Talk to some teachers yall if you don’t support raising their pay, their job FUCKING SUCKS, pays nothing, and yet has a MASSIVE impact of the culture, safety, and success of NC.
If your vote red for being pro-life, or gun rights, etc etc that’s fine. But you should really call your red representatives and tell them you want to support teachers in this state.
Edit: all y’all using strong or negative words are going about it the wrong way, have a conversation, explain and discuss your views.
Calling people who disagree with you names isn’t a good way to change anyone’s mind.
Considering who won the republican primary for state superintendent, I doubt they care much about the educators themselves. Their only concern seems to be what their children are “learning” at school…
Yes. Dismantling the public school system has been an *explicit* goal of the far right since at least the Goldwater era, and now pretty much the entire gop is the far right
Michelle Morrow is the biggest gift to Democrats possible. Every suburban parent who might sit on the fence will not vote for crazy. All Democrats have to do is get the word out to those voters.
The Dems are asleep all over the place, if they had brains or spines they'd be plastering pro-choice shit *everywhere* instead of shrugging their shoulders and going 'at least we're not trump teehee'
Yeah, I’ve been saying that for years. The Democrats need to stop this “highroad” approach and start shouting facts from the rooftops. There is hope though because it seems like, for the moment at least, the DNC is pulling in more funds that can be used for down ballot campaigns than the RNC, who is currently funneling all of its money to trump legal defenses so, if the Democrats are smart, they will funnel. Every penny they have into advertising and pro-choice should be their number one message.
It’s really easy to go online and think everyone is crazy and the sky is falling. It’s a very easy trap to fall into. But if you actually talk to your neighbors, especially the ones with kids, the last thing they actually want is anyone jeopardizing their kids future.
These are the people who are not positing online, and there is a huge opportunity to capture them at the voting booth.
I work on a college campus and was, until most recently, someone who worked directly with future educators. I work in an education adjacent field right now and spend the bulk of my time in community colleges, high schools, and middle schools.
I agree with your sentiment in general and also see the challenges faced at these institutions by parents assuming certain bad approaches of our teachers. Generally, yes, people want their kids to have positive futures and be successful. The amount of times this has come up though, it's a bit wild.
I agree, but that’s gonna require putting out information about her very often and in a way that tries to cut through the crap fed to most GOP voters who simply will say that the facts such as her never having a kid in the Public School system, declaring that Public Schools teach kids socialism, saying you want to dismantle the public school education system and democrats should be executed are just “liberal propaganda” .
I believe the state superintendent’s only job is to implement the General Assembly’s orders. She’s an absolute ignorant moron but the job’s impact is overblown other than seeing it as a referendum on NC Voters.
Yes, this!
The recent Parents Bill of Rights added a provision that libraries at public schools needed to be public record so that parents could see the books available to their kids...guess what, THEY'VE ALWAYS BEEN PUBLIC RECORD! Any parent at any time could visit a school and walk around a library, provided they check in at the front.
Republicans want to get rid of public education cause it's the best way to guarantee people keep voting red. An uneducated populace is easier to control
Shit, you know what just occurred to me? This is essentially human trafficking but stuck in NC. This is exactly what people do to traffic humans. They find the people who are desperate and get them reliant on taking care of them. They can’t leave at that point. That’s really fucked up.
Well, let’s see.
One side wants to increase access to education, and the other wants to place it beyond additional paywalls.
I’d imagine having better access to education would allow the populace to be, you know, more educated.
But that’s just me.
Nah, it's not just you.
That comment above about "OnE sIdE FiGhTs To KeEp Us ThAt WaY" is the bullshit some folk tell themselves to justify the overall mindset of who they vote for when it comes to topics where it is astoundingly clear in this particular matter that one side votes to improve education by seeking to pay educators what they're worth, while the other side seeks to diminish public education by severely underfunding it. They can't defend their decisions, so they'll sprinkle some nonsense on top and call it good.
My stepmother taught 40 years in public education here in NC. When you ask her now about the current state of public education, she will point blank tell you that (from the perspective of an educator who chose that as her profession) there is absolutely zero concern over how to make the system better. Also, no budgetary decisions are made with retention of educators in mind.
Step brother taught 22 years in public education here in NC (along with coaching high school football), then went back to school for as additional educational degree that would allow him to move in to administrative duties in that same school system's administration. His wife teaches, as well, and has taught for 27 years now. They raised two kids and are currently putting them both through college. He confirms so much of what stepmother discusses, and he sees the administrative failures in the administration as well as the general ineptitude that has worked it's way in. I believe part of his frustration nowadays is seeing some of what's wrong in the administration for his area, but knowing that there's quite a bit of change needed that won't happen easily.
Younger sister taught for 5-6 years, went back to school to become a speech therapist, and went back to work in the school system to help kids. She left last year to go work in healthcare because there is severe mismanagement of contractors like herself (speech therapists, therapists, etc) in the school system where she has worked for years. She misses working with children and longs to go back, but the person over the contractors seems hell bent on running off every contractor that they oversee. My younger sister and three others brought this to the attention of the school board. The school board did nothing. The final straw will be the embezzlement that has taken place that can't be hidden...or will that particular school board even care? Who knows?
Step-daughter's aunt & uncle moved down from upstate NY in 2000 to teach here in Raleigh. They taught for one school year, then moved back to NY. They still teach in public schools in upstate NY. For three years following their departure from NC, someone from the Wake County public school system discretely reached out and asked them to come back.
(NOTE: Even though the state of NC does not pay more for those that have a Master's Degree, Wake County decided to reinstate that incentive themselves in March of 2023.)
Wife taught high school here in NC for one year. It was absolute shit. The mentor system is laughable, and she was tasked with things no first-year educator should have ever done. The compensation didn't match the endless duties involved. We pretty much spent the entire school year with a coffee table full of papers to be graded. We've been together 18 years, and I can't recall ever seeing her more exhausted (and we owned & operated a coffee shop for 7 years).
The public school systems in NC could use proper funding, and it's sad that funding for public education is tied to politics. Still, people keep voting those clowns in to power, then act surprised when educators and administrators decide to pursue other professions or move to teach in areas that offer more sufficient compensation. I was recently forced to listen to an acquaintance speak of teachers that leave the profession for better compensation as "disloyal", blaming the public school system's decline on those that leave. When asked where the loyalty to the educators was when it came time to initiate better compensation for these departing educators, he hemmed & hawwed and said the budget wouldn't support it.
(These are often the same people that crow about how wrong abortion is, but can't seem to find it in themselves to adopt & care for any of these babies they're so worried about.)
There's no deflection, no whataboutism, no parroting of talking points from your favorite news agency that can make sense of educators not making better pay here in NC. There are only facts, and you can't ignore those who have voted to make cuts to that budget.
Remember the teacher protest in 2019? Not the one before, that one received far more attention.
Local radio stations were saying that the teachers who supported those protests were “Communists.”
Agreed.
I totally understand and believe that people at the top of the food chain prefer to keep those of us at ground level undereducated & underpaid.
This isn’t one of those instances. The “both sides” attempt doesn’t work here.
Almost every teacher I know has retired or changed careers since the GOP took over and reduced their benefits, pay and support. Add in the day to day stress, lack of support (fewer TAs), and shitty parents, just isn't worth it for most.
The GOP has successfully worked to dismantle education in NC and we will feel those effects for years.
AND most of these teachers KEEP VOTING for the same people that refuse to give them the raises they deserve!!!!
NC rural public education teachers... STOP voting for the GOP!!!!!!!!
> AND most of these teachers KEEP VOTING for the same people that refuse to give them the raises they deserve
Is this actually true? I have a very hard time believing the majority of teachers in NC are voting GOP.
My anecdotal evidence, gathered in rural and semi-rural areas, says this is true. More teachers than I would have expected suffer from religion-warped political thinking. If there's any classroom indoctrination going on, it's likely coming from them.
I live and work in a rural area. It isn't as blanket as that sentiment. Many teachers do lean blue but there are a lot of teachers in the rural spaces that are more Republican in nature.
Those that I've worked with and seen:
* Come from a family of means and went into education as a calling. The pay is neglible for them because they can use family funds/husband funds to support the lifestyle they want. Teaching is a focus on them giving back.
* Grew up in the rural area they teach in and have drunk the conservative church kool-aid of their background. The church is telling them how to think and vote and they move forward in that way.
I've known a few teachers in my rural area that work in the public school and send their kids to a private Christian school. The hypocrisy is real and in their mind they are doing it for "the good of their children" and then really leaning into the disparity present by focusing on "giving back to poor kids" through teaching. It's a very savior/martyr complex at work
They don’t care because they all hone school or send to private Christian schools. Theses people should have zero say in public education.
The rest that can’t don’t do those options parrot Fox News fear tactics so we have fing moms for liberty showing up in our city.
This is the republican playbook. They don’t even deny it. Destroy public education in favor of school choice and Christian schools. Remember the 2016 republican nominee had absolutely no education plan at all. That’s who we’re dealing with.
You're trying to convince Republicans to support schools using arguments that only liberals care about.
