Episode 250: Top Education Issues at Eggs & Issues 2025

On today’s episode, we’re taking a look at Eggs & Issues 2025 where the Public School Forum presented our Top Education Issues which represent the Forum’s legislative priorities for the 2025-26 biennium. We will also hear from educators who took part in a discussion of the challenges and strategies presented in this year’s Top Issues.On this episode we’re joined by members of the North Carolina General Assembly to discuss the upcoming legislative long session and which education issues we can expect to hear more about in the coming months.

Guests:
Dr. Lauren Fox, Public School Forum Sr. Director of Policy & Research
Natalia Mejia, NCCAT 2023 Empower NC Beginning Teacher of the Year, CC Griffin STEM Middle School, Cabarrus County Schools
Dr. C’Monee’ Wilkins, Principal, Clarke Elementary School, Vance County Public Schools
Dr. Don Phipps, Superintendent, Caldwell County Schools

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:13

Welcome to Education Matters, presented by the Public School Forum of North Carolina. I'm your host, Dr. Marianne Wolf. In today's episode, we are so pleased to give you a glimpse of our annual eggs and issues. We are so pleased to bring you this presentation of our top education issues for the 2025-26 legislative biennium. Lauren?

SPEAKER_04 0:36

Good morning, everyone, and thank you, Marianne. So I'm excited to share with you all our top education issues, which outline the forum's policy agenda for the 2025-2026 legislative biennium. And I want to note before I begin, and you heard some of our Marianne and Latania allude to this, that these priorities were informed by many of the students, educators, and families that we work with every day across the state, including some of you who are in the room today. So thank you to those of you who have shared your experience and expertise with us. We also recognize that while these priorities will guide the forum's advocacy work for the next two years, there are many critical things not on this list that are important to supporting students and educators in public schools that are just beyond the scope of what we're focusing on. So I'll give a fairly quick overview this morning of these issues, and you can find the full publication and sources at your tables as well as on our website. Our first top issue is to ensure school funding, that our school funding system is equitable, adequate, and flexible to meet students' unique needs. I think this will be no surprise that this priority will be no surprise to those of you who have followed the forum's work over the years. We've long advocated for investing in our local public schools because we know that this is an investment in our children, our communities, our economy, and the future of our state. Economic research is clear that investments in public education pay off both in the short and the long term. Increased school funding is tied directly to improved standardized test scores, higher graduation rates, higher rates of college attendance, and lifetime earnings. And these impacts are particularly strong for students from low-income families. But our state is not providing enough resources for all of our children to thrive and to have what they need to be successful in work and in life. In recent years, North Carolina has consistently ranked at the bottom of the country in per student spending. You can see these charts on our slide. Most recently, we were ranked 48th on per student spending, falling nearly $5,000 below the national average. We also ranked 49th in the country on funding effort or the amount of funding overall per student relative to the state's wealth. So we have a lot more that we could be doing to fund education. Our children need adequate and equitable funding, and we need a system that is flexible and efficient to ensure that unique student needs are being met. Last legislative Biennum in 2023, we saw a proposal to shift to a weighted student funding formula, which would tie funds more directly to students with a base amount for each child and additional funding based on students' individual needs and characteristics. The forum has and will continue to work to ensure that diverse stakeholders are at the table to inform what this model should look like if we do decide to move forward. While the local public schools that serve the vast majority of children across North Carolina do not have the resources that they need, state lawmakers appropriated nearly $1 billion to the Opportunity Scholarship School Voucher Program in 2024-2025. Many of the private schools receiving these funds are inaccessible to large numbers of students and families in North Carolina because of cost, lack of services, or admission policies that discriminate based on a number of characteristics like religion, disability, academics, and sexual orientation. So we encourage our lawmakers to prioritize public dollars for the public schools that are open to all. And the public agrees with us. Many of you in the room. Seventy-one percent of North Carolinians across different political parties, across different regions of the state, said in a recent poll that increasing funding for public schools would do more to improve education in the state than funding vouchers. Our next issue is to make educator pay competitive in North Carolina. As Marianne said, and as we will repeat till the end of time, educators are the number one factor impacting student outcomes. But we continue to see high rates of teacher attrition and fewer prospective educators entering the profession, due in large part to the fact that it's very difficult to afford basic living expenses on a teacher's salary in the state. North Carolina's teacher pay ranks 42nd in the country for beginning teachers and 38th in the country for average overall salary. We fall well below the national average on both of these measures. And North Carolina educators earn about 25% less than comparable college graduates in the state. So we have a very long way to go to get teacher pay to where it needs to be. So that our compensation can be competitive with that of other states, including our neighboring states and other industries. So a policy action for this biennium is to develop a plan with input from educators to increase base pay for teachers to reach the national average by 2030 and to compensate teachers for advanced degrees and additional duties. And again, after teachers, principals are the second most important school-based factor impacting student outcomes. So for this upcoming biennium, we'll be lifting up and supporting the efforts of many principals and leaders, some of whom are here today, who have pointed out the need to simplify and stabilize the current principal pay plan to be able to attract and recruit excellent educators into these roles, and to incentivize excellent principals to serve in low-performing schools. Issue number three is to address critical needs to support child well-being and success both in and outside of school. I think it goes without saying that our children have been through a lot in recent years. Recent events and shifting contexts, devastating impacts from Hurricane Helene most recently, the pandemic, and an uncertain future for vulnerable populations, among many other things, contribute to a very challenging time for our young people, as well as for the adults who care for them. I think everyone here in this room today can likely bring to mind a child who's struggling with mental and or physical health challenges. And we know that for students to be successful in school, their most fundamental needs must be addressed. The good news is that we know what types of supports work well for kids both in and outside of school. Having affirming and safe school spaces that are fully staffed by mental health professionals and that provide caring and safe environments for students to learn. High quality out-of-school time programs help students to build social and academic skills, reduce absenteeism, and can provide them with access to healthy snacks and meals, among other things. And my colleagues at the NC Center for After School Programs can tell you lots more about that. So this session, we are encouraging our lawmakers to implement policies that prioritize the mental health of students as well as educators and close the after-school summer learning and enrichment funding gap with funding designated specifically for school and community-based programs. Our final issue for the biennium, the most exciting one, is to adopt assessment and accountability policies. That was a joke, that are fair and effective. Effective assessment and accountability policies provide important information about student progress and areas where additional support is needed. But our current model, which relies on school performance grades based mostly on a single test score on a single day, is more reflective of student poverty rates than actual learning. And you can see this illustrated in this bar graph on the screen that shows the breakdown of performance grades by the percent economic disadvantage in a school. So we support moving to a multi-measure accountability model like the one proposed by the Department of Public Instruction in 2023. A lot of experts here today with us informed that proposal and we would like to see it move forward. This would offer much more informative and actionable data about school and educator effectiveness. And just as it is important for our families and our taxpayers and educators to have information about how schools in our public schools or students in our public schools are doing, the same is true for students in our private schools that receive public funds. Right now, private schools that receive school vouchers do not have to report what they teach or how their students are performing, which makes it very difficult to determine whether they're providing a quality education to their students. Our analysis showed that only 8.5% of the top 200 schools that received the most funding through vouchers last year publicly reported student outcome data. So we'd like to see our lawmakers take action to require all schools receiving taxpayer funds to measure and publicly report common and comparable student achievement outcomes. So that concludes my presentation of the top education issues for this biennium. We know that these priorities are shared by many people across the state and many of you in the room, and we look forward to partnering with all of you in the coming months to support our students, educators, and our schools.

