund into the recurring enrollment growth fund in the state budget.
• Excess tuition retention. Excess tuition receipts currently fund the enrollment increase reserve. Propel NC would change that, allowing excess tuition receipts to return to the college which generated them but only on years when the system as a whole generates excess receipts.

You can view more details about Propel NC, including projections for the proposed workforce sectors, . You can read more about how community colleges are currently funded .

What are people saying?

In January, NCCCS leaders said the system had already started meeting with lawmakers about Propel NC. In February, State Board Chair Tom Looney said the system had more than 100 letters of endorsement for the plan from businesses across the state.

“I couldn’t be more proud of where we’ve arrived at this point in time. I think this is a game changer for our system,” NCCCS President Dr. Jeff Cox said in November. “It answers the call that I think we’re hearing from our legislature and our governor about the community colleges’ critical role in meeting the workforce needs of the future of our state. …It aligns our system in a way we’ve just never been before.”

Feedback from lawmakers so far has been positive, NCCCS Information and Communications Specialist Marcy Gardner told EdNC in an email. System leaders plan to continue conversations and advocacy for Propel NC, she said.

“While we hope to get the full funding to launch Propel NC this fall, we are developing contingency plans so that we can be prepared to move forward with whatever level of funding is ultimately approved in the state budget,” Cox told EdNC.

Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, an ex-officio member of the State Board, expressed his support for the plan at the Board’s January and February meetings. Robinson is the Republican nominee for the 2024 governor’s race.

“Moving from tiers-based to labor-market driven, I would suppose that would give us a lot more flexibility, so I think that’s very good,” Robinson said. “Community colleges are going to be essential (to the economy)… so I’m glad to see the work that’s going on.”

North Carolina has a projected one-time $1.4 billion surplus in state revenues through Fiscal Year (FY) 2025, according to . This essentially means there are $1.4 billion extra state dollars that lawmakers can choose to invest this short session.

With a Republican supermajority this session, Republicans will drive fiscal and policy decisions. On May 1st, the Senate Appropriations Committee approved a , which are state-funded vouchers families can use to pay for eligible private schools. To do so, the bill would allocate roughly an additional $463 million to the program over the next two years.

In addition to expanding vouchers, House Speaker Tim Moore, , told media he would like to see funding for child care subsidies, additional raises to school and state employees, and an additional $400 million toward Medicaid.

So far, the General Assembly’s only discussions regarding community colleges have involved clarifying terms for how local college board trustees are selected.

Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper’s included $34.3 million to implement Propel NC.

“This new funding model will help streamline degree attainment and prepare a well-trained workforce to meet the demands of the State’s growing economy,” the proposal says.

Cooper’s proposal also allocated $3 million to establish the enrollment increase reserve. The governor’s proposal did not including funding to increase the base allocation for colleges.

John Locke Foundation Board Member John Hood also recently made the case for Propel NC in

“Implementing some version of the Propel NC model would require a modest increase in state funds,” he wrote. “Its advocates argue that community colleges not only produce labor-market returns but also serve as critical hubs in local communities. I find their argument persuasive.”

Enrollment growth adjustment

The NCCCS is also requesting an enrollment growth adjustment. This adjustment is usually funded in the budget, but it is not statutorily required.

During the Board’s finance committee meeting in March, the system shared an initial projection of $54 million in enrollment growth. Since then, the system has updated the enrollment growth estimate to $69 million, NCCCS’ Gardner said in an email.

The governor’s proposal included a $25 million enrollment growth adjustment for FY 2024-25, “based on the increase in community college enrollment. Community college enrollment increased by 4.6%, or 10,435 full-time equivalent students.”

myFutureNC’s legislative priorities

Five years ago,  of 2 million 25- to 44-year-olds with a high-quality credential or postsecondary degree by 2030.

“From 2019 to 2022, the state has increased overall educational attainment by 4 percentage points from 53.4% to 57.4%,” a . “But, most recent data show we still remain 391,900 away from 2 million, and are tracking 24,096 behind where we needed to be at this point in time to reach the goal.”

Screenshot from myFutureNC’s legislative priorities document.

myFutureNC’s include NC workforce credentials, targeted financial aid provided to all postsecondary students who face unexpected emergencies, and local and regional technical assistance to promote collaboration.

The organization’s legislative request also includes two partner support items:

• Early foundations for success, including NC Pre-K and Science of Reading implementation.
• High-quality implementation of Career Development Plans, integrated through NCcareers.org.

“myFutureNC promotes the work of all sectors and helps find and fill gaps to drive educational access and attainment outcomes that align with and fulfill employer needs,” the document says.

You can read their full priorities .

This first appeared on and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper presented on Wednesday, calling for approximately an additional $1 billion to go toward public education — including an average 8.5% raise for teachers, a $1,500 retention bonus, and reinstatement of master’s pay.

His proposal includes a 5% raise for most state employees, which includes non-certified school employees, and most community college employees.

Cooper said his proposal presents lawmakers with a choice to invest in North Carolina’s public schools, instead of prioritizing further tax breaks and the expansion of private school vouchers.

“That’s the billion dollar choice,” Cooper said during a press conference in Raleigh. “…We have the revenue to do this — it is about priorities.”

The governor’s proposal follows his declaration of  and proclamation of 2024 as

Cooper presented his budget proposal on during which lawmakers can adjust the . Most sessions, the governor’s proposal is released first, followed by the House and Senate. At that point, the two chambers work together to pass an updated compromise budget.

There is a Republican supermajority this session, meaning Republicans will drive fiscal and policy decisions.

This year, North Carolina has a projected one-time  through FY 2025, according to the . This essentially means there is $1.4 billion extra state dollars that lawmakers can choose to invest during the short session.

House Speaker Tim Moore, , has already  that he would like to put $300 million more toward . The program, which funds private school vouchers at eligible schools, was expanded during the long session to all families regardless of income.

Moore also said he would like to see funding for child care subsidies, additional raises to school and state employees, and an additional $400 million toward Medicaid.

On Wednesday, Cooper said his proposal includes “a moratorium” on further expansion of public school vouchers. His proposal freezes the investment in the Opportunity Scholarship program at 2023-24 levels — adding about $174 million toward his investments in public school pay raises.

“We are at a crossroads,” he said. “One path prioritizes giveaways to the wealthy over the well-being of our state. The other secures a future of success for everyone — let’s hope we make the right choice.”

Below, you can find an overview of the education investments included in Cooper’s proposal.

Educator pay, bonuses

Cooper’s proposal includes $322.7 million to raise salaries for educators by 8.5% on average. This includes the average 3% raise most educators are slotted to receive in FY 2024-25 under

Under the proposal, a $1,000 bonus would go to all state employees. An additional $500 bonus would go to employees making less than $75,000 per year. One half of the bonus would be paid in Oct. 2024; the second half in April 2025.

The budget “lifts starting teacher salaries to more than $47,500 — the highest in the Southeast,” the proposal packet says. This number seems to include the $1,500 retention bonus the governor is proposing for most teachers.

Take a look at Cooper’s proposed teacher salary schedule for FY 2024-25, in the rightmost column.

The proposal also includes $10 million to “restore 10% master’s pay supplements for over 1,000 teachers whose advanced degrees are in the subjects they teach.”

As mentioned above, the proposal includes a raise of at least 5% for all state employees, which includes non-certified school employees.

Most state employees would receive an additional 2% raise in FY 2024-25, on top of the raise approved in the 2023 budget. Employees paid on an experience-based salary schedule would receive an extra 3%.

Finally, the governor’s budget proposal includes a one-time 3% retiree supplement in FY 2024-25. The 2023 budget included a one-time 4% supplement.

Cooper’s proposal also includes:

• $25.4 million to improve recruitment and retention for school-based administrators through salary increases. The budget includes a 6% total increase for existing principals.
• $8.2 million to expand the North Carolina Principal Fellows Program “to prepare up to 300 new principals annually.”
• $1.8 million to expand the Advanced Teaching Roles program.
• $1.7 million to increase funding for district-level recruitment bonuses in small and low-wealth counties. With the allocation included in the 2023 budget, the net allocation for this item would be $6 million.
• $1.6 million in recurring funds to expand supports for pre-service and beginning teachers in becoming fully licensed.
• The proposal also increases supplemental funding for the state’s 69 eligible low-wealth counties by 13%, or $40 million.
• $900,000 to cover the cost of National Board certification fees for 470 teachers each year, with priority to educators in high-need and low-performing schools. Board certified teachers earn a 12% supplement to their annual salary.

The proposal would also invest in many initiatives to strengthen the state’s teacher pipeline. During the 2022-23 school year, — up from 7.8% of teachers who left teaching the year before.

There is $4.7 million to expand to up to 490 new candidates in FY 2024-25. The budget would extend eligibility for the program to all institutions with approved educator preparation programs (EPPs) and to students in any licensure area.

The proposal includes an additional $4 million to expand , which focuses on supports for beginning teachers at low-performing, high-poverty schools.

Another $5 million would establish a matching grant program for “high-quality teacher preparation residency programs in high-need rural and urban districts,” to be distributed by the State Board of Education.

There is $500,000 for statewide professional development from the N.C. Center for the Advancement of Teaching (NCCAT). Another $300,000 would expand “teacher candidate recruitment programs and fund a study to improve recruitment strategies” to reduce teacher vacancy rates. That study will “include research and recommendations for a statewide system or entity to coordinate teacher recruitment and support.”

Other funds for public schools, students

The governor’s proposal includes funding to hire 700 additional K-3 teacher assistants (TAs) — an increase of 11% from the current budget. The increase is funded by Education Lottery receipts.

Additionally, the proposal would fund about 575 new school health personnel, which includes school counselors, nurses, social workers, and psychologists.

The budget also proposes a $2.5 billion school construction bond, which would be voted on in November 2024. That bond could fund approximately 90 new elementary and middle schools, Cooper said during the press conference.

“Over the next five years almost 1,600 schools report needing renovation and 131 new schools need to be built,” the proposal says.

The proposal also addresses several of the

First, there is $35 million to expand Read to Achieve literacy programs to middle grade students.

There is also $19 million toward DPI’s . DPI asked the General Assembly for $4.5 million to continue that work after federal Covid relief dollars run out in September.

State Superintendent Catherine Truitt also advocated last long session for universal school meals for students.

Cooper’s proposal does not include funding for universal school meals, but does include an additional $900,000 to “offset the co-pays for students eligible for reduced-price lunches in schools participating in the National School Lunch Program.”

“Research shows that receiving free lunch improves school attendances and decreases food insecurity and suspensions,” the proposal says.

The 2023 budget included $3 million to permanently eliminate the reduced-price lunch copay for North Carolina students and eliminate penalties for unpaid student meal debt. The governor’s proposal makes that $3.9 million for FY 2024-25.

The proposal also includes required state matching funds for the federal Summer Electronic Benefit Transfer Program for Children (Summer EBT). The program, also known as , “will provide grocery-buying benefits to qualifying families to prevent child hunger during the summer months when school is out for children who rely on school meals for daily nutrition.” SUN Bucks will launch this summer.

Additionally, the proposal includes:

• $10 million to hire a Career and Postsecondary Planning Director at DPI and increase the number of school-based coordinators in sixth-12th grade.
• The elimination of the 13% funding cap for Exceptional Children (EC) students to “provide additional teachers and instructional support, instructional supplies and materials, and staff development.” The 2023 budget instructed DPI to to remove that cap and instead fund children “on the basis of the reported cost of services provided.”
• The proposal also removes the 10.6% funding gap for students with Limited English proficiency. Under the proposal, schools for whom English learners make up more than 10.6% of their ADM would receive additional funds for “classroom teachers, textbooks, staff development, and other supports needed to help these students thrive.”
• $70 million combined in the At-Risk and Disadvantaged Student Supplemental funds to “fund teachers and instructional support positions, provide intensive in-school and after school remediation, and provide professional development for teachers serving disadvantaged students.”
• $6 million to create a pilot program to give funds to high-poverty schools “that adopt a Community Schools or other evidence-based model to address out of school barriers to learning.”
• $12.8 million to the Uniform Education Reporting System (UERS) to increase statewide student reporting capacity. There is also nearly $5 million to support various cybersecurity initiatives across the state’s public schools.

The proposal also includes $400,000 to establish an equity office at DPI “to direct the recruitment and retention of a diverse educator workforce that is representative of the state’s student population.”

This comes after the UNC Board of Governor’s Committee on University Governance recently .

There is also $453,000 to fund positions to support DPI’s central financial infrastructure. Recent financial challenges and budget shortfalls among North Carolina school districts of chief financial officers and sound financial systems.

Early child care

Federal funds stabilizing child care run out at the end of June. In response, child care advocates  for a one-time $300 million allocation to avoid closures and price increases for parents.

Advocates  for the same amount last year .

The governor’s proposal includes $200 million for stabilization grants.

“Access to affordable child care for parents, businesses, and educators is one of the most immediate threats to sustaining our momentum,” the proposal’s introduction says. “Nearly one-third of North Carolina child care centers are at risk of closure and only 26% of parents can afford child care costs.”

There is also $129 million for child care subsidies to increase reimbursement rates for providers in rural and low-wealth communities, which the proposal says will “secure child care for approximately 50,000 children per year by creating a statewide rate floor starting in July 2024.”

“These funds will allow about 3,500 child care sites in over 75% of NC counties to see an increase in their subsidy rate,” the proposal says.

The proposal also includes $197 million to expand access to NC Pre-K, the state’s preschool program for eligible 4-year-olds. The program currently reaches about half of eligible 4-year-olds, or 30,000 children.

There is also $24 million to provide “wrap-around summer care and learning programs for students once they complete NC Pre-K and before they enter kindergarten.”

As EdNC has previously reported, child care teachers make some of the

The governor’s proposal would create a grant program to help child care teachers afford care for their own children. The $25 million program would provide “free or reduced cost care for the children of roughly 2,200 child care providers,” the proposal says.

There is also $26 million to provide educational attainment-based salary supplements, through expansion of the .

The budget also adds a fourth region to the . That model splits the cost of child care between participating businesses, eligible employees, and the state government.