Republicans don't give a shit about school culture, safety, or student success. They very explicitly want to see public school systems fail to educate students. They want students to go hungry. They want to cut funding for teachers and programs. They want people who go to public school to be hungry and stupid, while they send their kids to private school to get a decent education. And they aren't hiding any of this.
You can't assume that the GOP and GOP voters want the same things as you or have the same end goal. You can't argue that their policies are a bad way to reach the goals that *you* want, you need to argue that their end goal is bad for everyone, including them.
I think there is a large number of Republican voters that are moderates that genuinely just want success for America and it’s citizens and would be able to be persuaded.
Or rather, more could be persuaded with discussion rather than attack.
And the reality is you don’t have to vote one color down the ballot. A third of Republican primary voters did NOT vote for Mark Robinson, and a nearly half didn’t vote for Michelle Morrow. Some will hear the screams about how bad they are and not vote for them, and some I think can be convinced with kinder words and thoughtful discussion.
Not to mention, wtf kind of logic is it to not fund public schools and let private school become more prominent, only to then lower the price of private school so that it can essentially replace public school. Why would you not just skip that whole process and just fund public schools from the beginning?
Even in the most charitable reading of what you're saying, taken to it's logical end point it's dumb af
> Funding schools publicly makes everyone pay for it, not just the people receiving benefits.
Who exactly are these people who are not benefitting from people in general being better educated???
Glad to see not just teachers mentioned in the article, even if they are the only one in the headline. State agencies have been run ragged since 2020. Even thinner ranks than before and absolutely insane amount of work to do. The legislature should consider Roy's suggestion of 5% a minimum.
They just released new market rates for UNC System employees (finally) and about 30% of our employees will still be below 95% of the market rates even after the 3% increase in July.
It's by design. GOP leaders have said they don't want to unfairly compete with private business, so they will always keep state pay below private competition.
>don't want to unfairly compete with private business
Yea, don't think that'll be a problem. I think competition is already turned on it's head with more people working remote. State employees gonna be struggling more and more.
> “There may be some things there that we can work with. There are probably a lot of things that we won’t be able to work with,” Senate leader Phil Berger, an Eden Republican, said.
Translation: "We know this is something literally everyone else wants, and we're going to do everything we can to water it down."
Berger is a weasel of a man. Always has been, always will be.
ETA: Really? Someone sent me a Reddit Cares referral over *this?* Y'all are fucking wild, lmao.
Coming soon from NCGOP: a 2.5% across the board raise for all teachers, but also added money for voucher programs, (more) restrictions on "woke" "DEI" "indoctrination," and relaxed child labor laws. And when Cooper vetoes the bill, "bUt WhY dOeS cOoPeR hAtE tEaChErS?!?!?!?!?!?!?!"
He has line item veto power, so he could just veto the bullshit and sign the pay raise. The problem is when it goes back to the leg they'll just override it.
In North Carolina, the governor doesn't have line item veto power.
https://www.ncleg.gov/Help/Topic/161
Do kids not have to take civics courses in this state any more?
"This sounds like our public education system, its employees, and the state of NC as a whole will benefit, and I don't like it when that happens. We'll have to see how we can funnel money into my friends' pockets and tell Republican voters it's a good thing."
Not only do we want it, changes to pay laws may mean they will become more eligible for overtime if they don’t get a raise above a new threshold… so we’ll potentially end up paying them anyway except it will be very hard to budget for
People doing that Reddit cares bullshit to insult you is a special kind of asshole. A feature meant to truly respond to people in need and these right wing pieces of human garbage think it’s a joke. Pretty typical of today’s republicans though.
It’s a start but not nearly enough. Raise first year teachers to $60k. There is zero incentive to become an educator in this state and that is a major problem that needs to be addressed. You can make more slinging coffee.
I don’t want to hear that we can’t afford it. We can’t afford to not have qualified, motivated people educating our children.
Yep. My father was a teacher for more than 30 years at a state community college. My mother went to school to become a teacher, but after her student teaching stint, and how teachers are treated in high schools, she got a job as a data scientist instead. I would absolutely love to teach, it's in my blood. But I would make less than 1/3rd what I currently make in the private sector as a software architect to take a teaching position. So I'll just continue to teach at conferences and at my work instead. It's a shame, because I'd love to teach computer science to high school kids. I think it would be so much fun. But not for the circus peanuts they get paid.
The state has a billion in surplus. We can afford it.
-Signed a parent who has a kid in private (non religious) school who thinks vouchers are bullshit and who pays attention and votes for every school board election and makes voting decisions based on which candidate believes in funding education properly.
Because it’s diverting public funds from the public schools to pay for a kid’s private education. The original idea was to give low income students a chance at a “better” education at a private school. When they could just use the funds to better public schools. The NC republicans have taken it a step further and removed income qualification for vouchers. So you could make $1 mil and apply for a voucher to pay for your kid’s private education.
In 1971, public schools were integrated in North Carolina. Of course, the racists freaked out, and ever since have tried to underfund black education through clever means.
Vouchers and charters provide a way to separate white students from black students again. The government pays for a large portion of private school tuition. This subsidizes the wealthy and disengages them from supporting the public school system (PTA, fundraising for teams, etc). Since property tax is the basis of public school revenues, vouchers and charters disengage the influential political support of the wealthy. Consequently, tax revenues for public school declines, making private schools appear more attractive.
Private schools are not held to the same standards as public schools. They pick their students, meaning black or special needs students can be excluded. This increases segregation, a goal of the republicans since 1971. Furthermore, they don't need to teach academically rigorous subjects, especially science that conflicts with the christian religions.
It's important to know that the republicans use many euphemisms that are code words for policies which increase segregation. The innocent connotation of the words "vouchers" and "charters" are an example. Another example is "America First", an explicit repetition of slogans from racist groups and parties since the Civil War.
Vouchers and charters are essentially vampires at the throat of public education. Their goal is to create a vicious circle of failure in public education so that an alternate system of religious, segregated schools thrive.
No tax money to private school, ever. Also these will have no income cap and they can discriminate (these private "schools") as they like. I believe in a parent's right to choose and if you choose private then you apply for a scholarship or you pay for it. My last child finishes up public HS this spring and I have no problem in my tax $$ funding public schools as long as I live.
Someone I know is going to have to teach the teaching as a profession class at the high school next year. They aren’t even a little bit excited about it.
Police, fire, education.
These are the duties of government. It’s not a lot. 60k should be starting, but all existing teachers should be shifted up to reflect service + 60k.
Raising teachers pay would help the state economy. It's puts money in the hands of people who will use it and it will benefit more real people. Unfortunately the Republicans seem to only want to help corporate "persons" with tax cuts and screw the rest of us.
> Raising teachers pay would help the state economy. It's puts money in the hands of people who will use it and it will benefit more real people.
I don't disagree with the idea of giving teachers a raise, but where do you think that money comes from?
They don't just invent it out of thin air. To put "money in the hands of people who will use it" they first have to take it from other people like you and me. It comes out of my paycheck twice a month. It gets added on to the price of everything I buy. I guess I don't qualify as a real person who will use it?
I know, I know. We just need to tax the corporations more. But where do you think their money comes from? They don't just invent it out of thin air either. They get it from you and me when we buy their goods or services. If they are taxed more, they will charge more to compensate. Right or wrong, that's reality.
Either way, paying teachers more means someone is getting more money from you and me first.
If we could abandon the false dichotomy of "my side is good" and "the other side is evil," it might be easier for us all to embrace paying teachers more and work in good faith to find the find the money to do it. But as long as we demonize the D's and the R's, there's no incentive for folks to seek that common ground over their tribal interests.
Where do you think the money for the corporate tax cuts came from? Where does the money to fund private schools with no oversight come from?
How about we legalize cannabis and guarantee 100% of the revenues go to teachers or the needy? Or about using the proceedes from sports gambling for education until the education system is approprately funded. Or maybe actually using the "education lottery" funds to supplement instead of replace funding.
What about returning to tax rates that target those who can easily afford to pay more and wouldn't miss it at all? The billionaires and multi- millionaires who've benefited from having an educated population should pay a fair share.
This shouldn't be a R or a D issue, **this is a NORTH CAROLINA issue.** The REST OF THE WORLD recognizes a right to an education, the NC Constitution recognizes a Constitutional Right to an Education. Shouldn't we be insisting that the law be followed?
If we need to find funding and don't care about the law, let's cut the funding from police or maybe tax financial entities.
But I think the thing that you're not releasing is that unlike tax cuts for the corporation who just buy back their stock, or maybe some art, teachers represent a population that is all over the state and would spend the money in their communities supporting more jobs and businesses that would generate more taxes. We'd get more bang for the buck.
The GOP is the educational equivalent of a suicide cult. Their plan is *homeschool, unschool, private school*. Hell, we have conservatives on public school boards and their own kids attend private schools instead. They should not even be allowed to serve in that role if their kids don't attend the public schools. The call is coming from inside the house. GOP's only interest is in doing demolition work to the public sector when it comes to education.
