Strategic plan changes to come, no more references to DEI
Superintendent Dr. Christopher Barnes said the district is continuing work on revamping the strategic plan that would run from 2027 to 2031.
Barnes said they’re working on the pillars of academic achievement, safe and supportive learning and working environments, and family and community engagement. He proposed more specific goals, like improving metrics for graduation, benchmark classes like Math I and third-grade reading, and absenteeism. He also wants to improve the public’s view of the district’s efforts towards transparency, accountability, and accessibility.
Democratic board member Judy Justice brought up that one of the six former pillars of the district’s former strategic plan was diversity, equity, and inclusion, which has since disappeared as a goal. Republican board chair Melissa Mason jumped in to tell Justice to keep “politics out of the discussion.” Justice went on to say that the older plan tried to make steps in improving students’ individual needs, but now felt like the district was “going back in time.”
Her Democratic colleague, Tim Merrick, said there are still serious concerns about this language disappearing because of federal mandates and that they still have work to do on racial inequities that exist within the district’s schools.
Republican board member Josie Barnhart said they are doing work to close the achievement gap and referenced the work of Forest Hills Elementary School, saying it’s no longer an ‘F’ school, a designation they had three years ago. They have achieved a ‘D’ for the past two school years but have met growth metrics. The school can’t move beyond being labeled as low performing, according to a state evaluation system, because they would have to “exceed expectations” on growth, which measures how students grew on standardized tests from the beginning of the year to the end.
The statewide evaluation model has been critiqued so much so that the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction recently announced a task force to look at the way in which schools are judged through an A-F performance score.
Barnhart added that if the board just bused students to another school to address scores that they “wouldn’t be doing [their] job.”
Republican board member Pete Wildeboer said that when teachers are doing well, students would then do well, and argued that the gap would close through that effort. However, in NHCS, there are large gaps between racial groups in proficiency rates on these standardized tests.
Last academic year, on average, NHCS students who were White had a proficiency score of 76% across all standardized tests, Hispanic students were at 40%, and Black students were at 30%.
In addition to the discussion of academics within the new strategic plan, Republicans David Perry and Pat Bradford said they wanted additional emphasis on learning civics. Perry said students need to learn how to voice their concerns nonviolently and to avoid being “indoctrinat[ed]” in schools.
Board communications with attorneys, new contract
Board members voted 4-3 to adopt a process for board attorney selections for next year. Wildeboer, Perry, Justice, and Merrick agreed that they should have an evaluation tool identified by February 2026 that they would then use to assess the attorneys’ performance in March.
Bradford, Mason, and Barnhart said they thought this could be a burden on staff and that they could use more informal tools to assess how they are doing. Bradford at one point said she didn’t want documentation of the attorneys’ performance because that could go “to the media.”
Justice and Merrick said they wanted to be more transparent with the public on how they evaluate and choose attorneys who represent a public institution like the school district. Bradford mentioned this informal process would be more accurate, but didn’t provide reasons explaining this.
The board does have to decide soon on whether to continue with their current firm, Crossley McIntosh Collier Hanley & Edes, P.L.L.C. Their contract is up in December. The district also uses the Sink Law Firm for exceptional children (EC) services.
Barnes told the board that he could create a memorandum on the attorneys’ performance that could be “public or private.” However, state law dictates which records are public and which ones are private; it’s not unilaterally decided by the superintendent.
Mason also said their billing records are also private — they are not, unless they list a specific ongoing legal case, which could include a student name, which then can be redacted. Board member or staff names would not be protected on an itemized bill.
Personnel law protections mainly keep records of NHCS employees' performance private (although things like demotions, suspensions, or terminations are public records), but that law does not apply to contractors. Additionally, state public records law dictates which records are specifically exempted from disclosure.
The board also contemplated a policy change in how the members interact with the attorneys (2610). They couldn’t agree, so that policy was sent back to committee for further discussion.
The proposed language was to have a board member inform the others if they contacted the attorney for advice within a 24-hour timeframe. They then debated whether all communications to go straight to Mason and then she would inform the other members of the guidance.
Norwood Blanchard, one of the current attorneys, told the board that members had been calling him to talk about the behavior of another member, which put him in a “difficult spot” and that this gives him “heartburn,” adding he and his partner, Brian Kromke, don’t want to be in the middle of the members' disagreements.
Barnhart chimed in to say that she had been “spoken to very disrespectfully by other board members” and supported the idea that only the chair contact the attorneys.
Perry and Merrick voiced concern that Mason had to be the go-between at all times, mentioning they might want more direct access to legal.
Merrick mentioned he didn’t even know Bradford received guidance from the attorneys on possible changes to the call-to-the-audience policy.