SPEAKER_03 10:04

Thank you so much for joining us. After the break, we'll continue our session from Eggs and Issues 2025.

SPEAKER_04 10:37

So let's just start uh with all of you introducing yourself again. Just share a little bit about your role and the uh school district that you serve.

SPEAKER_00 10:47

Hello, everyone. I'm Dr. Simone Wilkins. I am the proud principal of Clark Elementary School, located in Henderson, North Carolina, Vance County Schools. We are Vance County Pride and proud. Um, I have been serving at Clark. This is my second year as principal. I actually took over in September of last year, going from assistant principal to principal in about three weeks. So I had to buckle in and strap up, but super excited. I've spent my whole career in Vance County Schools. I started an education in 2015 as a middle grades ELA teacher, worked my way up to an instructional coach assistant principal. So I am Vance County proud and super excited to be with you all on this morning.

SPEAKER_05 11:25

Buenos días, good morning. Uh thank you so much for allowing me to be here and to be able to speak and to represent my students in this space. Um, I'm a multilingual teacher, so I teach sixth, seventh, and eighth grade in Cavaras County schools. Um, I have always wanted to be a teacher because I so desperately wanted to see myself represented in the educators around me. And the truth is I never got that experience outside of having a Spanish teacher. Um the first one for me was actually at UNC Charlotte with Dr. Medina, and so she and all of the educators I've had around me that look and sound like me have really inspired me to be the educator that I am today. So thank you so much for having me here and being willing to listen to what I have to say. I appreciate it a lot.