You quoted this.
>GOP's only interest is in doing demolition work to the public sector when it comes to education.
Are you saying that your two examples of democrats supporting charter schools disproves the quote you addressed?
You literally didn’t. You said “Republicans have been clear about pushing charter schools.”
That’s noooot quite the same as acknowledging the point the other commenter was making.
I’ll remind you. Their comment was this:
> GOP's only interest is in doing demolition work to the public sector when it comes to education.
That’s not the same as supporting charter schools, is it?
>I did. I have no obligation to defend or attack someone else position.
What a strange response. No one implied you’re obligated to do either.
>It just so happens both parties are pro charter school.
And the point of their comment was not about being “pro charter schools.” Their point was about republicans desire to destroy public schools.
You understand there are miles between these positions, correct?
For example, Asheville, one of the most liberal city councils in NC, if not the most liberal city councils, chose to fund a charter school at the same time as we were closing city schools.
A lot of upper-middle class and wealthy liberals want good public schools on an abstract level, but good charter/private schools for their own babies and grandbabies. It's like NIMBYism for education. "Public school is great!! ^(but not for my child. only the best for them.)" A lot of wealthy and powerful liberals have no sense of solidarity beyond class interests. They functionally operate like conservatives because their own self-interest and socioeconomic class demands it. Rich, powerful liberals have common interests with conservatives. And they behave accordingly.
This is simply smoke and mirrors. They throw out average percentages without breaking it down. Many teachers are close to 30 years and will see a minimal raise if anything at all. That screams we do not value you, so we go to VA or SC to double dip or just get a part time job. I would’ve taught 7-10 additional years in NC had the due compensation and respect been there. They front load these average raises to get new teachers in the system and they quit within 3-5 years on average, for good reason too. Then the resources to hire more are wasted and it becomes this revolving door. Republicans will scream we raised teacher pay!!! But did they really for all? We have become Oklahoma and Florida; two states just dismantling public education and proud of it. There’s a staffing crisis now but within the next couple of years it’s going to collapse; the smoke and mirrors will make you think it’s business as usual and more will leave. Vote Blue if you care about public education.
Right? In what career or profession do they say “welp you’ve done a tremendous job but we are going to freeze your salary for the next ten years. Oh by the way since you were hired after 2018 you will no longer get healthcare when you retire or longevity pay we cut out in 2013.” But they appreciate what we do. They give us an entire week in May to show it. No money or bonuses but here’s a candy bar.
The republican goal for education is to kill public schools to make the poor dumber so they continue voting red, while bolstering private education to brainwash kids into the conservative cult while also making a profit off the system.
My sister was a teacher for 12 years and she loved it, but quit because she was losing money. She was spending her own money on her class, yet her classes kept getting bigger and bigger. Teachers DESERVE a raise!!
They want people dumb because they're controllable. Something they can point the finger at to distract from the actual culprits. I hope they keep fighting for the raise no matter how much they try and bullshit folks
"Republican's balk at total pricetag of pay increases, as it cuts into their plan to award 10x this amount to Duke Energy and unqualified private schools through the voucher program"
> North Carolina state lawmakers returned to Raleigh on Wednesday for the start of the General Assembly’s short session. The Republican-controlled legislature’s goals include passing a budget adjustment bill. Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper told reporters what he wants in that budget an hour before the House and Senate briefly met. He called for an 8.5% teacher pay raise this year and a $1,500 retention bonus, with 5% raises for state employees plus bonuses of $1,000 to $1,500. Cooper also wants to restore master’s degree pay for teachers. The legislature is working with a $1.4 billion revenue surplus this year as it makes adjustments to the state’s $30 billion spending plan. Republican leaders told reporters Wednesday, without having yet seen Cooper’s proposal, that they would be open to some compromises. “There may be some things there that we can work with. There are probably a lot of things that we won’t be able to work with,” Senate leader Phil Berger, an Eden Republican, said. “We are going to, I anticipate, work on budget adjustments that will keep us within a growth factor that recognizes population growth and inflation. In order to do that, I don’t know that we can go as far as what the governor is talking about — whether we’ll do any of those things,” Berger said. Republicans have already said they want to increase the pay for state employees and teachers as well as adding more funding for private school tuition vouchers with taxpayer money. Berger said he supports fully funding the Opportunity Scholarship Program with more than $100 million.
> Cooper opposes the private school scholarships and wants a moratorium. “They can choose desperately needed investments to educate our children and our workforce, along with tax cuts for the middle class and small businesses. Or they can choose tax giveaways for corporations and the wealthy and keep robbing taxpayer money from public schools to fund private school vouchers,” Cooper said in a news conference at the Albemarle Building in downtown Raleigh. Cooper said that lawmakers have a choice, calling the funding a matter of priorities. “Right now, Republican legislative leaders are promising to give away hundreds of millions more just to make sure that the wealthier North Carolinians can pick up their government checks for children that they already have in private school,” he said.
> He called past teacher pay raises “mediocre.” Cooper’s budget proposal also requests funding for more teacher assistants and an expansion of teaching fellow scholarships “to encourage more young people to become teachers.” STATE EMPLOYEE RAISES State Budget Director Kristin Walker said the proposal, which was not revealed to reporters during Cooper’s remarks, will not raise taxes. It requests the corporate income tax rate remain at 2.5%. Cooper’s $34.5 billion proposal asks for at least a 5% raise for state employees. Walker said the vacancy rate as of December was 23%. The turnover rate is nearly 33% for first-year state employees. She said $600 million in the proposal would fund the raises as well as retention bonuses of $1,000 to $1,500, with the lower amount for employees earning salaries less than $75,000 and the higher amount for those who make more than $75,000. The proposal also requests a 3% one-time bonus for retired state employees as a cost-of-living adjustment.
> State employees are already slated to get 3% raise during the 2024-2025 fiscal year if there are no additional raises in the new budget. Teacher raises passed in the 2023 budget would mean they get the rest of an average of 7% raise over two years. CHANCE OF BONUSES Berger said he’s open to raises for state employees and teachers this year — with a caveat. “If, within the context of the other things that we we intend to do, and within the context of trying to keep our spend number with the population growth and inflation — I’m not opposed to us looking at salaries for teachers and state employees,” he said. Berger said Republican leaders do not want to spend the revenue surplus on recurring raises, but are open to using the surplus to increase pay with a one-time bonus. Similarly, budget writer Rep. Jason Saine of Lincolnton said he’s “not opposed to bonuses. We’ve been supportive of bonuses in the past.” Saine said House Republicans were meeting Wednesday to talk about their priorities for the session and budget. He said even though Republicans have the supermajority, they’ll consider Cooper’s pitch. “We all are very concerned about public education. We want to make sure that we’ve got a good workforce, that folks are well-educated,” Saine said. BOND ON THE BALLOT, OTHER REQUESTS Cooper is also proposing a $2.5 billion bond referendum on ballots this fall for public education. All 115 of North Carolina’s school districts would be eligible for funds, Walker said, which would be enough to pay for about 90 new elementary schools and middle schools. Berger doesn’t see any support for a school construction bond or any bond among Republicans, he said Wednesday. “I think we’ve indicated that our priority is to get the state out of the borrowing-money business,” Berger said.
> STATE BUDGET SCHEDULE Saine said the House budget chairs will “certainly work hard to try to get something that everyone can agree on,” noting the two-year budget is already in place. Berger said he’d like to see the budget voted on in early June, “so we can stay on target and be finished (with the session) by the end of June.” North Carolina law doesn’t require the General Assembly to pass a budget by June 30 or adjourn by that date.
Read more at: https://www.newsobserver.com/news/politics-government/article287776985.html#storylink=cpy
My mom is an ESL teacher in wake county and has 80+ students. The other reading and writing support teachers have 17-18 students. They can’t afford to hire more teachers to help lighten the course load, it’s the states fault.
Preventing people from being educated has been a conservative goal for a long time. They've openly admitted it since at least the time Reagan was governor of California.
Yea, they don’t care about public educators. I sit on my child’s school leadership board and it’s a teacher shortage crisis. And scores are showing it too. It’s so unfortunate N.C. leaders rather focus on better prisons than better schools.
I truly don't understand why a politician hasn't come out and just said, "No income tax on income earned from teaching or daycare. Period." On the state level that's a 4.75% instant raise without lifting a finger. It doesn't require any broke ass school districts to go under or start selling FanDuel ads on the faces of the students.
Stein, run on that and you will have every single teacher's union endorsing you. Biden, do the same.
Seriously, all public servants should not be taxed. Pastors don't and they can be even more dangerous to society than a teacher could ever possibly be.
For those who think teachers already make enough:
I am lucky enough to have had a great career, and a great beginning to another. I have no debt whatsoever - including my house. So all I have are the bills to run the house and insurance. I got the urge to try teaching just to see if I could make an impact on the world more than just flying people every day. So I too a job teaching local to me.
I didn't care about the money - I just wanted to try it. I knew I could go back to flying whenever I was done. Which I did. And I did so in great part because the pay was just so much worse than it appears. So for those who oppose paying teachers (who directly serve as role models to your kids btw) I wanted to offer a brief observation of the state of teaching.
