Dear Gov. McCrory, Speaker Tillis, and Senator Berger,
It’s back-to-school time for children across North Carolina, but this year feels different. Instead of excitement, we as parents feel anxious, sad, and yes, angry, about what is happening to North Carolina public schools and our teachers. We are worried about the effect of these budget cuts and policy decisions not only for our own children, but for all children in North Carolina.
Thanks to your recent decisions, we will be sending our children back to schools that are deeply underfunded and which feel heavily unsupported by our state’s leadership.
The budget you supported and approved this summer fell $117 million short of what was needed to continue an already inadequate level of education services resulting from years of repeated cuts. When comparing the public education budget this year to the last budget prior to the recession adjusted for inflation, North Carolina spends less today on education than it did five years ago , despite more students entering public classrooms over this period.
Many of the schools our children are returning to have larger class sizes and fewer teachers and assistants. They have inadequate, outdated textbooks and fewer instructional supplies and support personnel. Parents, many of whom are already struggling, are receiving ever longer supply lists to ensure our schools have the basics at the same time that you chose to support tax breaks for North Carolina’s wealthiest citizens and corporations.
We are sending our children back to schools where morale is understandably low. Can you imagine spending your career in a profession, doing more than what was asked of you, and still having one of the lowest salary rates in the country? To spend your days dedicating yourself to the children of our state only to be barely able to support your own family and have to take on a second job? To pursue an advanced degree only to be told that it is essentially worthless? To be committed enough to buy supplies out of your own pocket yet be treated as though you are the problem? That’s what our state’s teachers and assistants are facing daily.
Governor McCroy, Speaker Tillis, and Senator Berger- I ask you to think back to your childhood to your favorite teacher. Someone who was a mentor to you, who maybe gave you the confidence to be the person you are today and serve in the leadership roles you do now. This person gave you the opportunity to learn, succeed, and grow both inside and outside of the classroom. Imagine this person being treated the way the staff in our schools are currently being treated.
We as parents see what our children’s teachers do. The way they work tirelessly – both in and outside of the classroom – to help every child achieve. From helping students afterschool, to staffing parent information meetings and school events at night, to planning lessons over the weekends, most teachers work far more than 40 hours a week to ensure that the children in their classrooms have what they need to become tomorrow’s leaders and citizens.
Yet our teachers, assistants, and school support personnel have been treated with such disrespect that many are choosing to leave the profession, taking with them tremendous talent and years of experience from places where we need it most. Who can blame them? And those who remain are left with the knowledge that the work they do is not valued by our state’s leaders while at the same time they are constantly being asked to do more with less.
But worst of all, our children will be going back to school in a state that has made it clear that they and their futures are not a priority. By your actions, you have sent our children a clear message that they do not matter and that they are not worth the investment.
This is the wrong message for a state striving to regain the competitive edge we once had, a state that desperately needs to build and retain the strong, educated workforce that will attract businesses and job growth.
It is an embarrassment that our state is 46th in teacher pay and 48th in per pupil spending. North Carolina was once a southern leader in education, a fact that was a source of great pride and which attracted many of us here. But the recent changes are enough to make any parent wonder whether a state that so clearly does not value our children is the right place to raise a family.
So, as our children head back to school this fall, we do so with heavy hearts knowing that many of the teachers and assistants we love will no longer be in our schools and that our children will find classes woefully under stocked compared to other states. As parents, we will scrape to find ways to help fill the holes you have created in our classrooms. And we will remember that you made the decisions that led us to this point.
You were elected to office talking about family values and the need to make our state more competitive. We all want to see North Carolina grow and prosper as a state, but these catastrophic cuts to our public schools do not represent the values of most families in our state, nor will they make us competitive for the long haul.
Sincerely,
Subject:
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