The governor’s proposal also includes:

• $50 million toward start-up and capital grants for NC Pre-K and child care centers. There is also $10 million to expand Smart Start, which serves young children and families across the state.
• $24 million to create a pilot program “to incentivize the business community to contribute to employee dependent care flexible spending accounts.”
• $1.2 million to implement recruitment strategies and professional development for child care teachers.
• The provision of a refundable child and dependent care tax credit.

Finally, the budget allocates $100,000 to the North Carolina Community College System (NCCCS) to “evaluate the effectiveness of the Child Care Grant Program, which was appropriated $1.2 million in recurring funds” in the 2023 budget.

The program, which has been in place since 1993, provides grants to community college students to use for child care while they are in school. The program needs more funding and wider eligibility, local administrators of the grants

“The evaluation will assess the program’s effectiveness and propose adjustments that would support more North Carolina parents seeking community college education,” the governor’s proposal says.

Community colleges

During the press conference, Cooper said his proposal includes “significant funding for community colleges.”

There is about $28.5 million to give 5% across-the-board raises to most state-funded community college employees in FY 2024-25. Another $28.5 million goes toward the Enhanced Labor Market Adjustment Reserve, to give the system “flexibility to address specific challenges for hard-to-retain and fill roles.”

State-funded community college employees would receive the same retention bonus as state employees and educators, up to $1,500. Community college retirees would also receive the same one-time 3% supplement.

On top of the retention bonus, Cooper’s proposal includes $3.1 million to give “a 10% per course bonus for full-time and adjunct instructors who teach courses inside correctional facilities.”

“Community colleges play a key role in education for incarcerated individuals. Obtaining an associate’s degree significantly reduces recidivism rates,” the proposal says. “Currently, over 75 community college courses are offered in prisons across the state.”

This year, the NCCCS’ primary legislative request is funding for Propel NC, . The request includes a nearly $100 million price tag for FY 2024-25.

Propel NC would shift the current full-time equivalent (FTE) funding tiers to “workforce sectors,” with courses ranked and valued by statewide salary job demand data. The NCCCS says this will move the system toward a labor-market driven model of community college programs. The anticipated cost of this component of the model is approximately $68.6 million, .

The governor’s budget includes $34.3 million to implement Propel NC.

“This new funding model will help streamline degree attainment and prepare a well-trained workforce to meet the demands of the State’s growing economy,” the proposal says.

Propel NC also includes a request of $6 million to increase the enrollment increase reserve across the system. Per the system’s proposal, those nonrecurring funds would go toward a fixed per-FTE amount for any colleges that go over the enrollment threshold set by their FTE for the fiscal year.

Cooper’s proposal allocates $3 million to establish that reserve.

The governor’s proposal did not including funding for the last component of Propel NC with a price tag — $24.4 million to increase the base allocation for colleges.

The proposal did include a $25 million enrollment growth adjustment for FY 2024-25, “based on the increase in community college enrollment. Community college enrollment increased by 4.6%, or 10,435 full-time equivalent students.”

The governor’s proposal also includes a number of investments in the workforce, funding many projects through the NCCCS.

The budget proposal includes $40 million to complete construction of Central Carolina Community College’s Moore Center, which “will be used as a shared training center by Advance NC to train staff for new and expanding employers in the electric vehicle manufacturing supply chain, semiconductors, and life sciences.”

There is $4 million for the NCCCS to create a competitive grant fund for community colleges with electric vehicle workforce programs.

Finally, there is also $133,000 for ApprenticeshipNC to establish a “whole system model” of apprenticeships with the DPI and the Department of Commerce.

“We recognize (community colleges) as a core anchor to economic improvement,” Cooper said.

The budget also includes $3.25 million in nonrecurring funds to establish a rural youth apprenticeship program across five regions, to be distributed by the Department of Commerce. After two years, the funding of successful programs will depend on local funding sources.

The proposal packet says the program is modeled on “the successful Surry-Yadkin Works model developed by Surry and Yadkin counties.” That model created in 2021 to connect high school students in Surry and Yadkin counties with internship and pre-apprenticeship opportunities in local high-demand fields.

You can read the governor’s full proposal .

This first appeared on and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

First Lady Dr. Jill Biden said North Carolina is a leader when it comes to providing opportunities for students to earn college credit and connect to careers while still in high school. 

Dr. Biden visited North Carolina April 15 to discuss innovative learning programs, like dual enrollment, that are bridging gaps between the classroom and careers.

The visit is part of President Biden’s .

In his , the president allocated $7.2 billion to establish or expand programs that would allow students to earn postsecondary credits through career-connected dual enrollment while still in high school. 

According to a statement from the Office of the First Lady, “The funds would be provided as matching dollars to states to initiate or expand efforts to spur greater enrollment in dual enrollment programs.”

The First Lady’s North Carolina visit included a stop at where she met with educators and students to learn about the college’s dual enrollment efforts. Following the briefing, Dr. Biden visited Pitt’s biotechnology lab and automotive bay and heard from high school students working toward postsecondary credentials.

Dr. Biden then visited alongside Gov. Roy Cooper.

Before welcoming the First Lady to the podium, Gov. Cooper explained how the state’s dual enrollment program,  (CCP), is a tool to help high school students fast track their education and career goals. “That’s why we’re all here today,” Dr Biden said. “North Carolina has been a leader in providing those (dual enrollment) opportunities and is exemplary in transforming high school into a place that prepares students for jobs.” 

More than across North Carolina participated in CCP during the 2022-23 academic year. 

A showed dual enrollment was up 12% from the previous year. The most notable increase was across the Career and Technical Education (CTE) pathway – jumping 21% from the last academic year. The CTE pathway is often aligned with high-skill and high-demand jobs, providing opportunities for students to learn a variety of academic and technical skills.

After her remarks, Dr. Biden and Gov. Cooper joined a panel of educators and dually enrolled high school students from three North Carolina community colleges to discuss their experiences with CCP. 

Panelists highlighted how CCP is a chance to identify career interests and begin earning college credit that will help them in a future job. The four students on the panel are taking college courses aligned with various careers, including EMT certification, business administration, electrical engineering, manufacturing, and computer science.

The students said CCP has given them opportunities to explore careers and the confidence that they could succeed in a college setting.  

“I can be successful in these types of environments,” said Giovanni Robinson, a dually-enrolled student at GTCC. 

As for connecting students to careers, community colleges are doubling down on their efforts to support students by providing opportunities to become pre-apprentices.

and , both represented on the panel, are among many of the state’s community colleges that are coordinating CCP in ways that meet the needs of industry in their communities. 

is one example of cross-sector partnerships that bring together K-12 districts, community colleges, and employers. It’s an approach that leverages dual enrollment and the state’s apprenticeship program to carve out pathways for students to earn college credit, income, and skilled training. 

In her closing remarks, panel moderator Amy Loyd, assistant secretary for the Office of Career, Technical, and Adult Education at the U.S. Department of Education, thanked the audience and expressed gratitude for the chance to learn from the state. 

“We really are delighted to learn from North Carolina and lift up the great work of your great state as a model and exemplar for all of our country to learn from as we’re thinking about how we create career pathways for all young people,” Loyd said.

North Carolina’s Career and College Promise explained

Career and College Promise (CCP) is a dual enrollment program that allows high school students to take college courses tuition-free in North Carolina. 

CCP includes three pathways: college transfer, career and technical education (CTE), and Cooperative Innovative High Schools (CIHS), which include early colleges. The pathways are structured and provide students opportunities to earn credits that often lead to certificates and associate degrees.  

The state has long been a leader in dual enrollment programs — dating back over 30 years when the first iteration of the program launched.

When CCP was , it was done in such a way that students could earn a credential in less time than would normally be required. And regardless of their path – obtaining a degree, earning college transfer credits, or pursuing a credential to transition to the workforce – students would save time and money, both of which are linked to an increased . 

Research has consistently found that Career and College Promise benefits students, parents, and North Carolina as a whole.

A showed students who participated in CCP had higher high school graduation rates and higher postsecondary enrollment rates than those who did not. The study compared CCP students to a similar group of students who did not participate in CCP over seven years.

Students in college transfer or CTE pathways were 9% more likely to enroll in a North Carolina public college after high school. CIHS students were 27% more likely to enroll in a North Carolina public college after graduating.

The study also found that economically disadvantaged students and those from underrepresented racial and ethnic groups benefited most from CCP. You can read more about CCP below.

Photo highlights

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The UNC Board of Governor’s Committee on University Governance voted unanimously — and without discussion — on Wednesday to repeal and replace the UNC System’s current diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policy.

The Board’s proposed policy, among other things, would eliminate system-wide DEI metrics and goals across the UNC System, along with the requirement for schools to appoint a senior-level DEI officer.

The policy will go before the full Board of Governors on its consent agenda in May. It is effective upon its adoption, the draft document says.

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“The University of North Carolina reaffirms its longstanding commitment to the equality of opportunity in education and employment as a core value,” . “As such, the University continues to ensure that diverse persons of any background, from North Carolina and beyond, are invited, included, and treated equally.”

The UNC System is made up of 17 institutions — 16 public universities and a public boarding high school, the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics — that serve nearly 250,000 students each year. This decision could have ripple effects on other institutions of education from K-12 to community colleges as well as issues from the preparation of educators to the

The new policy would require that each institution certify by Sept. 1 that it “fully complies with the University’s commitment to institutional neutrality and nondiscrimination.” That reporting deadline includes each school eliminating or updating its current DEI positions.

The new policy proposal also states that “diversity means the ways in which individuals vary, including, but not limited to, backgrounds, beliefs, viewpoints, abilities, cultures, and traditions that distinguish one individual from another.”

Members of the UNC System Board of Governors, who , oversee the entire system. Republicans have maintained control of the state legislature for the last decade, and there is on the Board of Governors.

The Board of Governors then  to the individual universities’ boards of trustees as well as chancellors and presidents. You can view a list of the Board’s 24 voting members .

WRAL reported House Speaker Tim Moore, , said last week that lawmakers would allow universities to tackle the issue first. Moore is not running for re-election for his state seat in 2024.

Already, last June, North Carolina Republicans passed , “an act to amend the State Human Resources Act to prohibit compelled speech when an individual seeks state government or community college employment.”

That ban on “compelled speech” in hiring and admissions decisions has since impacted diversity efforts in faculty hiring and evaluation,

You can view the new policy proposal, “Equality Within the University of North Carolina,”

You can also view the UNC’s System’s current policy, , which was adopted in 2019.

What does the new policy say?

The includes 10 sections.

First, the policy states its purpose.

Next, the policy outlines the system’s nondiscrimination in employment practices and educational programs and activities. The policy states that the system “shall continue to comply with federal and state law prohibiting discrimination and harassment of members of protected classes.”

Here’s a quick look at the other sections:

• Ensuring Equality of All Persons & Viewpoints: This section further extends the nondiscrimination requirements for state government workplaces outlined in state statute (G.S. 126 14.6) to university-led student orientations, training, or activities.
• Commitment to the Freedom of Speech & Expression: “…the University of North Carolina shall continue its proud tradition of pursuing and embracing the most vigorous, open, and thoughtful exchange of ideas.”
• Maintaining Academic Freedom: The policy says the system “shall take no action that would limit the right of academic freedom in its faculty’s pursuit of teaching, research, and service, subject only to the institutional tenure policies.”
• Commitment to Student Success & Employee Well-being: “Campuses shall continue to implement programming or services designed to have a positive effect on the academic performance, retention, or graduation of students from different backgrounds, provided that programming complies with the institutional neutrality specified in Section VII of this policy and/or other state and federal requirements.”
• Maintaining Institutional Neutrality: “…No employing subdivision or employment position within the University shall be organized, be operated, speak on behalf of the University, or contract with third parties to provide training or consulting services regarding: matters of contemporary political debate or social action.”

The policy’s Sept. 1 report requirement also requires campus leaders to submit “a report on reductions in force and spending, along with changes to job titles and position descriptions, undertaken as a result of implementing this policy and how those savings achieved from these actions can be redirected to initiatives related to student success and wellbeing.”

Finally, the policy says student-led organizations “may use university facilities and receive student activity funding notwithstanding any speech or expressive activity by such organizations that would otherwise violate” the policy’s section on maintaining institutional neutrality.

What was repealed?

, in place since 2019, “sets forth procedures related to the oversight of D&I activities and related reporting to monitor the effectiveness of these efforts.”

Here is a look at the major requirements laid out in that policy:

• The designation of a senior officer at the UNC System Office to serve as DEI liaison to UNC System campuses.
• The appointment of a senior-level DEI officer at each constituent institution. This officer will assist the chancellor in DEI policy development, oversee DEI work, and advise on trainings and outreach, among other things.
• The establishment of of a UNC System Diversity and Inclusion Council to develop system-wide DEI goals and metrics and share best practices.
• The dissemination of DEI information to students and employees.

Read the full policy .

Efforts to reform UNC governance

, the Governor’s Commission on Public University Governance announced its recommendations for strengthening the UNC System, including the creation of a Center of Higher Education Governance, a larger system governance board, and changes to term lengths for board members, among other things.

Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper announced the commission , citing signs of undue political influence and bureaucratic meddling among university governance in the state.

The 15-member bipartisan , co-chaired by former UNC System leaders Tom Ross and Margaret Spellings, spent the following eight months studying board governance and appointment methods. From February to April, the commission also hosted six public listening sessions across the state to gather stakeholder input on improving public university governance.

“The Commission’s recommendations are motivated primarily by the principle that the governing boards of the UNC System and its institutions should reflect, represent and be accountable to the people they serve,” the report says. “While our state is rich in all types of diversity, that diversity and that strength is not reflected in our governance today in the manner contemplated by existing state law.”

is a link to the final report of recommendations. You can read the recommendations on page i-iv.

On Wednesday, Cooper with Ross speaking out against the Board’s move to abolish DEI positions and initiatives across the system.