SPEAKER_01 12:08

Good morning. I'm Don Phipps, Superintendent in Caldwell County. I am in year 31 of uh education service in year 15 as a superintendent and look forward to being able to share with you all today.

SPEAKER_04 12:21

Thank you all so much for joining us. So let's start with talking about a challenge that you all are facing. And I know there are many things that you could talk about, but let's talk about one particular challenge, and we'd like you to share about that issue as well as how you and your colleagues are addressing that challenge. So let's start with Natalia.

SPEAKER_05 12:44

So the truth is, if you would have asked me this question two and a half weeks ago, I would have had a completely different answer. Um, I would have talked about budgets in my county and how, based off our county commissioners, how we're losing funding for ML teachers, and how um that affects my classroom. But as of last week, I had a student walk into my classroom, and I have a ton of students, they come in and check on me, and we do check-ins, and he said, Miss Mejia, if I comes to school, can I jump out of the window and run? I had another student who told me this classroom is going to be targeted. I had another student tell me that they practice what they need to say if ICE comes to their door. I had a parent later that day call me and honor me with their trust and break my heart by asking me what I thought. Should I keep my students at home? Is the school safe? And I had to break their heart and break my heart and tell them, no, the schools aren't safe, my classroom's not safe, but I promise you, I will always be a safe space. And it broke my heart because as an educator, I love. That is what we do. As human beings, we love, but we also understand that love is an action word. It moves us, it empowers us. And I ask you all, because I'm left here daunted honestly by the fact that where does my love go when I can't move? When there aren't actions that I can take for my community. What do I do? And that is a challenge I am facing because our North Carolina Constitution promises all students the right to a fair education, and here I am hearing that my students don't want to come to school. So, what do I do? Where does my love go? And so that is a critical challenge that I will be facing, and all North Carolina teachers are facing today in our classrooms. And that is truly where I find myself as an educator. How do I raise my voice? How do I move in love? How do I be an instrument of love? How do I work in empathy for my comunidad, for my community? Where do I go from here in uncertainty? And so I would say, right now, that is a critical issue for myself and for my students.

unknown 15:40

Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 15:49

Not sure how to follow that up. I've got a lot of issues. Um the one that I think is most pressing and that I've really recognized since we've come back from Christmas, as a superintendent in January, I like to invite our leadership team to come see me and talk about short-term and long-term goals. And that helps me in terms of planning to get an idea if somebody looks is looking for a position change, maybe they want to go from elementary to middle, whatever. And I've wrapped those up, and I realize that more than 60% of our leadership team could retire in the next two to five years. And I knew that, but I think sitting down and looking at that and having that realization hit me, it makes me realize that we've got to make sure, and it's not just in our Ed Center Central Services, that extends all the way down to classroom teaching positions and instructional assistants and cafeteria workers and the whole nine yards. So, what are we truly doing to attract and retain new talent? Are we developing it? Do we have the pipeline in place that we need to start at the classroom? And then what are we doing to make sure that we can infuse into the ranks of our leadership team new people that are going to be in place and ready so that when we have folks retire, we're in a good place to do that. So that's something that's that's on my mind right now as we're doing the work that moves into another year and we plan, and it's it's certainly a heavy lift that we've got to work ourselves through.

SPEAKER_04 17:08

Thank you, Dr. Wilkins.

SPEAKER_00 17:11

So, along similar along those lines, um, one of our challenges being in a rural school district is about how do we recruit and retain teachers. At Clark, about 80% of my staff is international, meaning either from Jamaica or the Philippines. So, as a principal, I have to constantly think about how do I bring in high-quality educators when unfortunately not everyone is going to be able to get sponsored at the end of a school year, where we have relationships with students and families already built. And I have to plan for that. How do I uh tell my family that unfortunately at the end of the year your favorite ESL teacher or your favorite fourth grade math teacher may no longer be with us next year? So that is something that we are really trying to work hard at with recruiting, especially when you're around other districts who unfortunately they do have a higher teacher supplement. So it's really hard to recruit and retain when, yes, we are a real community, we have so much passion and heart, but let's be honest, it's hard when you as an educator, you have to decide if you're gonna get the meat that's ten dollars at the grocery store, or if you're gonna get the pack of chicken that's six dollars. And we are really working with inflation, and we are we have to do something about it in terms of how do we recruit and retain. As a principal, it was really disheartening. I had a long-term sub-position in kindergarten, and anyone knows when you're dealing with kindergarten as a foundational skills, that it's like level 10 emergency. I literally took the day where I called at least six universities. Out of that six universities, I called only about five of those individuals were actually still in the teaching profession. And that's alarming when we think about teacher prep programs, and how do we create that pipeline from teacher prep programs into the school system? So that is a challenge that I know that we all are thinking about, but also in terms of relationship building, how do we make sure that our kids have equitable access to education so that no matter what their zip coding is, they have the opportunity to succeed?

