PUBLIC EDUCATION

My husband and I both went to NC public schools and our daughters are currently at Jesse Wharton Elementary School, an amazing public school in our district. 

Simply put, we are not doing enough to support public education in our state. 

Alexa (shown here) is a very special person to our family. She was the valedictorian at Trinity High School and received a scholarship at Wake Forest University where she studied math. She could have then gone on to enjoy a 6-figure Wall St. salary. Yet, she stayed and completed a graduate program in education at Wake and accepted a job at a Title 1 school in Winston-Salem, NC, bringing home around $41,000 a year after taxes. She is currently not compensated for obtaining her master's degree, which is a shame. She is an unsung hero, and I have incredible respect for her sacrifice on behalf of her students and our state.

We need more teachers in North Carolina like Alexa. We were 48th in the nation last year in public school funding. North Carolina’s cost-adjusted, per-pupil funding level was $10,791; $4,695 below the national average.  

NC public school teachers are leaving because they are underpaid and under supported. And fewer NC students are pursuing teaching - new enrollments in educator preparation programs during 2022-23 in NC are down 13% from 2021-22. And that is in addition to a 39% decrease from the year prior, when COVID waivers for tuition were in place to incentivize students.

Competitive salaries are a necessary condition to attracting and retaining great teachers. 

I propose raising public school teachers’ and staff salaries 8% per year until we are ranked at least average in public school funding. The current legislation in review has proposed 4.4% salary increases, which are not sufficient in my opinion given the current 3% inflation rate. But I do fully support the proposed salary increase for teachers with their master's degree and hope that finally gets implemented. I support reviewing student testing performance, attendance numbers and other factors in correlation with salary increases to ensure we trend positively in all areas and are minimizing inefficiencies whenever possible. 

We do not have to increase taxes to fund 8% salary increases - we can deprioritize other non-critical areas to keep our budget balanced - namely, the opportunity scholarships.

Currently our NC legislators are proposing to fully fund 100% of requests for the school choice vouchers regardless of income. I strongly disagree with funding requests from Tier 3 and Tier 4, which are families of four making over $250,000 a year or not even reporting their household income. These families are likely already sending their children to private school and do not need financial support from public tax payer dollars. 

We do not divert tax dollars to residents depending on if they use their local fire station or not. Just like fire stations, public schools are there for public usage regardless who uses it. Yet we are on track over the next decade to divert more than a half-billion dollars of state taxpayer funds annually to these vouchers. 

If we could reallocate these funds, in addition to better supporting our public schools, I would better support accredited preschool programming and organizations like Smart Start to ensure our children are ready to thrive in Kindergarten and that parents have reliable care so they can maintain steady jobs to provide ongoing income for their families.

Lastly, let’s treat teachers like the highly-trained professionals they are and give them the freedom to teach.

There are two concerning trends that I will fight at every instance: 

Last school year saw an unprecedented 3,362 instances of books being banned, restricted or access-limited, up 33% from the 2021-2022 school year, according to PEN America. I fully disagree with book banning and simply will not allow it. Knowledge is power.

Moms for Liberty is a new, unproven and controversial organization. I will not support anyone in this organization to claim that they represent what is in the best interest of our children and I will ensure that they do not introduce or sway future legislation in the NC House.