New Attacks on Public Education

By Rob Schofield

In modern America, it’s hard to imagine a more thankless job than that of public school official. To hold such a position is to subject oneself to an incessant barrage of demands, complaints, and pleas for special favors from a large and powerful array of passionate – often angry – people. Each expects you to provide better, cheaper and ever-more convenient services to the most important people in the world (their TV, Internet and electronic device-addled children) and to get it done yesterday. And those are just your best friends and supporters!

Now add to this happy mix the presence of:

1. a large and influential group of greedy commercial developers, homebuilders and realtors,
2. a “mainstream” business community whose two chief demands are lower taxes and a ready supply of technically proficient worker bees,
3. an exploding population,
4. rapid demographic and economic changes, and, to top it all off,
5. a small but borderline fanatical group of opportunistic ideologues devoted to the demise of public education and the construction of some weird, “market-based”  and increasingly sectarian school system plucked from some neo-con fantasy manual;

and you’ve got a pretty good snapshot of what North Carolina school officials face in 2007 – particularly in the large, urban counties.

To see examples of some of the more recent volleys launched by the fun-loving group in bullet “e”, one need only check out the current debate in Wake County, where, just a couple of months after voters ignored alarmist nonsense and convincingly approved a $970 million school bond, the far right is attempting to provoke and manipulate a new fight with beleaguered school officials.  

Among the lowlights of this latest concerted effort:

• Anti-bond zealots at “Americans for Prosperity” issue a call for the Wake School Board to help raise the state cap on charter schools as a way to “save money” and “craft alternative solutions for disenchanted parents.” The group alleges that Wake County taxpayers “have saved hundreds of millions of dollars” as a result of the fact that “over 4,000 students” attend charter schools. They also contend that the Board “has done nothing to help ease the burden on Wake County Taxpayers” (sic). 
• Wake County Commissioners, their membership recently supplemented by former Raleigh mayor and conservative ideologue, Paul Coble, attempt to interfere with painstakingly developed construction and renovation decisions and then, announce, without consulting school officials, that it’s time for another large school bond vote. 
• Far-right radio shock-jock, Bill LuMaye of Curtis Media’s WPTF in Raleigh extols the anti-public schools line on the Monday January 30 edition of his afternoon show and states that that he believes “in his heart” that the commissioners’ plan is a politically-calculated effort to “stick it to the School Board.”

Reality Check

Though the far right constantly attacks local and state public school officials for their supposed unwillingness to discuss alternative ideas for organizing the schools, about the only specific options that the right ever really offers are: more charter schools and cheaper construction practices that de-emphasize public space and extracurricular activities and promote the idea of schools as little more than education factories. (Proposals that might actually increase outlays in order to help kids at-risk such as have been suggested by advocates like the N.C. Justice Center, are never even a part of the discussion.)

And of course, neither of the right’s ideas is capable of having any significant effect – much less a significant beneficial effect – on the exploding demand for public school slots.

Here’s what the Wake County Public Schools have to say about the charter issue:

“Q: Would opening additional charter schools help?

A: If the legislature lifts the cap on charter schools, it would barely make a dent considering more than 7,000 new students enroll in the Wake County Public School System a year. WCPSS’s first priority must be ensuring the strength of the school system that serves the vast majority of students in Wake County.

In 2004-05 only two of the 14 charter schools in Wake County served more than 600 students, and 20 percent of the students in those two schools came from outside of Wake County. The median size of a Wake County charter school in 2004-05 was 197 and the average size was 324. Finally, as noted in the report of entries and exits from the Wake County Public School System during the past year, while WCPSS sent 442 students out to charter schools last year, 495 entered WCPSS from charter schools.”

Charter schools, of course, are a kind of public-private hybrid institution that has produced, at best, mixed results. As for AFP’s claim that charters have saved Wake County “hundreds of millions of dollars,” this is a fairly remarkable assertion given the fact that the total 2006-’07 budget for the system, including capital improvements, is $1.3 billion. How such a small handful of schools could have saved so much over the last few years is hard to fathom. By such reasoning, the school system could eliminate its budget entirely if it added a few more charters.

Hmmm, on second thought, maybe there’s more to their plan than meets the eye.