“Our diversity should be used to highlight our state’s strengths, not our political divisions,” Cooper said. “Republican legislative and university leaders who attack diversity at our public universities are failing in their duty to protect students while threatening our ability to recruit top scientists, researchers and innovators who power our economy.”

Ross said the bipartisan commission “found that a lack of diversity among university leadership and governance boards is both a disservice to students across the UNC System and leads to the controversy and volatility that we are seeing threaten our public universities.”

“Our universities should encourage diversity on their campuses and governance boards and have leaders, administrators, faculty and staff that reflect the extraordinary diversity of our amazing state,” Ross said.

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In short, America is doing a lot of math — at a time when math achievement is experiencing . 

Enter the March Mathness tournament, an NCAA-style competition hosted by the Collaborative for Student Success to spotlight state and district initiatives that are helping kids catch up and accelerating learning in math.

With the goal of bringing attention to innovative efforts transforming how math education is delivered in schools, we’ve convened a plucky panel of three expert judges, each with their own critical lens on K-12 education policy.

Chad Aldeman writes for and The 74 and formed his March Mathness bracket by evaluating each program for strong implementation, scalability and evidence. Jocelyn Pickford, writing for , weighs the contenders with eyes focused on the use of high-quality instructional materials and meaningful teacher and family engagement. Dale Chu rounds out the judges’ table with a focus on responsible use of data and strong student outcomes.

The tournament began with a Sweet Sixteen lineup representing a diverse range of approaches to improving math achievement. From statewide comprehensive reforms in states like Alabama, Kentucky, Arkansas and Colorado to the widespread use of innovative learning platforms like Zearn and the AI-powered Khanmigo, the tournament narrowed to an Elite Eight. Three state bills and the use of Zearn across four states advanced alongside novel tutoring approaches from Texas and New Jersey, a policy of automatic enrollment in advanced math courses out of North Carolina and Texas, and a statewide math fund in Kentucky focused on professional learning and coaching.

The competition heated up in the Final Four. Alabama’s Numeracy Act — a comprehensive set of reforms that provide elementary math tutors, set up a process for vetting and approving math curriculum, and transform teacher training and preparation — challenged the statewide use of Zearn in Nebraska, Louisiana, Colorado and Ohio. Zearn proved its worth throughout the bumpy road of pandemic-era schooling, when multiple states provided free, universal access to its digital learning platform to supplement instruction and enable kids to access instruction both in school and remotely.

Despite impressive evidence that shows gains on state math assessments for students who use Zearn consistently, the multi-faceted approach of Alabama’s Numeracy Act, and its standing as a nationwide exemplar of proactive math legislation, fueled its advance to the finals. 

The second matchup of the Final Four saw go toe-to-toe with a novel automatic enrollment policy out of North Carolina and Texas. Kentucky’s Fund is one of the longest-standing initiatives in the competition, dating from 2005. It provides grants to schools and districts for math coaches, high-quality materials and extra professional development. With nearly 20 years of outcomes data, the fund has strong evidence of having moved the needle for Kentucky students in grades K-3. 

Meanwhile, North Carolina and Texas have been garnering nationwide attention for new statewide policies meant to increase enrollment in advanced math courses. Students who score at the highest levels on the state math test are automatically enrolled in advanced classes for their next school year, turning on its head the long-held practice of having them opt in. Now, high-achievers must opt out, a move many advocates describe as game-changing.

Begun in Dallas Independent School District before being taken statewide in , the policy saw a doubling in the percentage of students of color enrolled in advanced math. In , the new process has resulted in a steadily increasing number of high-achieving students enrolling in advanced courses — and sticking with them — as they work toward additional college and career opportunities. While Kentucky’s Math Achievement has been moving the needle for two decades, automatic enrollment policies are making a big wave — enough to cinch the W in this round.

As for the championship match, the battle for the March Mathness title could not have been fiercer.

The judges fought passionately to decide between the heavyweight Alabama Numeracy Act and the newcomer automatic enrollment policies in Texas and North Carolina.

Pickford was a stalwart defender of Alabama, applauding the Numeracy Act as a national standout for state leadership in promoting instruction rooted in and wraparound supports for students, families and teachers. “Any state effort to advance learning should be rooted in access to and use of that are aligned to a state’s academic standards, have been endorsed by educators and empower teachers to reach all students. As leaders consider the March Mathness practices for their states or districts, I urge them to place evidence-based instruction and educator and family engagement at the center.”

Chu and Aldeman, while agreeing with Pickford about the merits of Alabama’s legislation, underscored the ripple effects of a move like Texas and North Carolina’s new process. “Automatic enrollment policies in advanced math courses represent a sea change in the way we think about math opportunities for students. After decades of requiring students to opt themselves into higher-level courses, widespread adoption of this kind of policy would represent a raising of expectations for students, rather than treating advanced math as a ‘nice-to-have’ for only some kids,” the pair said.

Ultimately, the judges decided, the relative simplicity of automatic enrollment — and the ease with which other states could adopt this for their K-12 systems — catapulted Texas and North Carolina to a winning slam-dunk.

Though automatic enrollment ultimately took home the championship, the full March Mathness bracket showcased a wealth of strategies that states and districts are employing to advance math education. From digital platforms and summer learning to professional development and comprehensive legislative reforms, the variety of initiatives reflects a nationwide commitment to improving math outcomes for all students.

The success of the March Mathness tournament lies not just in crowning a champion, but in highlighting the innovative and varied efforts underway to tackle the challenges in math education in the United States. 

Looking ahead, the Collaborative for Student Success will continue to shine a light on the most promising efforts to advance math learning, and will urge states and districts to learn from the past four years of academic recovery as they weather challenges posed by the expiration of federal relief dollars, record chronic absenteeism and the continuously changing needs of students and families. 

We hope you enjoyed March Mathness — but the math fun doesn’t end there. Stay connected with our math efforts and learn more about how you can help advance a renewed focus on math education on our platform. We’ll see you next year for the Big (Math) Dance!  

Members of the received an update on child care at their meeting April 2.

The biggest child care issue across North Carolina is the lack of sufficient funding to support competitive, family-sustaining wages for early childhood educators. Adequate funding could keep programs in operation when pandemic-era stabilization funding runs out at the end of June 2024.

‘Let’s be buffaloes’

Sandy Weathersbee, the owner of in Charlotte, who also serves on the boards of the and the , shared his concerns with the committee.

Weathersbee’s primary concern is staffing. Early childhood education programs like his have to compete for teachers with the public school system, which has the advantage of offering state-funded health and retirement benefits despite low teacher salaries.

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“We’ve not been able to find a solution to a problem that is bigger than we are,” Weathersbee said. “We need help.”

He argued that help is needed urgently because of the upcoming expiration of funding that stabilized early childhood education during the pandemic. That funding will sunset in North Carolina at the end of June 2024 — the date referred to as the “funding cliff.”

Weathersbee pointed to the recent results of a conducted by the to bolster his argument that support is needed now.

Here are some key findings from that survey about the challenges providers expect to face when we reach the funding cliff:

• About 3 in 10 programs (29%) expect to close.
• About 4 in 10 centers (41%) expect to close or combine classrooms, leading to decreased enrollment capacity.
• More than half of programs (54%) plan to cut costs, which could reduce program quality, including child nutrition.
• Almost all programs (88%) expect to increase parent fees in the second half of the year, raising the annual costs for families by more than $1,000 per year.
• When asked to name one support that would help programs be sustainable, the most common response was increasing funds for staff salaries (38%).

With these storm clouds brewing, Weathersbee asked members: “Do we want to be cows or buffaloes?”

“Cows will try to outrun a storm only to succumb to its speed and stay in it longer. Buffaloes will run right into the storm and get out of it faster,” Weathersbee explained. “Let’s be buffaloes.”

‘We know what quality looks like’

Ariel Ford, director of the (DCDEE) at the state Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), provided the committee with on the state’s efforts to revise our quality rating and improvement system (QRIS), in addition to addressing the challenges posed by the funding cliff.

In 2023, the General Assembly passed requiring the to make recommendations for updating the QRIS. This is the system through which child care programs are granted a rating of one to five stars based on meeting specific standards related to quality.

Ford pointed out that North Carolina was the first state to launch a quality star-rating system, back in 1999.

“What we’ve learned over 25 years is that we know what quality looks like, and we know that there’s multiple paths to get there,” Ford said.

Ford presented an overview of the to adopt three pathways to quality instead of the single pathway we’ve always had.

The first would be a modified version of the one that’s currently in place, in which programs are evaluated by an outside consultant and rated on a scale. The commission plans to review that scale if the new recommended pathways are supported by legislators.

The second pathway would be a new one specifically for programs that fall outside of the typical early childhood education framework, such as developmental day programs that serve children with disabilities.

“So for instance, if you have multiple children in wheelchairs that are feeding with feeding tubes, their day just looks a little bit different than our more traditional child care programs, and we wanted to honor that and to respect the quality that comes with that,” Ford said.

The third pathway is what Ford described as “shovel-ready” or “mission-ready” — a system for recognizing federal accreditations in our state’s star-rating system.

Right now, programs such as Head Start, Early Head Start, and those accredited by the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) have to go through the entire QRIS process for North Carolina, creating administrative redundancies and inefficiencies.

At the direction of the legislature, the commission created a crosswalk that aligns federal accreditations with our state’s rating system to relieve the administrative burden of these established high-quality programs.

Ford said the commission has this pathway ready to be implemented at the General Assembly’s discretion: “We can basically just turn that light on at any second.”

But looming over these potential changes is the June 2024 funding cliff. Ford also referenced the new survey results from the CCR&R Council, pointing out that North Carolina has already had a net loss of 53 programs in 2023.

Here are what some had to say about what they’ll do when the stabilization funding sunsets:

• “Childcare teachers have historically been one of the lowest compensated workers in our county. With the end of the staff bonuses we no longer have any incentive to offer teachers to stay except for their unending love of the children in their care. Unfortunately, that isn’t enough because their loving hearts do not pay the bills.”
• “I don’t know. This 4 years have beaten me up and I’m tired. We are taking the same surveys and SCREAMING that we are going under, and no one is listening. It’s disheartening.”

One intervention Ford proposed was the need to increase the subsidy rate floor.

Ford said the state’s child care subsidy program serves 51,000 children statewide, which is less than 15% of eligible children. And the subsidies reimburse less than half the cost of a classroom slot. That’s because the rate is based on what families can afford to pay, not what the service actually costs to provide.

Of particular concern to Ford is what she calls the “rural disadvantage” when it comes to the subsidy reimbursement rate.

Because the rate is based on what local residents can afford, it is typically lower in rural areas with a lower cost of living and income base.

“What we have learned over the years is that it doesn’t actually cost a whole lot less to run child care in our rural communities; their costs just look different,” Ford said.

When the Southwestern Child Development Commission announced in the western part of the state last year, Ford asked them about subsidies.

“I said, ‘What would have happened if that subsidy rate floor had been in place?’ and they said, ‘That would have made our bottom line work,’” Ford told the oversight committee.

Ford also said the continued underfunding of NC Pre-K needs to be addressed.

NC Pre-K is a statewide public preschool program designed to support low-income 4-year-olds at risk of negative education outcomes. It’s serving less than half of eligible students and costs $11,330 per student for one academic year.

Of the eligible students enrolled, more than half are in classrooms operated by public school systems, which receive $10,791 per student. But almost half of classrooms are operated by private programs, which receive only $5,450 per student — 48% of the total cost.

“I love our school districts, and we partner with them all the time, but they don’t have space or room or even necessarily the function of doing [NC Pre-K] for all across the state,” Ford said. “We need our private providers in that [they] are the ones set up for zero-to-five care. That’s their bread and butter.”

This first appeared on and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

Sixteen months ago, North Carolina’s highest court ordered the state legislature to spend $800 million to improve K-12 education — a landmark ruling that seemed to end a decades-long legal battle over adequate funding for schools.

The opinion, delivered 28 years after the suit was filed, was supposed to fund efforts in some of the state’s poorest districts for teacher and principal training, more books and supplies and expanded pre-K.

But those remedies are now in jeopardy as the Supreme Court, with a fresh political makeover, once again considers the case. 

When a trial court ordered the state to spend surplus funds on the remedies, Republican leaders who control the legislature appealed. They argue that the court never had the authority to issue “a sweeping statewide order” based on the claims of the original plaintiffs: five poor, rural districts. 

To the districts and equity advocates, however, the move smacks of a political power play. Under the former Democratic majority on the court, the ruling was tight — a 4-3 vote for the districts. Following the November 2022 election, the court flipped to a 5-2 majority in the Republicans’ favor.

If the court overturns the opinion, today’s students would be the “third generation of children since this lawsuit was filed to pass through our state school system without the benefit of relief,” Melanie Dubis, lead attorney for the districts, said during oral arguments in late February. The state, she said, has the “constitutional duty to provide the children the opportunity for a sound basic education.”

Matthew Tilley, the attorney who argued the case for House Speaker Tim Moore and Senate President Pro Tem Phil Berger, said it is his firm’s “policy not to comment on ongoing client cases.”

It could be months before the court issues an opinion on the case. That leaves districts in the state, which ranks nationally in per-student funding, in limbo. But experts suggest the case has implications beyond the education budget. In a state where lawmakers seek over Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper, and last year overrode 19 of his vetoes, the court’s decision to rehear the case raises questions about whether the legislature is exceeding its authority.

“This case is about having power over the courts,” said , a lawyer who co-founded The Innovation Project, a school leadership network. “The balance of power that helps government function properly is … at stake.”

‘Righting that wrong’

With the 70th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision ending school segregation this spring, other observers see the conservative court’s decision to reopen Hoke County Board of Education v. North Carolina — also known as the “Leandro” case — as a setback for efforts to address segregation’s legacy. 

“It’s important for us as a country to be righting that wrong and to ensure that we invest in schools and districts having high concentrations of students of color,” said Ary Amerikaner, co-founder of , a nonprofit promoting integration. “Underfunding of public schools in certain districts and states is deeply connected to racial segregation and racial inequities. That is certainly no different in North Carolina.” 

