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New generation takes the helm at Asheville–Buncombe League of Women Voters
May 14, 2012 By admin Leave a Comment
The League of Women Voters of Asheville and Buncombe County held its annual meeting and luncheon on Saturday, May 12 at the Renaissance Hotel in Asheville. The keynote speaker was Leanne Winner, an Asheville native who is now chief lobbyist for the NC School Boards Association (NCSBA). She discussed and analyzed changes in public school funding during the past five years, trends in charter and virtual schooling, and specific legislation that will impact education in North Carolina for years to come. Before joining NCSBA, she was an attorney with Everett, Gaskins, Hancock and Stevens, where she helped guide the $1.8 million school-bond legislation through the General Assembly.
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Editorial: E-learning – Hoke finds way to get its students online
May 13, 2012 By admin Leave a Comment
It was the Hoke County school system that spawned the Leandro court case over inequity of state funding for low-wealth school districts.
The case brought some improvement, but Hoke still is a long way from having big resources. But we just got a look at a program there that helps students use 21st century technology to learn better and faster, with more resources at their fingertips.
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Virtual charter moves forward after judge rules against State Board of Education
May 9, 2012 By admin Leave a Comment
A controversial bid to open up a statewide virtual charter school got a go-ahead this afternoon from an administrative law judge, and could open by this fall unless the N.C. State Board of Education appeals the judge’s order.
N.C. Administrative Law Judge Beecher Gray found the state education board acted in an “arbitrary and capricious” manner by not acting on an application submitted in February by N.C. Learns, a non-profit organization that will contract with K12, Inc., an online education company that sends its profits to Wall Street investors.
K12 has had a reputation for aggressively pursuing proposals in other states, and North Carolina was no exception. The company hired a s team of lobbyists from one of the state’s top firms, McGuire Woods, including former state Rep. Jeff Barnhart to lobby Cabarrus County school board officials, a group that up until recently he had represented in the state legislature. Then, N.C. Learns (which doesn’t have any apparent funding streams outside of start-up dollars forward by K12, Inc.) hired state Sen. Fletcher Hartsell, another Cabarrus County Republican, to serve as its lawyer.
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