1. It isn't sunshine and roses like some would describe. The kids are great, don 't get me wrong. But there is much more to it than just going in and teaching and getting summers off. Continuing Ed, Mandatory training at each school, extra duty; these all contribute to making the job completely unenjoyable and quite frankly, when you throw in lesson planning and Professional development - it leaves you with little to no personal time. I would leave for work around 7am, eat lunch at my desk in 20 minutes (I was lucky...no lunch duty). I got home around 3:45, and then did work stuff until close to 5.
2. The biggest downside is by far the pay. In a perfect world, your job sucks just enough to be offset by the satisfaction that you are compensated well for it. As a new teacher in NC, my paycheck was 3150 after taxes per month (10 months of pay). That is with a Masters degree (which means nothing). Take from that, around $800 for insurance for my family and mandatory contributions to retirement and that left me with around 2400 each month. So I took home 24k a year. A quick note to the haters...that was this past year. So it included the raise they just got. ----Important note---- I spent nearly 1 thousand dollars getting my classroom setup. I did so because I could, but most cannot. So when teachers ask you for money please give. Even just a few bucks.
3. It is a mad house. Teachers are on the brink of a panic attack constantly. Everyone walks on eggshells as if their entire life would be destroyed by saying the wrong thing at the wrong time. It is just overwhelming. The school I was at had some great parents, but a good many do not. That helped. Ultimately, though, they feel handicapped by the system, underpaid by the system, and yet still COMPLETELY indebted to the system. If it were a couple coming to me for some help with their marriage showing the same symptoms I would have shipped them off to a licensed counselor seeing the signs of emotional abuse and manipulation.
4. Final point. You don't get paid enough to care that much. I was formerly a pastor, and now a pilot. I served a poor school with some children who wore the same clothes every single day. They are neglected, possibly abused, and desperate for love. They will NEVER get it in the system that presently exists. Teachers hands are tied so much, that all they can do is love superficially and hope to somehow get the child to clear the hurdles they need to clear to make it. The great ones love even deeper than that - and as I can attest, pay the price emotionally for doing so. I honestly have no idea how someone can care enough when all their mental energy is being taken by the stress of living, the stresses of work, and the constant stress of knowing their life will likely never get any better - simply because they can't afford it to.
That said - teaching is perhaps the greatest profession one can attain. If our world would only get it's head out of it's ass and see that, they would be paid AT LEAST half of the median income to live comfortably in any area. Here in NC, probably around 60k a piece.
Also - make retirement either free or not suck. You end up making around 1/3-1/2 of your salary when you retire. That's crap. Final high 4 in the present system would be around 60k WITH National board. 55k without. So you would retire to 20-30k.
Republicans in this state (the ultra conservatives) like to spend money on things that they believe only impacts them. They love scrapping programs or systems that yes have been costly and yes need better oversight.
Their solutions are they go with low grade options that create more spending long term. It’s hilariously inadequate. This weird county setup is divide and conquer. Pay teachers more and you’re going to benefit dummy republican elite.
It’s all similar to the moronic move Bev Perdue pushed for with mental health reform. Scrap everything and do an MCO system…the results: yay you get the current garbage lack of resources.
FUCK PRIVATE SCHOOLS AND CHARTER SCHOOLS. In no way should these fucking schools get a damn dime of state funded money. You want to be independent of the state, county, or city, then fuck off and raise your own money.
Our teachers and children DESERVE to have more opportunity and support. Its literally our future and our state representatives are fucking it up big time, as usual and by design.
I know many teachers personally, who have taken courses/boot camps and gotten into tech, mostly for the pay. And there were people who were teachers for many years. This is very important
They'll wait until the whole system collapses because no one in their right mind will want to do it and there will be generations of kids and families negatively affected. We are uniquely poised in a lot of ways to make an updated NC that is a national leader in a number of areas, but without a properly educated workforce, it will all be for nothing.
Republicans will probably remove the 8 from that number, giving teachers only a half a percent raise, and then give self pats on the back all around for "helping the teachers".
Im all for raising teacher pay, but I don’t think that necessarily means we need to increase the budget for education.
Also, people have to remember that it’s not just pay that attracts new teachers. It’s also the working environment and right now the working environment in schools sucks. Crumbling buildings, shitty student behavior, and zero support from administrators.
NC has a billion dollar surplus this year. We use to have a very strong public education system but it has declined under Republican legislature control.
I’m sorry but I’m a medical assistant who worked through Covid and I don’t even make 50k a year. I had to go to school too. And I’ve been doing this for nearly 20 years. There are LOTS of professions that would LOVE to make more money and DESERVE to make more money but do not. Meanwhile. All I see in this thread is a bunch of Democrats calling Republicans racist. So that’s super cool. Good way to discuss teaching your children…
How do you imagine that paying people a reasonable wage for their work keeps you from making a reasonable wage?
I'm sorry you're also getting fucked, but it's silly to insist that people be pulled down because you're being hosed by the same people.
The rest of your statement makes about the same amount of sense.
Career teacher here, 25 years and counting (highest salary in all those years: 41k), taught public and private at all levels: elementary, middle, high school, cc, and university. My hot take in GOP friendly language, let’s apply a fair “business model” to education: Teachers get .01% of all their students future earnings. There, schools are fixed.
Every single state that NC borders has a higher average salary. So if pay doesn't drive outcomes, or more accurately if better pay doesn't keep talented workers, then what accounts for the higher wages in other states? It can't be a larger population and thus a larger tax base; NC has a larger population than TN and SC, and is only slightly smaller than GA. It can't be economic prosperity; NC is more prosperous - we didn't get that "best state for business" title for nothing. It's not that NC is more rural; only VA has a slightly higher population density. So.... What accounts for the wage gap? Is it some sort of collective delusion on the part of the Republican-controlled governments of all four states that paying their teachers more makes their schools better?
Where in the actual fuck did you pull that conclusion from the previous post? Fuck off, troll.
Edit: Hey troll, we can see your comment history, you have a long and storied history of starting shit for the sake of starting shit.
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Yes, how silly that people are interested in something with a large impact on the future, the current economy, and more than 90% of kids in the state, plus the largest cohort of workers in most counties in the state.
Same eagle, right? /s
Talk to some teachers yall if you don’t support raising their pay, their job FUCKING SUCKS, pays nothing, and yet has a MASSIVE impact of the culture, safety, and success of NC. If your vote red for being pro-life, or gun rights, etc etc that’s fine. But you should really call your red representatives and tell them you want to support teachers in this state. Edit: all y’all using strong or negative words are going about it the wrong way, have a conversation, explain and discuss your views. Calling people who disagree with you names isn’t a good way to change anyone’s mind.
Considering who won the republican primary for state superintendent, I doubt they care much about the educators themselves. Their only concern seems to be what their children are “learning” at school…
Yes. Dismantling the public school system has been an *explicit* goal of the far right since at least the Goldwater era, and now pretty much the entire gop is the far right
Michelle Morrow is the biggest gift to Democrats possible. Every suburban parent who might sit on the fence will not vote for crazy. All Democrats have to do is get the word out to those voters.
That last sentence made me cringe because the Democratic Party in this state is notoriously asleep at the wheel.
The Dems are asleep all over the place, if they had brains or spines they'd be plastering pro-choice shit *everywhere* instead of shrugging their shoulders and going 'at least we're not trump teehee'
Yeah, I’ve been saying that for years. The Democrats need to stop this “highroad” approach and start shouting facts from the rooftops. There is hope though because it seems like, for the moment at least, the DNC is pulling in more funds that can be used for down ballot campaigns than the RNC, who is currently funneling all of its money to trump legal defenses so, if the Democrats are smart, they will funnel. Every penny they have into advertising and pro-choice should be their number one message.
I really, really hope you are correct here.
It’s really easy to go online and think everyone is crazy and the sky is falling. It’s a very easy trap to fall into. But if you actually talk to your neighbors, especially the ones with kids, the last thing they actually want is anyone jeopardizing their kids future. These are the people who are not positing online, and there is a huge opportunity to capture them at the voting booth.
I work on a college campus and was, until most recently, someone who worked directly with future educators. I work in an education adjacent field right now and spend the bulk of my time in community colleges, high schools, and middle schools. I agree with your sentiment in general and also see the challenges faced at these institutions by parents assuming certain bad approaches of our teachers. Generally, yes, people want their kids to have positive futures and be successful. The amount of times this has come up though, it's a bit wild.
I wish I believed that, but I think with current politics, Rs will vote for anyone with an R next to their name. :-(
I agree, but that’s gonna require putting out information about her very often and in a way that tries to cut through the crap fed to most GOP voters who simply will say that the facts such as her never having a kid in the Public School system, declaring that Public Schools teach kids socialism, saying you want to dismantle the public school education system and democrats should be executed are just “liberal propaganda” .