The statewide between poor and non-poor districts has grown wider in recent years, according to a 2020 report from Public School Forum, a research and advocacy group. School systems without a strong tax base, like the five original plaintiffs, predominantly serve minority students — those who were more likely to because of the pandemic and need extra help. Meanwhile, districts have turned to for-profit companies to provide and long-term substitutes to fill vacancies as they await the additional funding the was supposed to provide.

To Anthony Jackson, superintendent of the Chatham County Schools, west of Raleigh, the plan would address some of the growing district’s greatest needs, including more funding for competitive salaries and additional pre-K slots for 4-year-olds on waiting lists.

“It would mean resources to recruit, retain and reward the best teachers and get them in front of our kids,” he said. “It would mean a strong leader standing at the schoolhouse door in every one of our schools.”

Jackson previously served six years as superintendent of Vance County schools, one of the original plaintiff districts. Located next to the Wake County district, the state’s largest, Vance struggles to fill classrooms with qualified staff, Jackson said.

Under the plan, Vance would receive an extra $16 million by 2028, a that could pay for 35 more teaching assistants, 47 more nurses and mental health professionals, and 46 more spaces for pre-kindergartners, according to Every Child NC, an advocacy group that calculated the impact on each district. 

According to the most recent from an early-childhood education research and advocacy group, the state serves 19% of its 4-year-olds in public pre-K, but no 3-year-olds.

“We’ve got to support parents from the day they have that child. Kids go home for five years and then we expect them all to show up at the schoolhouse door at the same place,” Jackson said. Noting the state’s passage last year of a universal that provides up to $7,500 per student for private school tuition and other educational expenses, he added that if the state can find resources for school choice, “I’m sure we could find resources for universal pre-K.”

But others say the plan does not directly address student achievement.

“Will the teachers get paid adequately? Will people be able to go to schools without mold? Those are things that are important, but they’re not about performance,” said Marcus Brandon, executive director of NorthCarolinaCAN, a nonprofit that advocates for school choice. A former Democratic state representative, he said he supports the Leandro plan in principle, but still thinks the court has the authority to throw it out.

During February’s oral arguments, Tilley, who represents legislative leaders, argued that the remedial plan “dictates virtually every aspect of education policy and funding” and that the court’s ruling removed “those decisions … from the democratic process.” He stressed that an earlier court order in 2004 limited the relief to just one county, Hoke, and said the court should not have found a statewide violation.

In her response, Dubis accused the lawmakers of “gamesmanship” and said it’s illogical to apply the solutions only to Hoke, but not to other districts with, for example, similar teacher vacancies.

“It is a system that works on a statewide basis,” she said.

The outcome of the long-running case also rests on a second, but no less significant, matter.

Just months after the 2022 opinion, the new conservative court undercut the decision by ruling, in what McColl called “shadow litigation,” that the state controller can’t transfer surplus funds to pay for the relief. That means that even if the school districts win, it’s likely that funding for the plan would be further delayed.

“That’s what makes this so odd,” McColl said. “Without the ability to enforce a money remedy, these cases just don’t serve a lot of purpose.”

Like McColl, Derek Black, a University of South Carolina law professor and a member of the Brown’s Promise advisory board, has followed the Leandro case for years. He was among the legal scholars who submitted a January amicus brief, arguing that, unlike state legislatures, which often repeal prior laws when the party in power changes, courts are obligated to uphold prior judicial decisions even when they disagree.

The brief noted that over the course of the litigation, both Democratic and Republican justices authored unanimous decisions in the case. 

“If overturned, it would be a huge shock to the rule of law,” Black told The 74. “To allow do-overs would mean that litigation would never end and that no judicial decision would ever be binding. I hope and believe that this court understands that.”

The Samuel DuBois Cook Center on Social Equity at Duke University has received $3.4 million in grants from four institutions to support research on the post-pandemic racial wealth gap in five U.S. cities, including Durham and Charlotte.

The other three cities are Atlanta, Houston and Washington, D.C. Throughout 2024 and 2025, researchers hope to better understand how the pandemic affected small business development in these areas, as well as analyze racial and ethnic wealth inequality across the United States.

The project will focus on the connection between the wealth gap and rates of entrepreneurship in various communities and the racially disparate effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.

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“In addition to comprehending these disparities, the Cook Center aspires to offer policy solutions that will meaningfully alleviate inequality,” said Gwendolyn L. Wright, director of strategic initiatives at the Cook Center. “The continuation and expansion of the NASCC [National Asset Scorecard for Communities of Color] project is a major step forward, and these partnerships reflect the widespread desire for such solutions.”

The Cook Center received major financial support from the MetLife Foundation, the JPB Foundation of New York, Walmart through the Walmart.org Center for Racial Equality and the City of Durham.

“We are thrilled to be able to collaborate with these organization and have their support in building upon the first NASCC Phase and continuing to study the racial wealth gap across America,” said William A, “Sandy” Darity Jr., the founding director of strategic initiatives at the Cook Center.” “The continuation and expansion of the NASCC project is a major step forward and these partnerships reflect the widespread desire for such solutions.”

Victoria W. Samayoa, American Rescue Plan Act Grants Manager for the City of the Durham, said the survey is critical to equity and justice work and creates opportunities to improve quality of life for residents.

“It is incredibly fortunate and fortuitous that the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funding allows for an unparalleled chance to deepen acceleration of tangible projects that target gaps in support and resources to be sure the city forges ahead tenaciously in its desire to create excellence with quality to support the foundations that create that,” Samayoa said.

The results formed the backbone of the Cook Center’s “Color of Wealth” reports, which offered a look at the depths of racial wealth inequality in Baltimore, Boston, Los Angeles, Miami, Tulsa, and Washington, D.C. Among other findings, the “Color of Wealth” helped highlight what study authors called an : that while the median household wealth for a white family in Boston was nearly $250,000, the median household wealth for a (non-immigrant) Black family in the city was just $8.

“The data from the original NASCC project were widely used by community foundations, think tanks, local governments, and the media to frame key issues, elevate promising approaches, and build support for strategic investments,” said Mark Harris, senior program officer of Community and Worker Power at the JPB Foundation. For more information about the Cook Center’s “Color of Wealth” series, view the Center’s website .

is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. NC Newsline maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Rob Schofield for questions: info@ncnewsline.com. Follow NC Newsline on and .

Child care is expensive and hard to come by for everyone. Local and statewide business leaders, advocates, philanthropists, and policymakers are asking how to solve that problem across the state.

But young children and families in certain communities and parts of the state are particularly lacking in early childhood access and opportunity, says from the Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute (FPG).

“We really have to prioritize those who we have already systematically been put in a position of economic precarity,” said Iheoma Iruka, FPG fellow and founding director of the at the institute.

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“There is a consistent pattern in which certain communities — particularly those that have low scores, especially in the northeast part of the state — are less likely to have high-quality programs,” says the report, “Start with Equity: NC Early Childhood Education Equity Analyses Project.”

The COI measures neighborhood factors that matter for healthy child development, such as quality schools, clean air, access to health care, and safe housing.

As the state’s early childhood programs teeter on the funding cliff projected for the end of June, Iruka said specific attention is needed in places where young children and families have lower COI scores.

“The cliff itself is going to impact them the most because they have less wealth, they have less resources, and they are the most vulnerable to any catastrophe,” she said. “The people who lose out are the people who are always on the brink of economic destitution.”

In states that have already run out of federal funds, or gone over that cliff, child care . North Carolina advocates are particularly worried about programs’ ability to remain open and accessible as those funds end, due to an inability to pay competitive wages to teachers.

Which communities are most vulnerable?

COI scores are the highest in central and urban areas, including the Triangle, Triad, and Mecklenburg County, the report found. The lowest scores are in the far east (Hyde and Bertie counties), southeast (Robeson, Scotland, and Columbus counties), and far west (Graham and Cherokee counties).

The report found that the areas with higher COI scores had clusters of high-quality licensed child care centers. There were particularly few high-quality options in the northeast part of the state.

At the census tract level, the report found high-quality centers (rated four or five stars ) were serving neighborhoods of high, moderate, and low opportunity at about the same rate.

“However, this does not mean that there is a sufficient number of quality programs in low-opportunity areas, given that more children in these neighborhoods have a greater need for quality programming than in high-opportunity areas,” the report says.

The report also looked at the reach of public funding streams designed to target low-income families with young children.

and Title 1 funding for pre-K, generally used for 4-year-olds, was reaching more children in areas with low COI scores. That makes sense, given that both funding streams are meant to target students from low-income families.

The same was true with slots. “While children four years old and younger who live in low-income households and in low COI communities are likely to receive subsidy, there was generally an even distribution of subsidy regardless of COI ratings at the county level,” the report says.

The report measured the distribution of subsidy slots, not the distribution of subsidy funding, which varies across the state depending on county-level market rates.

The report found that the higher the percentage of Black children in a county, the lower the COI score. It found the opposite was true about white children: the higher the percentage of white children, the higher the COI score. There was no correlation between the percentage of Latine children and COI scores.

When it comes to access, the report found there was not a statewide over- or under-representation by race/ethnicity in NC Pre-K or child care subsidy.

But in certain counties, that’s not the case.

For NC Pre-K, Black children were under-represented in 46 of the 100 counties, while white children were over-represented in 21 counties and Hispanic children were over-represented in 17 counties.

For subsidy, Black children were under-represented in 32 counties, while white children were over-represented in 32 counties. Data on Hispanic children receiving subsidy funding were unavailable.

What to do

Early care and education solutions need to address the variation in communities’ needs, the report argues. Iruka said she hopes policymakers, administrators, and advocates can use the report’s findings to push for more useful data and more equitable investments and policies.

“We have a lot of work to do to fully make sure that our youngest babies are able to get what the families believe that they need and they deserve,” Iruka said.

Specifically, the report calls for leaders to:

1. Prioritize and target specific populations and communities furthest from opportunity, including: racially an ethnically minoritized populations, infants and toddlers up to age 2, communities of concentrated poverty, unhoused children and children experiencing homelessness, dual-language learners, and children with disabilities.
   
2. Move beyond compliance to focus on quality improvement efforts by restructuring how quality is measured and by ensuring the equitable allocation of technical assistance (TA), coaching, training, and other quality improvement support by allocating greater resources to those with the greatest need. Maintain a laser focus on an accountability and continuous quality improvement system that is aligned with the goal of closing disparities in outcomes.
   
3. Focus on family child care (FCC) homes as part of a robust mixed-delivery system by increasing initiatives to support FCC providers, such as creating FCC networks or incorporating Pre-K into FCC.
   
4. Address poverty-level wages for the early childhood workforce.
   
5. Ensure that subsidy rates are sufficient for child care providers to provide quality programming.
   
6. Address data governance and lack of data for equity analyses by possibly using the Head Start model to obtain more comprehensive data to 1) identify communities and households farthest from opportunity by conducting racial equity analyses that require attention to child, family, and community sociodemographics, such as race, ethnicity, income, language, adversity, and their intersectional identities and 2) utilize geographical markers to better target resources.
   
7. Ensure attention is focused on addressing equity in access and resources for all. One possibility is to leverage the Head Start model to ensure that all children and families have access to resources, especially those in communities with multiple and layered inequities. Providing children living in poverty with the same access to resources—but with limited attention to environmental and intergenerational stressors and trauma—will not ultimately advance equity.

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Two of North Carolina’s 2023 Regional Principals of the Year during a House education reform meeting on Monday to revise the state’s plan for paying school principals. Among other things, two representatives from the (NCPAPA) said the current plan is too tied to test scores — discouraging some principals from serving in low-performing or high-poverty schools.

Currently, the state’s principal salary schedule is tied to Average Daily Membership (ADM) and school growth. In 2018, the state updated the principal pay scale to increase pay. On Monday, presenters Dr. John Lassiter and Ashley Faulkenberry told lawmakers that NCPAPA’s requested revisions build off that scale.

“It is not focused on significant increases in pay but on tweaking the compensation model to provide greater pay stability and to keep outstanding principals in their schools longer,” says. “The current plan was a step in the right direction for overall principal compensation. However, the plan had a few unintended consequences.”

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Those consequences, according to the presentation, include:

• Big swings in pay based on many factors beyond the principal’s control.
• Not considering the complexity of the school.
• De-incentivizing outstanding assistant principals from aspiring to become principals and stay in the field.

NCPAPA’s proposed plan would add a retention bonus and include factors such as how many multi-language and students experiencing homelessness a school has, in addition to school size and performance.

“We recognize that there’s a sense of urgency to support North Carolina schools, and to ensure strong school leadership is in place. Because we know that school leadership is one of the top two leading factors impacting overall school success,” said Lassiter, the principal of in Perquimans County Schools. “Today, we want to look at adding a few complexity factors to the principal compensation plan that look at the challenging job that a principal has in a more unique way. … We’re asking to redeploy some of the resources so that there’s more stability in pay.”

Here is a look at the current principal pay plan, followed by a look at the proposal presented to lawmakers on Monday.

Not removing performance pay, but changing how its calculated

Roughly one out of five N.C. principals (21%), agree or strongly agree that performance-based pay in the current pay plan makes up a fair portion of a principal’s total salary, according to a NCPAPA survey.

The current growth score metric also does not factor in scores on science and history tests, the presentation said, or exam scores in career and technical education and dual-enrollment courses.

“We don’t recommend removing performance pay from principal compensation. We know that it’s an important part of the work that we do,” Lassiter told lawmakers. “But we do want to share that the majority of principles are saying that it’s not a fair portion of how they’re compensated.”

Currently, principals get an additional 10% if they meet EVAAS growth targets and 20% for exceeding that target. The principals’ plan presented on Monday calls for reducing that to 5% and 10%, respectively.

The money not spent on growth scores would then go toward increasing the base principal pay, per the presentation. This is intended to stabilize principal pay while keeping the current structure of the plan in place, Lassiter said.

“Our current system ranks growth of all schools with no consideration of complexity or disadvantagement,” the presentation says. “This graph (below) shows the correlation between social economic status of the student population and the school’s ability to exceed growth.”