Official vote on New Hanover High plan
Assistant Superintendent Robert Morgan said he needed an official vote from the board on which plan to pursue for New Hanover High. The board voted unanimously to support the hybrid option, which would entail both renovating and building new facilities on Hanover’s campus.
Because of cost, the developers have split the campus rebuild into four phases, costing $230 million in total, which would roll out in four phases over 10 to 12 years. The first phase, which is currently proposed to be included in a 2026 school bond, would cost $60 million.
Perry said he wanted to build new, but that didn’t seem plausible because no one could identify the 60 acres of land needed.
In the past, Merrick has voiced concerns about rebuilding the school over a decade because they would have to potentially go back to the voters each election cycle to raise the funds – and told the public that New Hanover County does not have the debt ceiling for the total $230 million at once, as other school rebuilds are included in 2026 project list.
The county has signaled that they are looking into the policy surrounding how much debt it could take on. The school committee overseeing some of the bond planning has recommended the current ask be $300 million. Brunswick County Schools signaled they wanted their commission to support $409 million for capital improvements but negotiations have since stalled.
Like other advocates for NHHS, Merrick continues to say that this work has been deferred for over 25 years and that’s why the costs are so high, creating the need to rebuild the school in phases.
Morgan had mentioned that the school’s bond committee was created to brainstorm ideas on how to procure funds but most of the planning work had been done already to identify which schools needed building, rebuilding.
The county commission is statutorily responsible for capital costs on behalf of the district but Morgan mentioned ideas for public-private partnerships but said “I don’t know what that might look like; the conversation didn’t go very far.” Project Grace is an example of one of these collaborations, with private buildings happening in the same block as the county’s new library and museum.
Governor Josh Stein’s proposed biannual budget had $61 million for NHCS capital funds, but the legislature is currently battling over their two versions between the House and Senate. Those didn't have allocations for public school capital projects. However, the General Assembly did fund infrastructure projects for two private schools recently.
There was some arguing between Merrick and Bradford over the creation of an ad-hoc committee for the rebuilding of Isaac Bear. The high school is located on UNCW’s campus and plans have been drawn up for the building, but the district is hoping to get funding from either UNCW or the state because they don’t currently own the land. As of now, Isaac Bear didn’t make the proposed project list for the 2026 bond.
At the end of the day, the total cost to overhaul Isaac Bear could be upward of $45 million and no source of funding has been identified for the building beyond the initial state legislature-supported $1 million study. UNCW has dedicated the land to build it, but if those millions aren’t procured by June 30, 2027, then the offer expires.
At the board’s meeting on October 7, they’re slating 30 minutes to discuss the bond project list.
Call to Audience procedures revisited, future Robert’s Rules of Order training
The board voted, with Merrick dissenting, to tweak the language in the policy that outlines how the public delivers their speeches at board meetings, so that audience members cannot employ “shouting, harassment, personal attacks” during their three minutes. Comments will be directed to the board chair and not to individual members.
One of the reasons for bringing this policy to the forefront was how the board handled recent interactions with recent speakers Renegade Cherokee and Sandy Eyles.
Speakers who violate the rules may be asked by the chair to rephrase or redirect their comments. It also allows a board member to “excuse themselves” during the public’s speech.
What the members sent back to the policy committee were further edits by Bradford, which state explicitly how law enforcement can escort people out of the building.
Merrick said some in the public view Bradford’s additions as “punishments” and not as engaging in a democratic society. Bradford said that her conversations with New Hanover County Sheriff Ed McMahon helped her understand what law enforcement can and cannot do. There is a state statute on the books for removing a person for unruly behavior at government meetings.
There was also new language around civility and respect to which Merrick said “that is difficult to define,” adding he was concerned with vagueness with certain words and phrases in the new policy.
Barnhart started her comments by mentioning the Southport shooting and then went on to say “shouting and personal attacks” are not allowed, adding that if a person doesn’t stop, then there would “be consequences.”
The members had a discussion over who would give them new training on Robert’s Rules of Order. Bradford wanted to use the conservative John Locke Foundation’s Carolinas Academic Leadership Network (CALN) to do the training.
Justice responded that they shouldn’t be getting professional development from political organizations, but Bradford retorted that CALN is already one of the approved outlets for board training. Merrick added that if he proposed the ACLU for this, it would “ruffle some feathers” amongst the members.
Bradford also thought CALN was a cheaper option ($800-$1200) than local parliamentarian trainer Tannis Nelson, who quoted the district $2,250. However, Mason noted that Nelson could work with the board on pricing. Nelson’s proposal noted she would be available at no charge to answer members’ follow-up questions over the next six months. The North Carolina School Boards Association quoted the board $375 per hour plus travel-related expenses.
The board voted 5-2, with Bradford and Barnhart dissenting, to go with Nelson and for Mason to negotiate with her on pricing.