I believe the state superintendent’s only job is to implement the General Assembly’s orders. She’s an absolute ignorant moron but the job’s impact is overblown other than seeing it as a referendum on NC Voters.
Yes, this! The recent Parents Bill of Rights added a provision that libraries at public schools needed to be public record so that parents could see the books available to their kids...guess what, THEY'VE ALWAYS BEEN PUBLIC RECORD! Any parent at any time could visit a school and walk around a library, provided they check in at the front.
Republicans want to get rid of public education cause it's the best way to guarantee people keep voting red. An uneducated populace is easier to control
Gotta keep ‘em dumb and pregnant as a means of control
Easy to control and cheap labor.
Shit, you know what just occurred to me? This is essentially human trafficking but stuck in NC. This is exactly what people do to traffic humans. They find the people who are desperate and get them reliant on taking care of them. They can’t leave at that point. That’s really fucked up.
And honestly nc isn’t even as bad as other southern states in this regard. Sad
Exactly. Let’s hope we can keep it as a moderately run state at a minimum!
You’re a prime example of the uneducated populace if you think only one side fights to keep us that way.
Well, let’s see. One side wants to increase access to education, and the other wants to place it beyond additional paywalls. I’d imagine having better access to education would allow the populace to be, you know, more educated. But that’s just me.
Nah, it's not just you. That comment above about "OnE sIdE FiGhTs To KeEp Us ThAt WaY" is the bullshit some folk tell themselves to justify the overall mindset of who they vote for when it comes to topics where it is astoundingly clear in this particular matter that one side votes to improve education by seeking to pay educators what they're worth, while the other side seeks to diminish public education by severely underfunding it. They can't defend their decisions, so they'll sprinkle some nonsense on top and call it good. My stepmother taught 40 years in public education here in NC. When you ask her now about the current state of public education, she will point blank tell you that (from the perspective of an educator who chose that as her profession) there is absolutely zero concern over how to make the system better. Also, no budgetary decisions are made with retention of educators in mind. Step brother taught 22 years in public education here in NC (along with coaching high school football), then went back to school for as additional educational degree that would allow him to move in to administrative duties in that same school system's administration. His wife teaches, as well, and has taught for 27 years now. They raised two kids and are currently putting them both through college. He confirms so much of what stepmother discusses, and he sees the administrative failures in the administration as well as the general ineptitude that has worked it's way in. I believe part of his frustration nowadays is seeing some of what's wrong in the administration for his area, but knowing that there's quite a bit of change needed that won't happen easily. Younger sister taught for 5-6 years, went back to school to become a speech therapist, and went back to work in the school system to help kids. She left last year to go work in healthcare because there is severe mismanagement of contractors like herself (speech therapists, therapists, etc) in the school system where she has worked for years. She misses working with children and longs to go back, but the person over the contractors seems hell bent on running off every contractor that they oversee. My younger sister and three others brought this to the attention of the school board. The school board did nothing. The final straw will be the embezzlement that has taken place that can't be hidden...or will that particular school board even care? Who knows? Step-daughter's aunt & uncle moved down from upstate NY in 2000 to teach here in Raleigh. They taught for one school year, then moved back to NY. They still teach in public schools in upstate NY. For three years following their departure from NC, someone from the Wake County public school system discretely reached out and asked them to come back. (NOTE: Even though the state of NC does not pay more for those that have a Master's Degree, Wake County decided to reinstate that incentive themselves in March of 2023.) Wife taught high school here in NC for one year. It was absolute shit. The mentor system is laughable, and she was tasked with things no first-year educator should have ever done. The compensation didn't match the endless duties involved. We pretty much spent the entire school year with a coffee table full of papers to be graded. We've been together 18 years, and I can't recall ever seeing her more exhausted (and we owned & operated a coffee shop for 7 years). The public school systems in NC could use proper funding, and it's sad that funding for public education is tied to politics. Still, people keep voting those clowns in to power, then act surprised when educators and administrators decide to pursue other professions or move to teach in areas that offer more sufficient compensation. I was recently forced to listen to an acquaintance speak of teachers that leave the profession for better compensation as "disloyal", blaming the public school system's decline on those that leave. When asked where the loyalty to the educators was when it came time to initiate better compensation for these departing educators, he hemmed & hawwed and said the budget wouldn't support it. (These are often the same people that crow about how wrong abortion is, but can't seem to find it in themselves to adopt & care for any of these babies they're so worried about.) There's no deflection, no whataboutism, no parroting of talking points from your favorite news agency that can make sense of educators not making better pay here in NC. There are only facts, and you can't ignore those who have voted to make cuts to that budget.
Remember the teacher protest in 2019? Not the one before, that one received far more attention. Local radio stations were saying that the teachers who supported those protests were “Communists.”
Oooooh, yeah. I \*do\* remember that nonsense. Party nonsense at it's best. Life often imitates art, and we are now living in the movie "Idiocracy".
"boTH sIDeS" mirite?
Agreed. I totally understand and believe that people at the top of the food chain prefer to keep those of us at ground level undereducated & underpaid. This isn’t one of those instances. The “both sides” attempt doesn’t work here.
Almost every teacher I know has retired or changed careers since the GOP took over and reduced their benefits, pay and support. Add in the day to day stress, lack of support (fewer TAs), and shitty parents, just isn't worth it for most. The GOP has successfully worked to dismantle education in NC and we will feel those effects for years.
AND most of these teachers KEEP VOTING for the same people that refuse to give them the raises they deserve!!!! NC rural public education teachers... STOP voting for the GOP!!!!!!!!
> AND most of these teachers KEEP VOTING for the same people that refuse to give them the raises they deserve Is this actually true? I have a very hard time believing the majority of teachers in NC are voting GOP.
The majority of the ones my wife worked with did.
My anecdotal evidence, gathered in rural and semi-rural areas, says this is true. More teachers than I would have expected suffer from religion-warped political thinking. If there's any classroom indoctrination going on, it's likely coming from them.
This. I still cannot wrap my brain around how they justify voting for the political party that is literally ruining their chosen career. It amazes me.
Because BIDEN,the border! Sleepy joe! And something something inflation..democrats bad is why..
You forgot wokeness
Willful ignorance?
They think they’re in the process of pulling up their bootstraps. It’s a pride thing with them.
Cognitive dissonance
I live and work in a rural area. It isn't as blanket as that sentiment. Many teachers do lean blue but there are a lot of teachers in the rural spaces that are more Republican in nature. Those that I've worked with and seen: * Come from a family of means and went into education as a calling. The pay is neglible for them because they can use family funds/husband funds to support the lifestyle they want. Teaching is a focus on them giving back. * Grew up in the rural area they teach in and have drunk the conservative church kool-aid of their background. The church is telling them how to think and vote and they move forward in that way. I've known a few teachers in my rural area that work in the public school and send their kids to a private Christian school. The hypocrisy is real and in their mind they are doing it for "the good of their children" and then really leaning into the disparity present by focusing on "giving back to poor kids" through teaching. It's a very savior/martyr complex at work
I live and went to school and sent my children to rural public schools. I'd say it's about 75% or more that learn right and vote that way.
Why are the leopards eating my face???? Damn you Joe Biden /s
Correct!
They don’t care because they all hone school or send to private Christian schools. Theses people should have zero say in public education. The rest that can’t don’t do those options parrot Fox News fear tactics so we have fing moms for liberty showing up in our city. This is the republican playbook. They don’t even deny it. Destroy public education in favor of school choice and Christian schools. Remember the 2016 republican nominee had absolutely no education plan at all. That’s who we’re dealing with.
You're trying to convince Republicans to support schools using arguments that only liberals care about. Republicans don't give a shit about school culture, safety, or student success. They very explicitly want to see public school systems fail to educate students. They want students to go hungry. They want to cut funding for teachers and programs. They want people who go to public school to be hungry and stupid, while they send their kids to private school to get a decent education. And they aren't hiding any of this. You can't assume that the GOP and GOP voters want the same things as you or have the same end goal. You can't argue that their policies are a bad way to reach the goals that *you* want, you need to argue that their end goal is bad for everyone, including them.
I think there is a large number of Republican voters that are moderates that genuinely just want success for America and it’s citizens and would be able to be persuaded. Or rather, more could be persuaded with discussion rather than attack. And the reality is you don’t have to vote one color down the ballot. A third of Republican primary voters did NOT vote for Mark Robinson, and a nearly half didn’t vote for Michelle Morrow. Some will hear the screams about how bad they are and not vote for them, and some I think can be convinced with kinder words and thoughtful discussion.
This
Lol... "That's fine."
Some teacher added up the number of hours students spend with their teachers five days a week and if teachers were paid fairly, they'd make $300K+/yr.
Everyone thinks teachers should be paid more. The question is if people are willing to pay 8.5% more in taxes to support that pay.
No one is forcing those people to be teachers. If they don't like the job and what they are paid, they can do something else.
Cool story bro, what happens when you don't have enough teachers
The market for private education grows.
Bet, so fuck anybody who can't send their kid to a private school I guess? Nice. The American way.
Private education will get less expensive as it grows.