“This really proves that principals who serve more complex schools have unique challenges to overcome to accomplish similar results to schools located in more affluent areas across the state,” said Faulkenberry, the principal of in Craven County Schools.

Increasing principal retention

Nationally, 1 in 5 principals leave the profession each year, the presentation said. In North Carolina, that number is closer to 1 in 4.

“The problem of retention is greatest at high-poverty schools where nearly 30 percent of principals leave their school,” the presentation says. “As principals become more experienced, research shows they tend to move to lead schools with fewer complexity factors, schools that serve high-income areas with high-achieving students.”

Retention matters, as research shows that school principals greatly impact the schools they lead. According to , principals “contribute to important outcomes like student achievement, reduced absenteeism, and teacher retention.”

To help combat low principal retention, NCPAPA proposes adding the following retention pay bonuses:

• $2,000 for 5-9 years as a principal.
• $4,000 for 10-14 years as a principal.
• $6,000 for 15+ years as a principal.

The proposed model also seeks to increase principal retention by establishing a complexity model that considers more than just school size. The lowest “complexity tier” would start at $82,650 and the highest would start at $105,484.67.

“More complex schools equals high stress, higher burnout, more turnover, and less stability for schools,” Faulkenberry said. “Simply put, more complex schools are more difficult to lead.”

Here is a look at some of the factors the proposal would include:

Only 7% of N.C. principals agree or strongly agree that the current pay plan encourages high-performing principals to transition to low-performing schools, per the NCPAPA survey.

Accounting for factors beyond school size would encourage more principals to stay at high-poverty schools, Lassiter and Faulkenberry said.

They also spoke about the need to create a stronger “compensation progression” in North Carolina schools, citing a decreasing pool of candidates considering principalship. According to the NCPAPA survey, less than 15% of principals agree or strongly agree that the current pay plan encourages school leaders to transition into the role of the principal.

The principals’ proposal would address this problem, the presentation says, by “linking all school employees to one salary scale while ensuring that the principal is the highest paid employee in the building.” The proposed revisions start principal pay at the top teacher pay schedule, plus 25%.

“If we do not honor principal experience as part of the new proposal, we fear that the statistics will only become a greater concern across the state, further impacting our education future workforce,” Faulkenberry told lawmakers.

What did lawmakers say?

NCPAPA is asking state lawmakers to modify the principal pay plan in 2024 to “enhance recruitment, increase stability, add school complexity factors, and recognize experienced leadership.”

“It has never been more important to keep outstanding principals in their schools,” the presentation says.

, spoke about the importance of having school principals who are well known and have a strong reputation in the community.

, asked how the proposed plan would calculate complexity tiers.

“Each of these students would count for one point in each of these different complexity factors,” Faulkenberry said. “And then you would put all of those points into a bucket, and then that would tier those students in the pay plan.”

Warren also asked how much an impact shifting student enrollment has had on principal pay. He specifically mentioned an increase in homeschooling and families using Opportunity Scholarships to enroll their children in private school.

Faulkenberry and Lassiter said that impact is felt the strongest in smaller, transient districts. Faulkenberry clarified that school size is still considered a factor under the plan, but now one of many.

, said “bringing in more complexity factors is appropriate,” but questioned reducing incentives for growth in test scores.

“If our approach is to try to find the principles that are effective, it seems to me it just simply gives you higher pay for having a tough situation but doesn’t necessarily mean you’re effective in that role,” Blackwell said.

Committee Co-Chair , said the fiscal department will work to provide a “rough estimate” on how much the principals’ proposal would cost to implement.

, said lawmakers should continue discussing the principals’ proposal.

“We’ve got to look at this,” said Biggs, who co-chairs the education reform committee. “Because a lot of principals that are in tough situations are superstars, but they’re not getting paid like they’re superstars because of the situation that they’re put in.”

The House Select Committee on Education Reform is scheduled to hold its final meeting of the short session on March 25. Torbett said the committee plans to issue their final report then.

This first appeared on and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

Hundreds of higher education leaders across the country gathered virtually on Feb. 28-29 for hosted by several North Carolina agencies — the N.C. Community College System (NCCCS), the N.C. Department of Public Instruction (DPI), the University of North Carolina at Greensboro’s , and the national

The conference included more than 30 sessions focused on the benefits of dual enrollment, the need for equity, and strategies to improve and expand programs.

“This is the second conference focused on the role of dual enrollment in unlocking student potential and expanding access to postsecondary education in our state and across the country,” said NCCCS President Dr. Jeff Cox. “We are a leader in the country in dual enrollment, but there’s a lot of interest to expand even further.”

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In North Carolina, dual enrollment opportunities for high school students have existed for more than 30 years. The state’s dual enrollment program, , was created in 2011 to structured opportunities for high school students to earn college credits tuition-free that “lead to a certificate, diploma, or degree as well as provide entry-level jobs skills.”

In recent years, the NCCCS has focused on expanding and strengthening CCP, which includes three pathways: college transfer, career and technical education (CTE), and Cooperative Innovative High Schools (CIHS). The system’s includes high school enrollment as a focus of increasing access and enrollment across the state.

At the same time, participation in dual enrollment programs has increased. Last school year, the NCCCS served over 78,000 students in its dual enrollment programs during 2022-23, Cox said. CCP participation among N.C. high schoolers from 6% in 2014-15 to 12% in 2020-21.

State Superintendent Catherine Truitt said dual enrollment is an important part of student success. She said the community college system is crucial to her work of “improving the state’s public schools, expanding innovation, and ensuring that all students are prepared to be enrolled, enlisted, or employed when they graduate.”

Keynote speaker Dr. Karen Stout, president and chief executive officer of , urged conference attendees to “rethink access” to dual enrollment.

“Dual enrollment is the fastest-growing segment of community college enrollment,” she said. “We must stretch the boundaries of our thinking about the design of our dual enrollment programs and about the range of partnerships we might develop with K-12 partners to help more students thrive — who without these programs, would never have found their way to college in the first place.”

Stout raised a few themes for participants to think about over the two-day conference.

• The importance of CTE pathways to increase equitable access to dual enrollment.
• Aligning dual enrollment programs with other college offerings in a more strategic manner.
• Articulating a shared vision among partners and then creating a work plan to achieve desired outcomes.
• Focusing on equitable expansion. Specifically, Stout recommended creating culturally-focused and community-specific outreach, engaging prospective students earlier, and bringing advising/classes to students.

“Equity must be at the center of the work to strengthen dual enrollment,” she said. “There is much for us to do, and this is important work at a critical moment. Dual enrollment… must become a centerpiece to our equitable student success agenda.”

Here’s a look at some of the main takeaways from the conference. The graphic below also includes an overview of the three CCP pathways in North Carolina.

Impacts of dual enrollment

Overall, data shows positive impacts of dual enrollment, said Dr. Julie Edmunds, the director of the Early College Research Center at UNC-Greensboro’s SERVE.

that CCP programs allow participants to earn postsecondary credentials at higher rates than their peers — with larger benefits for economically disadvantaged students. Edmunds said economically disadvantaged students benefit most in attaining bachelor’s degrees.

Edmunds presented data on college-level credits earned by the end of 12th grade among CCP participants and their peers. You can see that data in the chart below.

“If you don’t see impacts on these college credits, then your program isn’t really doing anything at all,” Edmunds said. “But as you can see from this chart, CCP students earn many more college credits than students in the comparison groups.”

She noted that CIHS involvement has the largest impact on postsecondary attainment among the pathways.

Other benefits of CCP include higher graduation rates and a higher likelihood to earn a credential. That includes any postsecondary credential, certificate, associate degree, and bachelor’s degree.

Among all pathways and credentials, the only negative impact was among CTE participants. Students who participated in CTE were slightly less likely to earn a bachelor’s degree than their peers, Edmunds said.

“This seems to suggest that some students may have been steered away from earning a bachelor’s degree. Is this good, or is this bad?” Edmunds said. “It could be good if students might have learned that their desired career did not require a bachelor’s degree, and therefore they didn’t need to go to a four-year institution. However, we also know that students with bachelor’s degrees earn more over the long haul than students without bachelor’s degrees.”

Rural students also tend to benefit more from CCP participation, Edmunds said.

“(This is) mostly because they don’t have as many alternative options to them for high-level course taking,” she said.

Dr. Holley Nichols presented on benefits for rural students taking dual enrollment math courses.

North Carolina saw a 45% increase in math dual enrollment courses taken between 2017 and 2022, according to the Belk Center’s research.

“We really saw this incredible uptick that was much sharper than overall engagement in dual enrollment, in math,” said Nichols, the Belk Center’s associate director of research and evaluation.

The center analyzed participation in math dual enrollment courses across the state, focusing on highly transferrable courses like statistical methods, pre-calculus/algebra, and calculus.

They found that math dual enrollment participation was roughly 25% across the board in Tier 1 counties, as . Each year, the department ranks counties on their economic well-being, with 1 being the most economically distressed and 3 being the least economically distressed.

In rural counties specifically, the rate of participation in math dual enrollment was often higher. This could be due to generally higher rates of math teacher vacancies in rural areas, Nichols said.

In some counties, the rate of math dual enrollment participation was up to 50%, Nichols said.

“In rural areas, the importance of these math dual enrollment classes cannot be underestimated,” Nichols said. “For a lot of these high schools, that is the chance to take upper-level math.”

Despite all the benefits CCP offers, access to dual enrollment is not equitably distributed, conference speakers said. Here is a look at what research says about increasing the equity of dual enrollment.

Equitable expansion

While dual enrollment is particularly beneficial for economically-disadvantaged students, gaps exist in participation and attainment. Those gaps vary across dual enrollment pathways, speakers said, but generally impact Black, Hispanic, and male student populations.

In the college transfer pathway, Edmunds said an additional gap exists among economically disadvantaged students.

Many gaps exist because colleges are not intentional about outreach, she said.

“When you just sort of make an opportunity available to people, who are the people who are going to take advantage of that?” Edmunds said. “Well, they’re going to be the people that are already super motivated… or their parents are super motivated. People who come with all of those inherent supports and advantages, those are going to be the people who are going to take advantage of it first.”

Conference speakers, including Edmunds, emphasized several strategies to advance equity in dual enrollment: the importance of strong K-12 partnerships, academic and non-academic supports, and early career/academic exploration.

Edmunds also shared several recommendations on expanding access to dual enrollment, included below.

Sarah Griffin, a research associate with Columbia University’s , shared the center’s equity framework, dual enrollment equity pathways (DEEP).

DEEP is “a research-based framework for rethinking dual enrollment as a more equitable on-ramp to college programs of study that lead to family-supporting, career-path jobs for students who might not otherwise pursue education after college,” per

“In general, the expansion of dual enrollment has been really positive for students and communities,” Griffin said.

However, in addition to gaps in access, some dual enrollment programs also lack structured guidance for students. Griffin said the DEEP framework seeks to mitigate both challenges.

“So the DEEP research was motivated by our interest in understanding who was getting access to dual enrollment,” she said. “But also what were students getting access to, in terms of their dual enrollment programs and how they were being implemented.”

Here’s a look at the main components of the DEEP framework:

Leaders from Ohio’s and also presented on their efforts to address food insecurity among dual enrollment students.

“Why should we address food insecurity among dual enrollment students?” asked Columbus State K-12 Partnerships Director Kimberly Connell. “Because when students don’t have access to adequate food, it impacts their concentration, their memory, their mood, and their motor skills. Those are things that are all important for students to be successful.”

In fall 2021, the college started a lunch card distribution program to address food insecurity. Students who take in-person courses are eligible to receive lunch cards based on the number of days they are on campus for class.

Presenters said the program has addressed an important need. During the first year of the program, the college distributed 309 lunch cards to 10 students, per the presentation. By fall 2023, that amount increased to 1,088 lunch cards to 48 students.

“Students cannot achieve self actualization if their basic needs are not met,” Connell said.

Speakers lifted up a number of other strategies for increasing equity in dual enrollment, listed below.

• Build resources for under-resourced schools with the most limited capacity.
• Invest time and resources.
• Strengthen and streamline dual enrollment processes.
• Promote student success once students have enrolled in courses.
• Attend community and school events to explain the opportunities of dual enrollment, and market that message well.
• Prioritize authentic connections between staff and students, which requires capacity and strong team vision.

Dr. Jason Taylor, an associate professor at the University of Utah’s Department of Educational Leadership, stressed the importance of program vision and planning.

“We really need to be looking at the relationship between design and outcomes,” Taylor said. “How we design our programs and the purpose of our programs matters quite a bit in terms of what we might need to consider for equitable outcomes.”

Lessons from early colleges

Throughout the conference, several panels and speakers highlighted the strengths of the early college model.

“The early college is a really great setting to explore these other ideas about how to support students in dual enrollment courses more effectively,” said Dr. Julie Edmunds, with the Early College Research Center.

In North Carolina, early colleges fall under the pathway, which also includes middle colleges and STEM and career academies. CIHS students account for 31% of those enrolled across the three CCP programs in the state.

In order to address equity gaps in dual enrollment,  states that schools must target one of the following three student populations:

1. First-generation college students.
2. High school students who are at risk of dropping out.
3. High school students who would benefit from accelerated instruction.

Nationally, there are about 1,100 early colleges, according to research presented by . That research identifies North Carolina as a national leader of early college programs, . Here’s a map of those programs across the state.

RTI Senior Research Education Analyst Dr. Elizabeth Glennie said early colleges can help mitigate barriers to college. Glennie discussed financial, academic, cultural, and logistical barriers.

Early colleges help prepare students for the rigor and culture of college. They also provide support in applying for college, which is particularly important for first-generation students. Perhaps most importantly, Glennie said, early colleges provide students with college courses for no cost.

Dr. Frank McKay, an education consultant with RTI, spoke about the characteristics of early colleges.

In North Carolina, early colleges have a cap of 100 students per grade. N.C. early colleges serve students in grades 9-13, which allows students to remain in school for a fifth year to earn their associate degree.

“If you’ve seen one early college, you’ve seen one early college, because they’re such unique implementations,” McKay said. “The kind of sweet spot and secret of success is the combination of the rigorous (college) program and curriculum, tied with really strong student supports.”

