In a state renowned for its higher education, the same attention to quality is critically undervalued in K-12 schools. The N.C. General Assembly’s unwillingness to pay North Carolina’s public school teachers a deserved wage is a moral failure.
As K-12 public education continues to be devalued, passionate education students at this University will become flight risks. Many will leave North Carolina for any one of the 41 states estimated by the National Education Association to pay teachers a higher wage.
With its recent failings, the legislature has violated the trust of the state’s current and prospective teachers.
K-12 tenure was on the chopping block last year. Nixing it could have been an attempt to limit state employees’ collective bargaining rights — had they had any at all.
Even with a paltry $750 bonus, the teachers’ salaries are estimated to be the ninth lowest in the country.
In a (Raleigh) News & Observer column, UNC law professor Gene Nichol wrote a piece that let the state’s teachers illustrate their plight.