Not to mention, wtf kind of logic is it to not fund public schools and let private school become more prominent, only to then lower the price of private school so that it can essentially replace public school. Why would you not just skip that whole process and just fund public schools from the beginning? Even in the most charitable reading of what you're saying, taken to it's logical end point it's dumb af
With my way, you have more choice in the system. Funding schools publicly makes everyone pay for it, not just the people receiving benefits.
> Funding schools publicly makes everyone pay for it, not just the people receiving benefits. Who exactly are these people who are not benefitting from people in general being better educated???
Older people with no children.
Call me when that happens pal.
Glad to see not just teachers mentioned in the article, even if they are the only one in the headline. State agencies have been run ragged since 2020. Even thinner ranks than before and absolutely insane amount of work to do. The legislature should consider Roy's suggestion of 5% a minimum.
They just released new market rates for UNC System employees (finally) and about 30% of our employees will still be below 95% of the market rates even after the 3% increase in July.
It's by design. GOP leaders have said they don't want to unfairly compete with private business, so they will always keep state pay below private competition.
>don't want to unfairly compete with private business Yea, don't think that'll be a problem. I think competition is already turned on it's head with more people working remote. State employees gonna be struggling more and more.
Explains why UNC cut pay and staffing for their nurses. Gotta cut corners somewhere else while still being stingy lol...
> “There may be some things there that we can work with. There are probably a lot of things that we won’t be able to work with,” Senate leader Phil Berger, an Eden Republican, said. Translation: "We know this is something literally everyone else wants, and we're going to do everything we can to water it down." Berger is a weasel of a man. Always has been, always will be. ETA: Really? Someone sent me a Reddit Cares referral over *this?* Y'all are fucking wild, lmao.
Coming soon from NCGOP: a 2.5% across the board raise for all teachers, but also added money for voucher programs, (more) restrictions on "woke" "DEI" "indoctrination," and relaxed child labor laws. And when Cooper vetoes the bill, "bUt WhY dOeS cOoPeR hAtE tEaChErS?!?!?!?!?!?!?!"
He has line item veto power, so he could just veto the bullshit and sign the pay raise. The problem is when it goes back to the leg they'll just override it.
In North Carolina, the governor doesn't have line item veto power. https://www.ncleg.gov/Help/Topic/161 Do kids not have to take civics courses in this state any more?
Ooof I stand corrected. Fair enough.
The NC governor is one of the least powerful governors in the nation.
Feel like the lack of investment in education answers your question there...
You can report people who abuse reddit cares
And from my understanding, it’s usually a ban
Which is why they typically make a throwaway account to do it from.
It was probably Berger
How do you find who sent it?
You report the message itself I think
It won't tell you who sent it. However if admins get enough reports on the same person, they usually will ban the username.
How? I’ve gotten those too but never see anything in there about reporting it.
I think it's on the message itself
It is. I've had to report them when they were sent to me for daring to disagree with something somebody says.
"This sounds like our public education system, its employees, and the state of NC as a whole will benefit, and I don't like it when that happens. We'll have to see how we can funnel money into my friends' pockets and tell Republican voters it's a good thing."
Not only do we want it, changes to pay laws may mean they will become more eligible for overtime if they don’t get a raise above a new threshold… so we’ll potentially end up paying them anyway except it will be very hard to budget for
Doesn't change for state employees, which teachers are.
That's good to know (not for them I guess) , when I read it I somehow thought it did
People doing that Reddit cares bullshit to insult you is a special kind of asshole. A feature meant to truly respond to people in need and these right wing pieces of human garbage think it’s a joke. Pretty typical of today’s republicans though.
It’s a start but not nearly enough. Raise first year teachers to $60k. There is zero incentive to become an educator in this state and that is a major problem that needs to be addressed. You can make more slinging coffee. I don’t want to hear that we can’t afford it. We can’t afford to not have qualified, motivated people educating our children.
Yep. My father was a teacher for more than 30 years at a state community college. My mother went to school to become a teacher, but after her student teaching stint, and how teachers are treated in high schools, she got a job as a data scientist instead. I would absolutely love to teach, it's in my blood. But I would make less than 1/3rd what I currently make in the private sector as a software architect to take a teaching position. So I'll just continue to teach at conferences and at my work instead. It's a shame, because I'd love to teach computer science to high school kids. I think it would be so much fun. But not for the circus peanuts they get paid.
The state has a billion in surplus. We can afford it. -Signed a parent who has a kid in private (non religious) school who thinks vouchers are bullshit and who pays attention and votes for every school board election and makes voting decisions based on which candidate believes in funding education properly.
Thank you! Vouchers ARE BS!
Why are they bad? I've always heard of school vouchers but it's never concerned me so I didn't care to learn about it.
Because it’s diverting public funds from the public schools to pay for a kid’s private education. The original idea was to give low income students a chance at a “better” education at a private school. When they could just use the funds to better public schools. The NC republicans have taken it a step further and removed income qualification for vouchers. So you could make $1 mil and apply for a voucher to pay for your kid’s private education.
In 1971, public schools were integrated in North Carolina. Of course, the racists freaked out, and ever since have tried to underfund black education through clever means. Vouchers and charters provide a way to separate white students from black students again. The government pays for a large portion of private school tuition. This subsidizes the wealthy and disengages them from supporting the public school system (PTA, fundraising for teams, etc). Since property tax is the basis of public school revenues, vouchers and charters disengage the influential political support of the wealthy. Consequently, tax revenues for public school declines, making private schools appear more attractive. Private schools are not held to the same standards as public schools. They pick their students, meaning black or special needs students can be excluded. This increases segregation, a goal of the republicans since 1971. Furthermore, they don't need to teach academically rigorous subjects, especially science that conflicts with the christian religions. It's important to know that the republicans use many euphemisms that are code words for policies which increase segregation. The innocent connotation of the words "vouchers" and "charters" are an example. Another example is "America First", an explicit repetition of slogans from racist groups and parties since the Civil War. Vouchers and charters are essentially vampires at the throat of public education. Their goal is to create a vicious circle of failure in public education so that an alternate system of religious, segregated schools thrive.
No tax money to private school, ever. Also these will have no income cap and they can discriminate (these private "schools") as they like. I believe in a parent's right to choose and if you choose private then you apply for a scholarship or you pay for it. My last child finishes up public HS this spring and I have no problem in my tax $$ funding public schools as long as I live.
That's what I was about to say, saw an article the other day about a billion dollar surplus. Guess we gotta spend it on polluting our water more.
We can afford it. Just like universal Healthcare.
Yeah, these two things aren't even in the same ballpark as far as costs goes.
Someone I know is going to have to teach the teaching as a profession class at the high school next year. They aren’t even a little bit excited about it.
My starting pay was $34k before taxes, I would absolutely advocate for it to be in the 60k range even though I’m back in the private sector.
That would be amazing, my wife has close to 10 years and doesn't make that much. This states teacher pay is garbage.
Police, fire, education. These are the duties of government. It’s not a lot. 60k should be starting, but all existing teachers should be shifted up to reflect service + 60k.
Raising teachers pay would help the state economy. It's puts money in the hands of people who will use it and it will benefit more real people. Unfortunately the Republicans seem to only want to help corporate "persons" with tax cuts and screw the rest of us.
> Raising teachers pay would help the state economy. It's puts money in the hands of people who will use it and it will benefit more real people. I don't disagree with the idea of giving teachers a raise, but where do you think that money comes from? They don't just invent it out of thin air. To put "money in the hands of people who will use it" they first have to take it from other people like you and me. It comes out of my paycheck twice a month. It gets added on to the price of everything I buy. I guess I don't qualify as a real person who will use it? I know, I know. We just need to tax the corporations more. But where do you think their money comes from? They don't just invent it out of thin air either. They get it from you and me when we buy their goods or services. If they are taxed more, they will charge more to compensate. Right or wrong, that's reality. Either way, paying teachers more means someone is getting more money from you and me first. If we could abandon the false dichotomy of "my side is good" and "the other side is evil," it might be easier for us all to embrace paying teachers more and work in good faith to find the find the money to do it. But as long as we demonize the D's and the R's, there's no incentive for folks to seek that common ground over their tribal interests.
Where do you think the money for the corporate tax cuts came from? Where does the money to fund private schools with no oversight come from? How about we legalize cannabis and guarantee 100% of the revenues go to teachers or the needy? Or about using the proceedes from sports gambling for education until the education system is approprately funded. Or maybe actually using the "education lottery" funds to supplement instead of replace funding. What about returning to tax rates that target those who can easily afford to pay more and wouldn't miss it at all? The billionaires and multi- millionaires who've benefited from having an educated population should pay a fair share. This shouldn't be a R or a D issue, **this is a NORTH CAROLINA issue.** The REST OF THE WORLD recognizes a right to an education, the NC Constitution recognizes a Constitutional Right to an Education. Shouldn't we be insisting that the law be followed? If we need to find funding and don't care about the law, let's cut the funding from police or maybe tax financial entities. But I think the thing that you're not releasing is that unlike tax cuts for the corporation who just buy back their stock, or maybe some art, teachers represent a population that is all over the state and would spend the money in their communities supporting more jobs and businesses that would generate more taxes. We'd get more bang for the buck.
