At 7:30 a.m. on Wednesday morning, about 50 people gathered in front of the school. They wear red for education and plan to walk into school in solidarity, signifying their support for the public school system.
Tamika Walker Kelly, president of the North Carolina Association of Educators, was also there. She asked lawmakers to continue paying teachers in western NC while recovery efforts are underway. Enrollment drives budgets, so Walker Kelly says she opposes cutting funds if student enrollment drops. She also wants to allow calendar flexibility for those schools. [Note: On Wednesday afternoon, legislators passed a bill containing some of those provisions; Gov. Roy Cooper is expected to sign it soon.]
Walker Kelly said they’ll need funding to rebuild schools and facilities — pivoting to the issue of school vouchers.
“And so we say that because we cannot invest our public tax dollars in vouchers when we need to be supporting our schools. Do y'all agree?” she asked the crowd.
These vouchers are available to families at every income level, and they can receive anywhere from $3,360 to $7,468 to send their children to private or religious schools.
Proponents of the bill say it gives families more educational options — while critics say it diverts funding that could go to public schools.
North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper recently vetoed a bill to funnel $463 million in additional funding for vouchers this year and the next. The state has already distributed close to $192 million for this year. Legislators are expected to take up a veto-override vote soon.
Boubacar Aw came out to join his Hoggard colleagues. He’s an educator and a basketball coach.
“I have a little child too, but it was very important for me to come out here and show support, and also let people know that public education does matter and that we need to pay attention to it," he said.
Everette Rose-Wilkinson is a student at Hoggard who showed up to support her teachers.
“We do not have all the funds, but we're still good schools, and great students come out of our schools,” she said.
Ed Terzian is a science teacher at the school. He said that even if families need the funding to attend their school of choice, how will they pay for the rest of the tuition — if the voucher doesn't cover the total amount? (For example, private school tuition can run well over $20,000, so for lower-income families getting just over $7,000 in voucher funding, there's a significant financial gap).
“And so what you end up with is people that have enough money already to send their kids to private school, just taking advantage of, you know, a tax system that's just giving them a little bit extra money that they probably don't need to begin with,” he said.
Of the vouchers awarded, only 19% went to families making under $57,720 ('Tier 1'). WUNC reports that last year, more than half of the applications came from households with annual incomes up to $115,000 ('Tier 2'). The next 'tier' to access funding is families making up to $259,740 — and the fourth and final tier is over $260,000.
WUNC also reported that most of the current waitlist members have household incomes "higher than two-thirds of North Carolinians."
And Terzian said some legislative candidates talk about struggling public schools. If they want to support students, he said, voucher spending "would be the last thing you want to do because as simple as it sounds, I feel like money really can solve many problems with public education. It can hire new educators, many of whom have been laid off in the past few years. And I feel like, it almost seems like a concerted effort to allow public education to wallow in its difficulties.”
Terzian said another issue facing the district is that it needed a new high school about ten years ago.
“I feel like that process should have started already. I know that the school board and the [county commission] are touting that enrollment is supposed to go down, but with a constant influx of people coming to the area, I don't think that's a guarantee, especially with the amount of housing they're building," he said
He said he feels the overcrowding now. Some of his classes have upwards of 37 students, as do others at the school.
“As a science teacher, many of them should be capped around 24 for safety purposes, which doesn't happen. But [one] of my classes of 33 students is on-level [as opposed to an honors level course]. In my opinion, they don't get the education they deserve because you're dealing with behavioral issues; when there are 33 kids in the room, it makes it almost impossible to give individual attention to the students,” Terzian said.
Teachers who attended the rally agreed—they’d like to see the New Hanover County school board follow the example of other boards, like Bladen County, and pass a resolution telling the legislature to vote down voucher spending.
Hoggard civics teacher Linsday Noble, who helped organize the rally, said she wants North Carolina courts to follow the example of another southern state, where its Supreme Court struck down the spending of public funds on private schools.
“Maybe they'll do what South Carolina and some other states are doing and say it's unconstitutional. I mean, because it's an equity issue, we need to make sure that our kids are getting a good start to their lives, and this is where it all starts,” she said.
Noble told the crowd, "We go home tired every day, and we get up and do it the next day, and we love our kids. Many of us have our children in the public school system, and we want them to have a good education and opportunities."
New Hanover County school board member and county commission candidate Stephanie Walker and Jon Berger, who is running for House District 20, a seat currently held by Representative Ted Davis, attended the rally.