Principal Matt Bristow-Smith spoke about how to help dual enrollment students succeed.

“One of the way you grow programs is by creating something successful that people want to be a part of, and that they can see themselves in,” Bristow-Smith said. “Giving folks hope and inspiration is really important, and someone needs to be the ‘moral cheerleader’ of your school… And the second piece is you need to have a plan for folks.”

Lisa Cummings, principal of , said “intentional supports” are crucial for student success.

Wake Early College of Health and Sciences opened in 2006 as the first early college in Wake County and focuses on careers in health sciences. Seventy percent of the school’s students are first-generation students or from underrepresented backgrounds.

Last year, 80% of their graduates were accepted and planned to attend four-year universities, Cummings said.

Here are other student success strategies Cummings shared:

• Strategic advising, front-loaded when students first arrive.
• Purposeful scheduling.
• Targeted courses.
• Interventions inside and outside the classroom.

Future research, work

Keynote speaker Dr. Karen Stout left conference attendees with several questions on which to reflect:

• Does dual enrollment help the many, many students who aspire to transfer into a bachelor’s program, but never do?
• Do our programs lead not only to good, in-demand jobs, but also put students on a pathway to a meaningful career over the long-term?
• Do our programs have positive social, economic, and cultural impacts on our communities?

Speakers also lifted up the need for strong data collection and reevaluation of programs.

The Early College Research Center is researching the impact of dual enrollment on employment and earnings, Edmunds said, and how the pandemic impacted students’ postsecondary choices and performance.

On Thursday afternoon, attendees also heard about the role of policy and legislation in dual enrollment expansion.

Those panelists emphasized the need for strong data, design, and partnerships. They also cautioned against broadly expanding all programs and advocated instead for focusing on impactful programs and practices.

Finally, the panel encouraged conference attendees to remain engaged in the policy conversations in their prospective states.

“We’re at a critical point,” said panel facilitator Dr. Joel Vargas, vice president of . “So we really need all of you champions out there.”

Everyone has a leadership role to play, Achieving the Dream’s Nick Mathern said during the conference’s closing remarks. It will take all stakeholders to reach educational attainment goals and close equity gaps, he said.

“Talk to the students and families in your community about what the value proposition for higher education looks like to them,” said Mathern, Achieving the Dream’s executive director of K–12 partnerships. “I’ve been inspired by the excellent work shared by so many of you around the country. And I’m eager to see what the collective impact of our continued work will be.”

Starting the week of March 4, you can view session recordings on after creating an account. After 30 days, those recordings will be moved to YouTube, under the handle @DE24DualEnrollmentConference.

This first appeared on and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

More than 58,000 students were eligible for placement in advanced math courses in grades 6-12 during the 2022-23 school year, Department of Public Instruction (DPI) Deputy State Superintendent Dr. Michael Maher told lawmakers on Tuesday during a Joint Legislative Education Oversight Committee (JLEOC) meeting.

The number of students eligible for advanced math courses increased more than 18% from 2021-22 — by 9,032 exam scores. Of those eligible students, 94% are currently enrolled in an advanced math course, Maher said.

“We have an increase in both the number of students scoring at the highest level on their math assessment, in addition to the percent of those students placed in the advanced math course,” Maher told lawmakers. “We are clearly seeing huge increases in the number of students participating.”

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Maher’s presentation was part of a larger discussion with legislators about advanced math courses — and the importance of automatic enrollment policies that place all students with qualifying scores in advanced courses.

North Carolina lawmakers passed to expand access in advanced courses. The goal, according to DPI’s presentation, was “to guarantee the opportunity to access advanced coursework in mathematics for those students who demonstrate readiness, regardless of student’s address and demographic factors.”

Here is a look at that statute. Note that qualifying students are automatically enrolled in the next advanced math course, unless a parent or guardian opts out.

When advanced courses are offered in mathematics, any student scoring a level five on the end-of-grade or end-of-course test for the mathematics course in which the student was most recently enrolled shall be enrolled in the advanced course for the next mathematics course in which the student is enrolled. A student in seventh grade scoring a level five on the seventh grade mathematics end-of-grade test shall be enrolled in a high school level mathematics course in eighth grade. No student who qualifies under this subsection shall be removed from the advanced or high school mathematics course in which the student is enrolled unless a parent or guardian of the student provides written consent for the student to be excluded or removed from that course.” – , Advanced courses in mathematics

Johns Hopkins University School of Education Associate Dean Dr. Jonathan Plucker said automatic enrollment policies are important to student success.

“Course placement can be fairly arbitrary and biased,” Plucker told lawmakers. “Parents shouldn’t have to have the social capital… and knowledge about how schools work to go in and fight for our children. It should be automatic. If you perform at a high level, you should be in advanced courses.”

North Carolina is one of just six states with automatic enrollment in these courses, and it’s the only one collecting “data showing whether it’s actually working or not,” Plucker said.

Here is a look at participation in N.C. advanced math courses over the last three years.

Access and advanced courses

Nationally, “many high-performing students are not offered advanced learning opportunities even when there is clear evidence that they are ready for higher-level academics,” according to an analysis by The 74, co-written by Plucker and President and CEO Brenda Berg.

“ for Hispanic, Black, Native American and low-income students, leading to a chronic underchallenging of many of the nation’s brightest children. As a result, these students are  to be ready for postsecondary education,” the analysis says. “One obvious, but surprisingly underused, remedy is . Also known as mandatory or opt-out enrollment, the concept is straightforward: Students who perform at the top of their classes are automatically placed in advanced courses for the following academic year.”

While other states are considering automatic enrollment policies, Plucker and Berg said “North Carolina is far ahead.” North Carolina’s policy begins in third grade and “specifically guarantees access to high school-level math for highly qualified middle schoolers.”

On Tuesday, Plucker told lawmakers the percentage of high-performing North Carolina students not placed in advanced math courses “has steadily and significantly dropped.”

“I would argue in terms of participation it absolutely is working. … There’s been progress across the board, which I think is very important,” Plucker said. “That’s probably due to several different factors. Pandemic recovery is probably part of it. But there’s no question that automatic enrollment is probably part of that too.”

In 2019, lawmakers updated the state statute to require an annual report from DPI on implementation. Here are a few highlights from :

• For eligible eighth grade students, data indicates the overall number and percentage of students placed in Math 1 or other advanced mathematics courses is again >95%. This reflect a 1% increase over the 2022-23 reporting year.
• That eighth grade increase is true across all race/ethnic groups, per the report. Before the legislation (2017-18), only 87% of eligible eighth grade students accessed N.C. Math 1 in eighth grade.
• Of students who qualified for advanced courses, 94% of white, 92% of Black, 92% of Hispanic, 88% of American Indian/Alaska Native, and more than 95% of Asian students actually enrolled in advanced math courses.
• Data indicates middle school students are more likely to access advanced courses beginning in sixth grade. Last year, 90% of eligible sixth grade students took an advanced math course.
• Across grades six-12, current data shows that 94% of both male and female eligible students enroll in advanced mathematics courses. This is an increase of 2% for females and 3% for males from the previous year.

“Several districts have reported that the policy helped to accelerate students who might otherwise have been overlooked,” The 74 analysis says. “Districts responded to the legislation by developing partnerships between middle and high schools, expanding virtual instruction, personalizing support based on students’ needs and increasing access to advanced education for students who previously were not offered such opportunities.”

You can view the Johns Hopkins School of Education report, which served as background for The 74 article, . You can also view DPI’s full presentation .

Future possibilities for automatic enrollment and math

Plucker raised several opportunities for automatic enrollment in the future:

• North Carolina could expand automatic enrollment to other content areas, such as English Language Arts or science.
• Creating more opportunities for students who ask to take advanced courses to be able to do so. “If students self nominate, they should be given a chance,” he said.
• Continuing efforts to teach math more effectively, including teacher prep, high-quality curriculum, and and emphasis on research and evaluation.

Maher said schools also must offer support for students who place in advanced coursework for the first time.

“Next steps will be to continue to review our data for disparities and looking for other opportunities,” he said. “We are also interested in conversations around extending auto enrollment to other subjects.”

Plucker also raised the following research questions for North Carolina:

• Why are there lower rates of participation in sixth and 12th grade? Are there ways to address this?
• What’s happening at the elementary school level? What are districts doing to get more students to advanced performance?
• What strategies have districts used most successfully to increase access? What hasn’t worked?
• How are districts using automatic enrollment to complement other advanced education services?
• What is the impact of automatic enrollment on a wide range of student outcomes?

Above all, Plucker and Maher stressed that state leadership should continue to stress both remediation and excellence when it comes to math.

“We are very interested in not only continuing to work at supporting students at the highest level of math, but also reaching students who are being underserved right now in mathematics — in an effort to accelerate math learning for for all children,” Maher said.

This first appeared on and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

State Superintendent Catherine Truitt the Department of Public Instruction’s (DPI) proposal for school performance grade redesign to lawmakers on Monday during a House education reform committee meeting.

To move forward, the model requires legislative action.

“The new proposed model… aims to tell parents and the public more about the quality of each school and how it is preparing students for life after graduation, rather than solely reflecting student performance on high-stakes testing,” DPI in a press release.

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Currently,  each school’s achievement score, weighted 80%, and on students’ academic growth, weighted 20%. Education leaders say that formula does not capture the full picture of the work happening in our public schools. DPI’s presentation said national data “affirms North Carolina schools are performing considerably better than their state performance grades otherwise suggest.”

“We have to do more than simply look at test scores that occur on one day of the year at the end of the year or semester,” Truitt said. “We must absolutely be as transparent as possible about the percentage of students who are proficient in reading and proficient math, but there has to be more than that.”

The proposed model include developing “a multi-measure model of school performance that moves beyond compliance with federal guidelines and represents NC educational values,” per DPI’s presentation.

Under DPI’s proposed model, presented on Monday, schools would receive four different grades. Those four grades, listed below, would not be combined into one single letter.

• Academics. Across all grades, this would measure proficiency in math, science, and reading.
• Progress. This grade would measure a school’s growth, based on .
• Readiness. Across K-12, this grade would measure postsecondary preparation. In middle school, it would also include career development plans. In high school, it would also include postsecondary outcomes and graduation rates.
• Opportunity. This grade would measure chronic absenteeism, school climate, and intra/extra curricular activities.

“Instead of one performance grade, we have four,” Truitt told lawmakers. “This proposal creates a more robust state accountability model. That is the best way for holding schools accountable for providing a high-quality education.”

DPI convened a working group to redesign the accountability model in fall 2022. That work included input from a . After unveiling eight possible new indicators in January 2023, working groups began meeting in May to refine each indicator. Those groups met through October.

DPI is asking for lawmakers to enact legislation allowing for a voluntary pilot to begin during the 2024-25 school year. In Year 2, all school districts would participate in both models, with support from DPI. In Year 3, only the new accountability model would be used.

Because the state already tracks school achievement and growth data, Truitt said no changes would need to take place for the first two measures. However, DPI would need to create new tracking systems for postsecondary preparation indicators and outcomes and intra/extra curricular activities.

More information about the DPI advisory group’s work is available on .

How we got here

Current school performance grades were first reported in February 2015 based on 2013-14 school year data, .

School grades are based on achievement through test scores (80%) and growth (20%) and are assigned as follows:

• A = 100–85
• B = 84–70
• C = 69–55
• D = 54–40
• F = 39 and below

According DPI’s presentation on Monday, 46.5% of elementary schools were “D and F schools” in 2021-22. More than half of middle schools (52%) and 23% of high schools received the same designation in that time period. K-8 school grades are limited to test score results, contributing to the higher number of low-performing schools. You can view .

“A large proportion of our schools is low performing,” Dr. Michael Maher, DPI’s deputy state superintendent, said on Monday. “As we think about this problem, one of the first steps we took was to say, ‘Well what does it look like across the country?’”

Based on school performance grades alone, North Carolina schools are performing worse than several other states, DPI said.

Here’s a look at North Carolina’s school performance grades in 2021-22, compared with scores in Arizona, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas. This data is the same data Truitt presented to lawmakers in May.

However, if you look at National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) scores in each state, DPI said North Carolina is performing much better than its school performance grades suggest. Here is a look at those comparisons:

Maher said this disproportionate number of low-performing schools in North Carolina suggests a problem with the accountability model.

“We’ve set up a system that is no longer valid,” he said. “How do we then as a state, revise this system in a way that it becomes more representative of not only our evolving priorities in North Carolina and addresses the needs of stakeholders, but is also valid and reliable?”

Truitt said the current formula is only part of the problem. Another challenge is that the same data results in two different designations at the federal and state level. That lack of alignment between models makes it difficult to ensure school improvement plans are carried out, Truitt said, or that they are working.

Per DPI’s presentation, such designations also don’t currently result in much funding. That can make it difficult for schools to implement required improvement plans.

“The result is well intentioned but provides ineffective support for principals, educators, and ultimately students,” the presentation said.

DPI’s proposed model would allow the state to measure what matters, she said. In the future, she said, this model would also allow DPI to better use state dollars to assess and support schools.

The proposed model generated bipartisan discussion from lawmakers. Among other things, lawmakers asked about how to increase the capacity to assist low-performing schools, mental health of students, and the use of the .

, asked how the model would support teachers and principals. Cotham, who , previously served as an assistant school principal and educator. She also asked how the “readiness” measure would account for the quality of success, rather than just the number of students who enroll, enlist, or employ.

Truitt said the new model would help schools start to address both.

“I have not asked this body for money to support low-performing schools to date, and this is exactly why,” Truitt said. “We have to fix this before we can come to you and say, ‘We need X amount of dollars in personnel who can go in and support low-performing schools.’ So eventually we would come back for an ask.”

In May, a bipartisan group of lawmakers expressed support for the model, and the impact of chronic absenteeism, school discipline, and the accountability models that other states use.

“The accountability model drives what gets done in a school and what gets prioritized. Right now, we are only prioritizing high-stakes, one-and-done testing,” Truitt last May. “While it is important to be public about how our students are doing in reading and math and science and their proficiency rates and those teacher growth rates, there’s so much more that we need to be transparent about.”