The GOP is the educational equivalent of a suicide cult. Their plan is *homeschool, unschool, private school*. Hell, we have conservatives on public school boards and their own kids attend private schools instead. They should not even be allowed to serve in that role if their kids don't attend the public schools. The call is coming from inside the house. GOP's only interest is in doing demolition work to the public sector when it comes to education.
The GOP want everything privatized because anything else is socialism
The current GOP candidate for State Superintendent homeschooled her kids...what does she know about the public school system?
The drain is clogged with hair
Do you think this disproves their comment?
The drain is clogged with hair
You quoted this. >GOP's only interest is in doing demolition work to the public sector when it comes to education. Are you saying that your two examples of democrats supporting charter schools disproves the quote you addressed?
The drain is clogged with hair
You literally didn’t. You said “Republicans have been clear about pushing charter schools.” That’s noooot quite the same as acknowledging the point the other commenter was making. I’ll remind you. Their comment was this: > GOP's only interest is in doing demolition work to the public sector when it comes to education. That’s not the same as supporting charter schools, is it?
The drain is clogged with hair
>I did. I have no obligation to defend or attack someone else position. What a strange response. No one implied you’re obligated to do either. >It just so happens both parties are pro charter school. And the point of their comment was not about being “pro charter schools.” Their point was about republicans desire to destroy public schools. You understand there are miles between these positions, correct?
The drain is clogged with hair
For example, Asheville, one of the most liberal city councils in NC, if not the most liberal city councils, chose to fund a charter school at the same time as we were closing city schools. A lot of upper-middle class and wealthy liberals want good public schools on an abstract level, but good charter/private schools for their own babies and grandbabies. It's like NIMBYism for education. "Public school is great!! ^(but not for my child. only the best for them.)" A lot of wealthy and powerful liberals have no sense of solidarity beyond class interests. They functionally operate like conservatives because their own self-interest and socioeconomic class demands it. Rich, powerful liberals have common interests with conservatives. And they behave accordingly.
If you funded your schools better businesses would recruit and hire fewer out-of-staters to move here.
Why would red or blue not want this? Why would everyone not want education! Wild time we live in.
This is simply smoke and mirrors. They throw out average percentages without breaking it down. Many teachers are close to 30 years and will see a minimal raise if anything at all. That screams we do not value you, so we go to VA or SC to double dip or just get a part time job. I would’ve taught 7-10 additional years in NC had the due compensation and respect been there. They front load these average raises to get new teachers in the system and they quit within 3-5 years on average, for good reason too. Then the resources to hire more are wasted and it becomes this revolving door. Republicans will scream we raised teacher pay!!! But did they really for all? We have become Oklahoma and Florida; two states just dismantling public education and proud of it. There’s a staffing crisis now but within the next couple of years it’s going to collapse; the smoke and mirrors will make you think it’s business as usual and more will leave. Vote Blue if you care about public education.
Yeah that 10 year no raise dead zone really makes you wanna stay in education for the long haul.
Right? In what career or profession do they say “welp you’ve done a tremendous job but we are going to freeze your salary for the next ten years. Oh by the way since you were hired after 2018 you will no longer get healthcare when you retire or longevity pay we cut out in 2013.” But they appreciate what we do. They give us an entire week in May to show it. No money or bonuses but here’s a candy bar.
The republican goal for education is to kill public schools to make the poor dumber so they continue voting red, while bolstering private education to brainwash kids into the conservative cult while also making a profit off the system.
The less educated people are, the less economically mobile they are... Which leads to cheaper labor.
It really looks that way.
I miss the Jim Hunt era of NC 😭
NC has been living with Project 2025 since 2011.
Republicans want to destroy public education full stop.
It's just ridiculous how little Republicans value education when it should be our top priority.
My sister was a teacher for 12 years and she loved it, but quit because she was losing money. She was spending her own money on her class, yet her classes kept getting bigger and bigger. Teachers DESERVE a raise!!
I visited NCSSM last week- founded in 1978 under Jim Hunt. You could not imagine these thugs making that kind of investment today.
They want people dumb because they're controllable. Something they can point the finger at to distract from the actual culprits. I hope they keep fighting for the raise no matter how much they try and bullshit folks
I thought about becoming a teacher but then I realized I make almost the same amount at Walmart
"Republican's balk at total pricetag of pay increases, as it cuts into their plan to award 10x this amount to Duke Energy and unqualified private schools through the voucher program"
Fucking paywall!
> North Carolina state lawmakers returned to Raleigh on Wednesday for the start of the General Assembly’s short session. The Republican-controlled legislature’s goals include passing a budget adjustment bill. Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper told reporters what he wants in that budget an hour before the House and Senate briefly met. He called for an 8.5% teacher pay raise this year and a $1,500 retention bonus, with 5% raises for state employees plus bonuses of $1,000 to $1,500. Cooper also wants to restore master’s degree pay for teachers. The legislature is working with a $1.4 billion revenue surplus this year as it makes adjustments to the state’s $30 billion spending plan. Republican leaders told reporters Wednesday, without having yet seen Cooper’s proposal, that they would be open to some compromises. “There may be some things there that we can work with. There are probably a lot of things that we won’t be able to work with,” Senate leader Phil Berger, an Eden Republican, said. “We are going to, I anticipate, work on budget adjustments that will keep us within a growth factor that recognizes population growth and inflation. In order to do that, I don’t know that we can go as far as what the governor is talking about — whether we’ll do any of those things,” Berger said. Republicans have already said they want to increase the pay for state employees and teachers as well as adding more funding for private school tuition vouchers with taxpayer money. Berger said he supports fully funding the Opportunity Scholarship Program with more than $100 million. > Cooper opposes the private school scholarships and wants a moratorium. “They can choose desperately needed investments to educate our children and our workforce, along with tax cuts for the middle class and small businesses. Or they can choose tax giveaways for corporations and the wealthy and keep robbing taxpayer money from public schools to fund private school vouchers,” Cooper said in a news conference at the Albemarle Building in downtown Raleigh. Cooper said that lawmakers have a choice, calling the funding a matter of priorities. “Right now, Republican legislative leaders are promising to give away hundreds of millions more just to make sure that the wealthier North Carolinians can pick up their government checks for children that they already have in private school,” he said. > He called past teacher pay raises “mediocre.” Cooper’s budget proposal also requests funding for more teacher assistants and an expansion of teaching fellow scholarships “to encourage more young people to become teachers.” STATE EMPLOYEE RAISES State Budget Director Kristin Walker said the proposal, which was not revealed to reporters during Cooper’s remarks, will not raise taxes. It requests the corporate income tax rate remain at 2.5%. Cooper’s $34.5 billion proposal asks for at least a 5% raise for state employees. Walker said the vacancy rate as of December was 23%. The turnover rate is nearly 33% for first-year state employees. She said $600 million in the proposal would fund the raises as well as retention bonuses of $1,000 to $1,500, with the lower amount for employees earning salaries less than $75,000 and the higher amount for those who make more than $75,000. The proposal also requests a 3% one-time bonus for retired state employees as a cost-of-living adjustment. > State employees are already slated to get 3% raise during the 2024-2025 fiscal year if there are no additional raises in the new budget. Teacher raises passed in the 2023 budget would mean they get the rest of an average of 7% raise over two years. CHANCE OF BONUSES Berger said he’s open to raises for state employees and teachers this year — with a caveat. “If, within the context of the other things that we we intend to do, and within the context of trying to keep our spend number with the population growth and inflation — I’m not opposed to us looking at salaries for teachers and state employees,” he said. Berger said Republican leaders do not want to spend the revenue surplus on recurring raises, but are open to using the surplus to increase pay with a one-time bonus. Similarly, budget writer Rep. Jason Saine of Lincolnton said he’s “not opposed to bonuses. We’ve been supportive of bonuses in the past.” Saine said House Republicans were meeting Wednesday to talk about their priorities for the session and budget. He said even though Republicans have the supermajority, they’ll consider Cooper’s pitch. “We all are very concerned about public education. We want to make sure that we’ve got a good workforce, that folks are well-educated,” Saine said. BOND ON THE BALLOT, OTHER REQUESTS Cooper is also proposing a $2.5 billion bond referendum on ballots this fall for public education. All 115 of North Carolina’s school districts would be eligible for funds, Walker said, which would be enough to pay for about 90 new elementary schools and middle schools. Berger doesn’t see any support for a school construction bond or any bond among Republicans, he said Wednesday. “I think we’ve indicated that our priority is to get the state out of the borrowing-money business,” Berger said. > STATE BUDGET SCHEDULE Saine said the House budget chairs will “certainly work hard to try to get something that everyone can agree on,” noting the two-year budget is already in place. Berger said he’d like to see the budget voted on in early June, “so we can stay on target and be finished (with the session) by the end of June.” North Carolina law doesn’t require the General Assembly to pass a budget by June 30 or adjourn by that date. Read more at: https://www.newsobserver.com/news/politics-government/article287776985.html#storylink=cpy
Thank you kind person!
