Dear Pat,
I had such high hopes for us, expressed in “My Love Letter” to you back in April. I eagerly followed your campaign, excited for a much-needed change in administration for our state, only to be let down.
It is not so much your actions that have appalled me, but your lack of action. When hasty legislation came across your desk, you simply passed it along without taking advantage of your veto power, making you seem like a bobble-head doll the representatives in the General Assembly keep on their desks.
When I first learned of our shared degrees in education (yes, readers, Pat does have his undergrad in education from Catawba College), I was hopeful for some much-needed attention to my future career path. Unfortunately I’m ashamed to say the lack of attention given to education by our state’s previous administration was better than the attention yours is giving to it.
I was willing to accept the changes to teacher tenure and embracing the idea of teacher performance assessments; however, allowing the legislature to grant vouchers to students attending private schools and eliminate a monetary incentive for teachers with master’s (AP) degrees is simply a backward way to improve our state’s failing education system. Yes, 46thin education leaves our graduates in the dust on the job market.
I supported, and still support, your creation of two educational pathways (vocational versus higher education endorsements), but this accomplishment is overshadowed by the sheer ignorance on display with regard to some other changes to our state’s educational system:
The Voucher Program
A program that attempts to privatize education by giving vouchers to families to send their children to private school is absolutely absurd. Not only does this further hurt public schools by creating a less academic and socially diverse population, it also hurts the families you are attempting to fool into thinking that these vouchers will pay for all of their child’s private education. And having been at multiple levels of management at Duke Energy, did you ever give your customers vouchers to pay for Schneider Electric’s services? I wouldn’t think so, seeing your job was to provide customers with the best possible service. Public education is our state’s service to our children.
Cutting Incentives for Teachers to get Master’s Degrees
Our state wants to recruit the best of the best for its classrooms, but we don’t want to pay for it? This message tells students that education is not valued in our state and that if they want to pursue various levels of education, our state sees it as worthless. We’re not talking about a $10,000 raise; this is a 5 percent pay raise.
$12 million to Teach for America
As a part of our state’s anxious acceptance of Race to the Top federal money to put toward our education system, North Carolina was required to increase its teacher recruitment. It wasn’t enough for the General Assembly, in its last session, to eliminate their last-standing teacher recruitment program Teaching Fellows (which could have fulfilled this requirement), but to throw $12 million to Teach for America is insulting. These individuals complete a six-week course regarding educating our children for a two-year requirement as opposed to a four-year teacher preparation program that ensured teaching in N.C. for four years. This further demonstrates the priority of education in the eyes of our state government.
While these changes to our state’s education budget are mostly the doing of our legislature, your lack of action in addressing these matters demonstrates your lack of concern for our state’s education system. There is nothing worse than seeing our state’s representation tarnished on a national scale due to the happenings in our state government.
Because these changes have affected, and will continue to greatly affect, my future career as an educator, I’m afraid our relationship can no longer exist. While my first column about you was professing my “love,” this one will have to be entitled our “breakup.”
The best of luck,
Trey