More from the committee

The House select committee on education reform also heard two other presentations on Monday.

Alexis Schauss, DPI’s chief financial officer, gave . There are currently 211 charter schools in North Carolina, per that presentation, making up 10% of the state’s allotted Average Daily Membership.

Superintendent Dr. Aaron Woody also gave a brief

Committee Co-Chair , praised Woody’s leadership at the beginning of his presentation — noting that Woody formerly served as his children’s principal.

Among other things, Woody highlighted the , growth in the number of students credentialed, and the system’s mission.

“I was thinking about our why — why we do what we do, why you do what you do here in this chamber, talking about public education and why it matters,” he said. “It matters for each and every one of the 4,600 students that are in my school district for the staff and the parents that are represented, and for the students all across our state.”

This first appeared on and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

During the height of the pandemic, states received nearly $122 billion in Elementary and Secondary Schools Emergency Relief (ESSER III) funds to address student academic, social, emotional, and mental health needs. North Carolina received $3.6 billion, on top of previous federal Covid relief dollars.

Now, districts must spend those funds by Sept. 30 — a deadline coming to be known as “the funding cliff.” On Monday, officials from the Department of Public Instruction (DPI) presented a to state lawmakers at a House education reform meeting.

The toolkit seeks to help districts with “data-driven financial decision making for post-ESSER spending,” per DPI’s presentation.

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“The toolkit is built to really support leaders in public schools as they think about the end of ESSER funding,” said Dr. Michael Maher, DPI’s deputy state superintendent. “The idea is we want districts to be able to have the toolkit to have really good conversations about how they spent their money, and whether those funds were effective or not.”

States received during the pandemic. The first round — roughly $13.2 billion — largely went toward personal protective equipment and devices for students to safely reopen schools. The second and third rounds — nearly $123 billion — were a little more flexible, but were intended to support academic and mental health at schools as they recovered from Covid.

DPI’s toolkit is specifically designed to help discussions between district leaders like the superintendent (or charter school leader), chief financial officer, and administrators with budgetary responsibilities. DPI presented the toolkit to superintendents across the state last month, Maher said, and is also hosting in February.

Districts should not include any one-time expenditures in their ROI discussions, per the presentation. Interventions that might be discussed in this process include high-dosage tutoring, summer learning initiatives, and robotics programs.

“The expectation is that the district now really has to make a decision about whether or not to continue an intervention,” Maher said. “In essence, this is what we’re trying to do, is give them the best available data that we can to help them drive themselves to the right decision for their given school, for their given context.”

Here are a few strategies the presentation identified for continuing initiatives currently funded through federal relief funds:

• Apply for specific grant funding, from private or federal sources.
• Request an increase in local funding from county commissioners.
• Use an innovative approach of “braiding” or overlapping federal funds.
• Identify funding from within current budget.

You can view DPI’s full presentation , and its full toolkit . Check out DPI’s dashboard’s for ESSER spending by school district .

More on remaining funds, cliff

In March 2021, State Superintendent Catherine Truitt created the Office of Learning Recovery and Acceleration to help find and make evidence-based decisions regarding recovery from lost instructional time during the start of the pandemic — with a large focus on how to spend ESSER funds well.

The state received roughly $6 billion total in federal Covid funds for K-12 education, Maher told lawmakers. Approximately $1.3 billion of North Carolina’s ESSER III funds remained to be allocated as of Oct. 31, according to

DPI’s toolkit includes a starting point for districts of last December through the end of this month. During this time, the presentation says, districts should convene a team to focus on evaluating ESSER spending. The toolkit presentation includes the following questions:

• What is the PSU’s risk for a dramatic fiscal cliff post-ESSER?
• What initiatives/programs/expenditures will different groups of stakeholders be most interested in sustaining post-ESSER?
• What are the PSU’s top 2-3 priorities and which expenditures most support those priorities?

Districts should obligate all their funds by April or May of 2024, Maher said. This is to ensure no funds get reverted back to the federal government after the September deadline.

An  issued in March 2023 identified 15 states facing the most complex challenges with the cliff. North Carolina was one of them.

However, a recent FutureEd  found that North Carolina school districts — especially in rural regions — generally spent more of their ESSER funds on short-term staffing fixes than long-term personnel commitments. “This decision could potentially ease their fiscal pain when the funds run out,”

On Monday, , asked Maher about how DPI is approaching planning for the replacement of technologies funded in the last few years through ESSER dollars.

“The technology, after two or three years, it’s just outdated. And that’s my big concern with the direction we’re headed in right now,” Biggs said. “If we can’t keep up with our students and our parents, they’re gonna find somewhere where they can keep up.”

Last month, DPI also gave  to the education reform committee That report showed that 114 of 115 school districts currently have one device per student. This allows students to take devices home with them to help with studying and homework.

However, 89 of 115 districts have reported they do not currently have sufficient resources “to sustain their refresh cycles for student devices beyond ESSER funding.” That’s more than 77% of districts.

Maher said that “a large chunk” of ESSER funds have gone toward HVAC systems, technology hardware and infrastructure, and access to broadband. He said DPI is still discussing how districts can “replenish technology as it becomes, in essence, out of date.”

, said good data will be key to good decisions moving forward.

“We’re going into post-Covid and those monies are running out,” Torbett said. “Hopefully, we have worked procedures out to help those agencies that used that money. For one time purposes should be okay, but there were some that have used the money for recurring expenses that we’ll be probably be hearing about in the days and weeks to come.”

If you have additional questions about DPI’s toolkit, email Rachel Wright-Junio, director of the Office of Learning Recovery & Acceleration, or Dr. Andrew Smith, the assistant state superintendent of DPI’s Office of Innovation.

This first appeared on and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

North Carolina has lost almost 4% of its licensed child care programs since the start of the pandemic, according to data provided by the NC Child Care Resource and Referral Council (CCR&R) in partnership with the NC Division of Child Development and Early Education (DCDEE).

Since February 2020, there has been a net loss of 203 licensed child care programs statewide — from 5,242 before the pandemic to 5,039 at the end of 2023.

And those losses are likely to accelerate this year.

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Federal funding helped stabilize early childhood education in the state during the pandemic, but that funding expired in September 2023 and will run out for North Carolina after June 30.

A estimated that 1,178 licensed child care programs in our state will close without intervention from the state or federal government.

What we know

Since the General Assembly approved a state budget in September 2023 that in early childhood education, licensed child care centers and family child care homes have been grappling with how they will keep their doors open beyond the summer funding cliff.

Shay Jackson, a licensed provider of a family child care home in Forsyth County, told EdNC, “They may possibly lose a great quality [program], because I am not gonna be able to sustain and I’m trying to think ahead. I’m literally like, updating my LinkedIn account.”

At the federal level, the U.S. House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed an extension of the child tax credit at the end of January. The bill’s future in the Senate is less certain. While that legislation could and improve the economic circumstances of another 3 million children, it does not address the child care crisis directly.

The General Assembly’s short session begins on April 24, giving members barely two months to adopt policies that would prevent North Carolina’s child care system from the worst effects of going over the funding cliff.

EdNC is with a particular focus on three subgroups of counties — the two counties with high Indigenous populations, the eight counties in the northeastern corner of the state in which more than half of the population identifies as Black or mixed race, and the 18 counties in the southwestern corner of the state that make up the focus area of the . The trust was created in 2018 “to address the upstream factors that influence the wellbeing of individuals, families and communities: housing, education, economic opportunity and health & wellness.”

The data for the third quarter of the year (July-September) revealed that these three subgroups were bucking the statewide trend, with each showing modest net gains in their numbers of licensed child care sites.

But there were changes in the fourth quarter (October-December).

The Dogwood counties (Avery, Buncombe, Burke, Cherokee, Clay, Graham, Haywood, Henderson, Jackson, Macon, Madison, McDowell, Mitchell, Polk, Rutherford, Swain, Transylvania, and Yancey) officially have fewer licensed child care sites than before the pandemic. They went from 386 in February 2020 to 385 in December 2023.

The majority-Black counties (Bertie, Edgecombe, Halifax, Hertford, Northampton, Vance, Warren, and Washington) have seen a slight increase in the number of sites since the beginning of the pandemic. While individual counties have gained and lost sites in the time between the September 2023 data and December 2023 data, the overall number (204) has held firm.

The counties with high Indigenous populations (Robeson and Swain) have seen an overall increase in the number of sites since the beginning of the pandemic as well, from 99 to 105. It’s worth noting that there were 106 sites at the end of the third quarter, so the fourth-quarter data represent a slight decrease.

What we don’t know

The data provided by the CCR&R Council in partnership with DCDEE can only tell us about licensed child care, which does not include friend, family, and neighbor (FFN) care. FFN may be the care of choice for a variety of reasons having to do with quality — especially trust and cultural match — accessibility, and affordability. Data on FFN are hard to come by because they are outside of state regulatory structures.

EdNC recently from visits to five states who are leading the way on early childhood investment and policy. We identified four strategies — advocacy from the business community, grassroots organizing, streamlining governance, and identifying/creating new funding streams — that could help North Carolina regain its position as a leader for its youngest learners. We’ll be watching to see if local and state policymakers embrace any of these strategies (or others) in time to avoid the dire consequences of the funding cliff.

This first appeared on and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

North Carolina’s adoption of the “Parents’ Bill of Rights” law has led to school-based policies and practices that discriminate against LGBTQ students, the Campaign for Southern Equality (CSE) alleges in a against the State Board of Education and the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction.

The complaint was filed with the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights and the U.S. Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division on Tuesday. It contends that the state’s public schools are “systematically marginalizing” LGBTQ students with the mandates included in Senate Bill 49. The law requires educators to alert parents if their child changes their name or pronoun at school. It also restricts instruction about gender identity and sexuality in K-4 classrooms.

“Under the leadership of the North Carolina State Board of Education and the Department of Public Instruction, local school districts are barring LGBTQ-affirming content, outing transgender students, erecting barriers to LGBTQ students receiving needed health care at school as well as support from educators and prohibiting transgender girls from playing athletics consistent with their gender identity,” CSE wrote in its complaint on behalf of LGBTQ students.

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The complaint is critical of Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson for making what CSE contends are “homophobic and transphobic” remarks. The complaint shares several Robinson quotes about homosexuality including in which he said: “There’s no reason anybody anywhere in America should be telling any child about transgenderism, homosexuality, any of that filth.”

CSE is also critical of State Superintendent Catherine Truitt for her support of SB 49 and House Bill 574, the so-called “Fairness in Women’s Sports Act,” which restricts transgender females from playing middle school, high school and college sports.

“While she [Truitt] avoids ranting about “filth,” she agrees with the Lieutenant Governor [Robinson] that transgender people do not really exist,” the complaint states. “ She consistently refers to transgender women as “biological males” and speaks consistently of “gender preference.”

CSE asked federal officials to protect students.

“SBE’s and DPI’s implementation of SB 49 and HB 574 is discriminating against LGBTQ students in North Carolina,” the complaint states. “This discrimination has created a hostile educational environment that harms LGBTQ students on a daily basis and, in so doing, violates Title IX.”

Educators have been left in an impossible position due to SB 49 mandates and a lack of guidance from the state education leaders about how to implement them, the complaint said.

“They [educators] must choose between, on the one hand, following state leaders’ orders or, on the other hand, federal and state legal obligations as well as their professional obligations to their students,” the complaint states.

NCDPI spokeswoman Blair Rhoades told NC Newsline in December that the department provided information about SB 49 to more than 350 participants via a webinar. Rhoades  the department has provide for guidance with the lengthy title: “Parents Guide to Student Achievement (PSGA) Considerations from NCDPI: Based on Parents’ Bill of Rights – SB49; Session Law 2023-106.”

Meanwhile, the complaint included dozens of testimonials from students, parents, educators and other who shared stories about how the mandates are harming students by forcing LGBTQ students back into the closet and preventing them from receiving supportive services.

One high school student reported: “I personally have a supportive family who has put my preferred name in PowerSchool, but my friends are no longer feeling safe going by their preferred name and pronouns because they’re afraid that they will be outed to their families who are not supportive. These friends are scared for their safety and well-being.”

Democratic critics of the law complained that the legislation would have a chilling effect on student and teacher relationships at a time when student mental health is a top concern. But Republican supporters said it grew out of parental concerns about school curriculum parents saw when children were learning from home during the pandemic.

Chapel Hill-Carrboro School member Mike Sharp said SB 49 needs more work.

“I think a logical next step then would be to send this back to the policy committee with a clear directive from us that says: take out the parts of this that are harmful to children, rewrite it, ignore whether you’re breaking SB 49,” Sharp said in testimonials shared by CSE.

Last week, Sharp’s board declined to create a procedure to alert parents before allowing a student to use a different name or pronoun at school. It also declined to prohibit instruction about gender identity and sexuality in K-4 classrooms.

Truitt said there could be consequences for not following the law.

“No. Sorry. You may not break the laws you don’t like – even in Chapel Hill. I worked with the legislature to pass the Parents Bill of Rights to protect children and empower parents and it’s unacceptable for Chapel Hill or anyone else to ignore it,” Truitt tweeted last week.

is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. NC Newsline maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Rob Schofield for questions: info@ncnewsline.com. Follow NC Newsline on and .

Inside a classroom at the , a group of small children sit in a circle with their teacher to learn about the alphabet, but how they go about learning their letters is what makes this lesson unique — and fun.

These children have , small touchpads loaded with learning games. Distributing the Seedlings to schools, care centers, state and local agencies, and families is the mission of , a nonprofit founded by former State Board of Education member that seeks to prepare underserved children ages 3 and 4 for kindergarten through interactive games teaching letters, numbers, shapes, and colors.

For this classroom game, a child holds a Seedling displaying a letter over their head, and asks their classmate and teacher questions about the letter like, “does my letter make the ‘W-uh’ sound?” or “does my letter come after ‘V’ in the alphabet?”