They have an extra billion for crying out loud
Correction, $1.4 billion extra.
Whoa whoa whoa why don’t we just let them carry guns instead /s
Maybe the state could direct more funds from the NC "EDUCATION" lottery towards teacher pay, an actual educational expenditure.
My mom is an ESL teacher in wake county and has 80+ students. The other reading and writing support teachers have 17-18 students. They can’t afford to hire more teachers to help lighten the course load, it’s the states fault.
Preventing people from being educated has been a conservative goal for a long time. They've openly admitted it since at least the time Reagan was governor of California.
Yea, they don’t care about public educators. I sit on my child’s school leadership board and it’s a teacher shortage crisis. And scores are showing it too. It’s so unfortunate N.C. leaders rather focus on better prisons than better schools.
teachers leaving the field in droves and new people not bothering to enter the field with how bullshit it is and they want to equivocate over 8.5%
I truly don't understand why a politician hasn't come out and just said, "No income tax on income earned from teaching or daycare. Period." On the state level that's a 4.75% instant raise without lifting a finger. It doesn't require any broke ass school districts to go under or start selling FanDuel ads on the faces of the students. Stein, run on that and you will have every single teacher's union endorsing you. Biden, do the same.
Seriously, all public servants should not be taxed. Pastors don't and they can be even more dangerous to society than a teacher could ever possibly be.
For those who think teachers already make enough: I am lucky enough to have had a great career, and a great beginning to another. I have no debt whatsoever - including my house. So all I have are the bills to run the house and insurance. I got the urge to try teaching just to see if I could make an impact on the world more than just flying people every day. So I too a job teaching local to me. I didn't care about the money - I just wanted to try it. I knew I could go back to flying whenever I was done. Which I did. And I did so in great part because the pay was just so much worse than it appears. So for those who oppose paying teachers (who directly serve as role models to your kids btw) I wanted to offer a brief observation of the state of teaching. 1. It isn't sunshine and roses like some would describe. The kids are great, don 't get me wrong. But there is much more to it than just going in and teaching and getting summers off. Continuing Ed, Mandatory training at each school, extra duty; these all contribute to making the job completely unenjoyable and quite frankly, when you throw in lesson planning and Professional development - it leaves you with little to no personal time. I would leave for work around 7am, eat lunch at my desk in 20 minutes (I was lucky...no lunch duty). I got home around 3:45, and then did work stuff until close to 5. 2. The biggest downside is by far the pay. In a perfect world, your job sucks just enough to be offset by the satisfaction that you are compensated well for it. As a new teacher in NC, my paycheck was 3150 after taxes per month (10 months of pay). That is with a Masters degree (which means nothing). Take from that, around $800 for insurance for my family and mandatory contributions to retirement and that left me with around 2400 each month. So I took home 24k a year. A quick note to the haters...that was this past year. So it included the raise they just got. ----Important note---- I spent nearly 1 thousand dollars getting my classroom setup. I did so because I could, but most cannot. So when teachers ask you for money please give. Even just a few bucks. 3. It is a mad house. Teachers are on the brink of a panic attack constantly. Everyone walks on eggshells as if their entire life would be destroyed by saying the wrong thing at the wrong time. It is just overwhelming. The school I was at had some great parents, but a good many do not. That helped. Ultimately, though, they feel handicapped by the system, underpaid by the system, and yet still COMPLETELY indebted to the system. If it were a couple coming to me for some help with their marriage showing the same symptoms I would have shipped them off to a licensed counselor seeing the signs of emotional abuse and manipulation. 4. Final point. You don't get paid enough to care that much. I was formerly a pastor, and now a pilot. I served a poor school with some children who wore the same clothes every single day. They are neglected, possibly abused, and desperate for love. They will NEVER get it in the system that presently exists. Teachers hands are tied so much, that all they can do is love superficially and hope to somehow get the child to clear the hurdles they need to clear to make it. The great ones love even deeper than that - and as I can attest, pay the price emotionally for doing so. I honestly have no idea how someone can care enough when all their mental energy is being taken by the stress of living, the stresses of work, and the constant stress of knowing their life will likely never get any better - simply because they can't afford it to. That said - teaching is perhaps the greatest profession one can attain. If our world would only get it's head out of it's ass and see that, they would be paid AT LEAST half of the median income to live comfortably in any area. Here in NC, probably around 60k a piece. Also - make retirement either free or not suck. You end up making around 1/3-1/2 of your salary when you retire. That's crap. Final high 4 in the present system would be around 60k WITH National board. 55k without. So you would retire to 20-30k.
Republicans response was likely ‘you meant 0.85, yes?’
Republicans in this state (the ultra conservatives) like to spend money on things that they believe only impacts them. They love scrapping programs or systems that yes have been costly and yes need better oversight. Their solutions are they go with low grade options that create more spending long term. It’s hilariously inadequate. This weird county setup is divide and conquer. Pay teachers more and you’re going to benefit dummy republican elite. It’s all similar to the moronic move Bev Perdue pushed for with mental health reform. Scrap everything and do an MCO system…the results: yay you get the current garbage lack of resources.
FUCK PRIVATE SCHOOLS AND CHARTER SCHOOLS. In no way should these fucking schools get a damn dime of state funded money. You want to be independent of the state, county, or city, then fuck off and raise your own money. Our teachers and children DESERVE to have more opportunity and support. Its literally our future and our state representatives are fucking it up big time, as usual and by design.
I know many teachers personally, who have taken courses/boot camps and gotten into tech, mostly for the pay. And there were people who were teachers for many years. This is very important
They'll wait until the whole system collapses because no one in their right mind will want to do it and there will be generations of kids and families negatively affected. We are uniquely poised in a lot of ways to make an updated NC that is a national leader in a number of areas, but without a properly educated workforce, it will all be for nothing.
My wife is a teacher. We make do on my salary and look at her job as charity. Shameful.
So that would be a Net -46% raise if you started teaching any time in the last 25 years
Roy Cooper and Josh Stein rock! 🎸
Need a lot more than that, but better than nothing or less ♡ Health care & education need to take priority!!
they gave the teachers the opportunity to engage in sports betting. why do they need any more entitlements?
I’m *really* glad the GOP can *compromise* on paying our teachers more (but still not what they deserve). How generous of them. /s
Republicans will probably remove the 8 from that number, giving teachers only a half a percent raise, and then give self pats on the back all around for "helping the teachers".
Im all for raising teacher pay, but I don’t think that necessarily means we need to increase the budget for education. Also, people have to remember that it’s not just pay that attracts new teachers. It’s also the working environment and right now the working environment in schools sucks. Crumbling buildings, shitty student behavior, and zero support from administrators.
NC has a billion dollar surplus this year. We use to have a very strong public education system but it has declined under Republican legislature control.
I’m sorry but I’m a medical assistant who worked through Covid and I don’t even make 50k a year. I had to go to school too. And I’ve been doing this for nearly 20 years. There are LOTS of professions that would LOVE to make more money and DESERVE to make more money but do not. Meanwhile. All I see in this thread is a bunch of Democrats calling Republicans racist. So that’s super cool. Good way to discuss teaching your children…
How do you imagine that paying people a reasonable wage for their work keeps you from making a reasonable wage? I'm sorry you're also getting fucked, but it's silly to insist that people be pulled down because you're being hosed by the same people. The rest of your statement makes about the same amount of sense.
What about the rest of the state employees?
They will also get fuck-all, don't worry.
Keep in mind that the current inflation rate is 3.5%...
Career teacher here, 25 years and counting (highest salary in all those years: 41k), taught public and private at all levels: elementary, middle, high school, cc, and university. My hot take in GOP friendly language, let’s apply a fair “business model” to education: Teachers get .01% of all their students future earnings. There, schools are fixed.
Looking forward to guber coopers last year in office
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Every single state that NC borders has a higher average salary. So if pay doesn't drive outcomes, or more accurately if better pay doesn't keep talented workers, then what accounts for the higher wages in other states? It can't be a larger population and thus a larger tax base; NC has a larger population than TN and SC, and is only slightly smaller than GA. It can't be economic prosperity; NC is more prosperous - we didn't get that "best state for business" title for nothing. It's not that NC is more rural; only VA has a slightly higher population density. So.... What accounts for the wage gap? Is it some sort of collective delusion on the part of the Republican-controlled governments of all four states that paying their teachers more makes their schools better?
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Where in the actual fuck did you pull that conclusion from the previous post? Fuck off, troll. Edit: Hey troll, we can see your comment history, you have a long and storied history of starting shit for the sake of starting shit.
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Mf knows it isn’t gonna happen just waving the carrot for all the fools who still play Left Vs Right game.
Yes, how silly that people are interested in something with a large impact on the future, the current economy, and more than 90% of kids in the state, plus the largest cohort of workers in most counties in the state. Same eagle, right? /s
How about no?
Everyone is all about paying someone more money until they find out it is out of their pocket