SPEAKER_04 19:03

What do you want policymakers to know about your students, about the work that you all are doing, and what do you want them to have as top of mind?

SPEAKER_01 19:11

Mine is for us to develop a local report card to try to take the place or at least stand up beside the old, antiquated, useless report card that exists in North Carolina. It is shameful that in 2025 we still judge students and teachers in schools by what happens on a single day, and that becomes a record of what goes on. I walk in our schools and I know the great work that's happening, and I feel like it's going to be valuable in our community when we ask our community what are the things that you want us to be measured on. And those may look different in 115 different school systems across the state. But for Caldwell County, my feeling is after we've done that a couple of years, folks should want to see what the local report card looks like much more than what the state report card looks like. Because we know that those report card grades, though sometimes they may be accurate, most of the times they're not. And it's because they're measuring something that's just not comprehensive enough.

SPEAKER_05 20:11

Um, so I think not just for this year, but for the next four years, I'm gonna really be focusing on my students, making sure that they feel seen and have a sense of belonging, that they feel safe in my presence, right? Because I can no longer promise there's safety in my classroom. I'm gonna make sure that my students understand their rights as humans, as citizens in this country. I'm gonna make sure that I'm I have my non-negotiables, that I know the things that I must stand strong in. No matter what room I walk into, these are my beliefs, this is what I hold true about my students. And I'm gonna make sure that in every room I walk into that I'm building these stories about my students because stories can build people up, right? These community members, these people that have these children, right, that face these problems that we're seeing, deportation or their families being deported back to their home country, remember that is the woman in church that prays with you. Remember that's your neighbor that you go and get bread and butter from when you're missing it from your house. Remember that's the person that goes on a morning walk when you're driving down the highway, right? Or driving down your neighborhood. Just making sure that these stories are seen, right? And in the midst of all this hopelessness, I had the amazing opportunity to go to the Freedom Park in Raleigh, and I was reminded in the midst of all my hopelessness, right, that the fight for freedom begins every morning. John H. Wheeler, right? He was a local Durham activist. He owned a bank, or he was a president of a bank, and he was a lawyer. And so I'm going to remind my students that every day, right? It's a new day in the midst of darkness. We have hope. Morning is coming. We will continue. We will continue. We will continue. We have this, right? And it's all about building narratives and stories. And then all of you just see me, see my students, hear their stories, and be active listeners and know that you also have a role in this. You can also partake, right? Because the fight for freedom is something that we all can believe in, right? As Americans, as people who live in this country, and as North Carolinians.

SPEAKER_00 22:18

So for 2025, my top issue at Clark is equity. I am going to stand on the front line and continue to fight for rural schools in districts such as mine that were often overlooked in the conversation. But we have challenges just like suburban schools and urban schools, and our challenges might be different, but nevertheless, they're still challenges. As a principal, I have the mindset and the perspective where I see the struggling mother that sometimes has to decide between am I going to be able to provide new school clothes for my children, or if I'm going to be able to keep my lights on at the end of the month. And for me, that's serious work. Equity in terms of making sure that with my particular school, every resource that we're given, we use in totality with intentionality. Because we know that at the end of the day, if we do not do it with a purpose, it is in vain. So for me, making sure that my students at Clark know I do not care if you are from Henderson, North Carolina, you have the same ability as if you were in Wake County, Chapel Hill, and you are not going to let where you come from dictate your journey and dictate your future. So for me, I take this work very, very seriously. When we walk into that building every day, it's our job to make sure that our babies understand that you are going to be somebody, that you are going to be a game changer. At our school, we say every day we are focused on being game changers. Growth, achievement, motivation, and empowerment. And if we don't challenge them to change the game and the status quo, that's gonna have generational effects. And we are determined that we are going to break generational curses and barriers in Vance County and in Henderson, North Carolina, because our children deserve it.

SPEAKER_04 24:05

We can't thank you all enough. How lucky are we to have these amazing educators in our school?

SPEAKER_03 24:12

Thank you so much to our guests and all those who tuned in for this Exit Issues episode. That's all for today, and we'll see you next week.