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The child can then use the answers as clues to determine the mystery letter. Once the letter is correctly guessed, they can trace the letter on the Seedling tablet, successfully learning a portion of the alphabet while using visual, auditory, and tactile skills.

What makes this game and these Seedling touchpads even more special is that the devices were given to Ashe County Schools, and many other locations across North Carolina and beyond, at no cost.

Over 22,000 Seedlings have been distributed to children since 2016, according to ApSeed. The nonprofit distributes them for free to families and locations such as Head Starts, pre-K programs, child care services, at special events, health care practices, or WIC centers.

ApSeed currently serves 16 counties in North Carolina, four counties in South Carolina, and other locations in California, New York, Liberia, and Zimbabwe.

Funding for ApSeed comes from grants and private donations as well as from government appropriations. In 2022, the General Assembly allocated $2.5 million to ApSeed, which in turn provided service for about 12,000 children.

Making a ‘big hairy audacious goal’

ApSeed is part of what Alcorn calls a “big hairy audacious goal,” or “BHAG.” Alcorn said a BHAG is something to achieve on the macro-level at least 10 years out that requires leadership and helps to create a future that would otherwise be impossible.

A BHAG for ApSeed is to promote higher graduation rates to create a well-educated workforce for the future of the state and elsewhere by starting early with a community’s youngest learners. Alcorn emphasized that those who graduate high school are more likely to have higher wages once entering the workforce.

Alcorn said when a student is able to succeed academically early on, the success continues to have a ripple effect throughout the child’s educational journey.

“If you’re pretty good at pre-K you’ve got a good chance of being a good kindergartener, right? And then if you’re good at kindergarten, you’ve got a pretty good chance at first grade,” Alcorn said.

Helping children succeed is a priority for ApSeed, Alcorn said, but helping communities succeed is an additional priority, he said. When schools have success, that encourages others to reside in that area, he said, benefiting that community.

Alcorn is working toward a return on investment, hoping to see long term-results that start with a child first beginning to learn.

Dr. Eisa Cox, superintendent of , said increasing the area’s graduation rates is part of her district’s strategic plan, and that effort is a dedication that begins with early learning. Cox said if a child is unprepared for kindergarten, they will be less likely to graduate.

“It’s a long-term commitment to how we support families and how we support learning, from the time they begin learning clear through postsecondary education,” Cox said. “We want kids to graduate ready with skills and the knowledge and the confidence that they can do whatever they want.”

Planting a Seedling

Terry Richardson, director of exceptional children and pre-k programs for Ashe County Schools, said the opportunity for multi-sensory learning on the Seedlings is important as children develop their unique learning styles.

“It’s auditory, tactile, and visual. Every child learns in a different way. We don’t know what their learning style is until we get them and we are teaching, and to see what their learning style is,” Richardson said. “They can learn every area of literacy and math on the ApSeed tool through the visual, the tactile, or the auditorial because it’s integrated within each app.”

The Seedlings come preloaded with games and have no Wi-Fi or camera capabilities to ensure safety and promote the age-appropriate learning of the child using it.

Each Seedling comes with headphones, a charger, information for families on kindergarten readiness, and a protective case with a handle.

The touchpads have a variety of games that range in difficulty levels from “baby games” all the way to multiplication for those children seeking to explore extra challenges. Colorful and happy cartoon animals serve as the mascots for the games and cheer the students on when a question is answered correctly.

Richardson recalled getting goosebumps during an ApSeed distribution event that brought out over 500 families, and said she has seen children with Seedlings around her community.

“I’ve gone to different activities in the community and you’ll see kids carrying little ApSeed around and things like that because it’s such an engaging, appropriate learning tool for literacy and math that are developmentally appropriate for their ages,” Richardson said.

This first appeared on and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

Four months after officially beginning work in August to revise its funding model, the N.C. Community College System (NCCCS) unveiled its new plan, called Propel NC, at the State Board of Community Colleges meeting Jan. 19.

The plan received a unanimous vote of approval from all 58 members of the N.C. Association of Community College Presidents (NCACCP) in December. The full State Board is set to vote on the modernization plan in February and then will request consideration of Propel NC by the legislature during the short session in April. Between now and then, NCCCS stakeholders are working to engage business leaders across the state, too.

“This is an orchestrated effort with businesses in all 100 counties and across all 58 colleges,” State Board Chair Tom Looney said at Friday’s meeting. “Exciting times are ahead for us here in the North Carolina Community College System.”

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Propel NC

The NCCCS’ current state funding model was created in 2010 and last updated in 2013.

The vast majority of funding for the state’s 58 community colleges comes from state appropriations, with  allocated each year of this biennium.

The system’s current funding model allocates resources to the colleges in proportion to the number of full-time equivalent (FTE) students they enroll in each of their programs. Certain courses receive more state funds than others based on a four-tier funding model.

Under the proposed model, funding based on FTE would remain in place, but the current FTE tiers would shift to “workforce sectors” instead. The 16-person Propel NC work group says this will move the NCCCS toward a labor-market driven model of community college programs.

The anticipated cost for this part is approximately $68.6 million, .

Under this model, all curriculum and continuing education (CE) courses would reside in the same workforce sector. A nursing curriculum and nursing CE course would be funded the same way, for example.

The proposed sectors largely focus on health care, technology, and trades. Courses not on this list would be held harmless and retain their same value, but they would not be labeled in tiers. There would be a catch-all sector for transfer and general education courses.

“Tier funding never resonated with anyone, no one ever knew what (the tiers) meant,” Finance Committee Chair Lisa Estep said. “This model… resonates with everyone and ultimately brings so much back to the student and to business, so I think its great we’re going down this path.”

Under the proposed model, courses will be ranked and valued by statewide salary job demand data. The course rankings will be updated every three years.

On Friday, Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, an ex-officio member of the State Board, expressed his support for the plan.

“Moving from tiers-based to labor-market driven, I would suppose that would give us a lot more flexibility, so I think that’s very good,” Robinson said. “Community colleges are going to be essential (to the economy)… so I’m glad to see the work that’s going on.”

In addition to instructional funding based on FTE, colleges receive a base allocation for institutional and academic support, which includes additional funding for multi-campus centers.

The NCCCS modernization plan proposes to increase the base allocation 5.8%, “which closes the gap to actual spending patterns and account for inflation,” the NCCCS document says. “This modification would also increase the enrollment allotment above 750 FTE based on this increase in other costs funding.” The anticipated cost for this request is about $24.4 million.

The NCCCS modernization plan also includes two other focus areas, listed below.

• Enrollment increase reserve. The current enrollment growth reserve was implemented in 2010 in response to the large number of students enrolling in community colleges after the Great Recession. The system wants to request $6 million in non-recurring funds for a fixed per-FTE amount for any colleges that go over the enrollment threshold set by their FTE for the fiscal year. The system would then like to build replenishment of the fund into the recurring enrollment growth fund in the state budget.
• Excess tuition retention. Excess tuition receipts currently fund the enrollment increase reserve. The NCCCS work group would like to change that, allowing excess tuition receipts to return to the college which generated them but only on years when the system as a whole generates excess receipts.

Together, the request has a nearly $100 million price tag. Meetings between NCCCS leaders and legislators have already started, per the system.

“I couldn’t be more proud of where we’ve arrived at this point in time. I think this is a game changer for our system,” NCCCS President Dr. Jeff Cox said in November. “It answers the call that I think we’re hearing from our legislature and our governor about the community colleges’ critical role in meeting the workforce needs of the future of our state. …It aligns our system in a way we’ve just never been before.”

You can view more details about Propel NC, including projections for the proposed workforce sectors, . You can read more about how community colleges are currently funded .

Increased oversight of presidential reelections

State law has historically given the State Board of Community Colleges the authority to approve or deny the election of local college presidents by local boards of trustees. The new budget, , adds reelection authority to the Board.

This is being interpreted as requiring State Board approval for any contract renewals, extensions, or amendments for local presidents, and the State Board on Friday proposed an to reflect that.

On Friday, the Board approved two reelections: President Dr. Patty Pfeiffer and President Dr. Janet Spriggs.

The Board also approved Dr. Michael Rodgers as the next president of . The college’s board of trustees shortly after the meeting. The search process began after Cox announced his new role as system president.

“We did a nationwide search and had 42 applicants for the position,” said Wilkes Community College Board Chair Jay Vannoy. “We are excited to announce Dr. Michael Rodgers as the next president of WCC. He has the education, knowledge, and experience to lead our college. We are looking forward to working with him to continue and build upon the work Wilkes Community College is doing to educate and train our students. I also want to thank Morgan Francis for his great leadership as interim president during this transition period.”

Dr. Rodgers will take the helm in early June.

The meeting included several other personnel decisions and announcements.

• The Board announced Kelly Klug as the new director of grants with a salary of $105,000. Klug will serve as a resource for grants within the system.
• The Board voted to create a new position, , who will lead the Career & College Readiness Graduate (CCRG) program. The position will be funded through a reorganization of system funds.
• Cox also recognized two new staff members: Dr. Chris Harrington, the new lead of ApprenticeshipNC, and Dr. Zach Barricklow, for the new position of associate vice president for strategy and rural innovation.

Student completion strategies

Strategies to advance student success and completion were discussed several times at January’s meeting.

First, the Board’s “transformative discussion” focused on strategies for increasing student completion.

The discussion included information on Collaborative, a program established by the City University of New York (CUNY) in 2007 to increase timely degree completion. Today, the program serves 25,000 students a year, and the collaborative partners with institutions across the country to replicate their model.

Dr. Shun Robertson, the UNC System’s vice president for access and success strategy, spoke about how the UNC System has replicated this model with a focus on community college transfers. The program, , provides financial aid and advising to eligible students.

Only 36% of N.C. community college students graduate within two years of transferring to the UNC System, Robertson said — nearly 20 percentage points lower than the four-year completion rate for first-time, full-time students. Despite this gap, community college transfers have, on average, equivalent GPAs in their first year as their peers.

“So they are qualified, they are doing well in our institutions,” Robertson said. “They’re just not graduating at the same rate. So why is this?”

TrACe is currently offered at three institutions right now — Appalachian State, UNC Greensboro, and East Carolina University.

Scott Byington, associate vice president of onboarding and advising at (CCCC), also spoke about student completion strategies.

At CCCC, 62% of students are part-time, he said. About a third of students are parents, and 17% are single parents. Another third of students struggle with housing and/or food insecurity.

The college has worked to address these challenges in a few ways: more intensive advising, accelerated course options, emergency funding for micro-grants, and laptop loaners, among other things.

These strategies are working, Byington said. But most of the strategies are funded through grants, which don’t always offer very sustainable funding.

“We need these graduates. There are thousands of jobs coming to North Carolina, and we need students who are ready,” he said. “It’s going to require investment to get more of these students to not just start, but to finish.”

Minority Male Success Initiative

The Board also heard and approved its , which was established in fall 2003 to improve the retention and graduation rates of minority male students. Since then, “over 10,000 students have received support and assistance towards achieving their educational, professional, and civic goals,” the report says.

This is the first year the system has had to provide a report regarding the program.

As of July 2022, 21 community colleges received funding for the initiative. The amount of state funding has remained the same since 2016 — $810,000 for a 3-4 year period. The report says funding is “allocated through a competitive funding process.”

“This is a critical program,” said Sarah West, co-chair of the Board’s programs and student success committee.

Several Board members, including West, emphasized the need for such an important program to include more funding to expand the initiative to more colleges and to expand the work happening at each campus.

You can read examples of how colleges with initiative funding used the money starting

ERP, student food insecurity, and more

• The Board approved funding to for the period Sept. 1, 2023, through Dec. 31, 2025, for “an amount not to exceed $2,000,000 to reimburse the pilot colleges for costs incurred for the modernized ERP.” These updates should eventually improve data collection and sharing across the system.
• Tony Pile, the Board’s student member and president of the North Carolina Comprehensive College Student Government Association (N4CSGA), read a letter promoting the importance of student representation on local boards of trustees, based on a motion passed at the N4CSGA fall conference. The letter asked the Board to formally vote to maintain the ex-officio student member on local boards.
• Pile read another letter asking the board to acknowledge and address food insecurity on campuses across the state. Over 50 of the 58 campuses have a food bank, he said, but the N4CSGA would like to see a fully operational food pantry on every campus by fall 2024.
• The Board approved to continue support of a prison education project carried out by Pamlico Community College and Pamlico Correctional Institution. You can read EdNC’s report on the program from August 2022 .
• Cox approved the following colleges to offer with an effective term of fall 2024: Cape Fear Community College, James Sprunt Community College, Sandhills Community College, and South Piedmont Community College.
• The Board also met in closed session at the end of its meeting to discuss winners for this year’s NCCCS faculty and staff awards.

The full Board is scheduled to meet next Feb. 15-16 in Raleigh.

This first appeared on and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

Fifteen school districts, charter schools and tribal schools will share nearly $27 million in federal dollars to purchase 114 electric buses as part of the EPA’s Clean School Bus Grant Program, Gov. Roy Cooper announced Tuesday.

Cooper said in a statement that electric buses help protect children from harmful diesel fumes, cut carbon emissions, save money on bus maintenance and repairs, and create good jobs.

“This investment is good for our students, schools, economy and planet and I appreciate the Biden Administration for investing in our communities across North Carolina,” Cooper said.

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The state was awarded 31 buses under the Clean School Bus Program in 2022. Cooper’s administration funded 43 electric buses in 2022 through a settlement with Volkswagen. North Carolina received $92 million as part of a nationwide multi-billion-dollar penalty assessed by the EPA on the car company, which violated the Clean Air Act by cheating on millions of emissions tests.

North Carolina has added 188 electric buses within the past two years. The majority of the new buses will be sent to low-income, rural and/or tribal communities that serve more than 300,000 students in 13 counties.

Durham Public Schools will receive 38 buses, which is the largest share of the 114. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools will receive 27, Cherokee Central schools 15 and Kannapolis City Schools eight. Five buses have been awarded to two Durham charter schools — Maureen Joy Charter School will receive four, and Reaching All Minds Academy was awarded one bus.

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