In this installment: Magnet school hypocrisy, failing third graders, academic “integration” options and other Wake County Public Schools (WCPSS) headlines.

Last week’s edition: #WCPSS Updates: Enrollment Caps, Busing & Teacher at center of $450k settlement resigns

WCPSS related headlines

• Man kidnapped and raped a 15-year-old girl – then used Google Translate to tell her she was pretty (Daily Mail UK).  I inquired with the Wake Sheriff’s office if ICE had placed a detainer on him but was told to ask ICE directly. More on this story at WRAL.
• Stephen Barnabas Holland, age 36, of Zebulon was charged with a parole violation and being a sex offender on school grounds. (News and Observer)
• Wake County school bus with 39 students on board involved in a crash in Cary (CBS17) and “The driver of the school bus was cited with unsafe movement.”(WRAL)
• Parents continue to push for Wake Co. school district to use more than plain water to clean lunch tables (ABC11)
• For some Wake County parents, the math still doesn’t add up (CBS17)

#1 – Hypocrisy & Awards for 37 Wake County Magnet schools

The Wake County Board’s magnet school program has brought in more awards. The board and their staff have openly admitted they are using magnets to “woo” students from charters.

“Parents in Wake County have always had choice. Our focus is on ensuring Wake County families know the choices that we offer,” Wade Martin, Wake’s assistant superintendent for school choice, planning and assignment told the News and Observer.

So how many are they wooing from charters? The board and the article don’t say, but the article does say this about magnet enrollment:

“Overall, 57% of the 5,800 applicants for a magnet school were accepted this school year. Some of the schools receiving awards this year are among the hardest to get into because of the high demand.” (News & Observer)

When demand is greater than the number of seats at a charter school, a lottery has to be held. There is no priority for anyone. What happens at a Wake County Public Schools magnet? The rich get priority:

It’s even more difficult for some families to get in because most Wake magnet schools give selection priority to applicants from affluent areas. Only 10% of Wake magnet seats are filled by random lottery. (News & Observer)

It would appear that with the Board’s magnet schools, “choice” means creating a system within a system that is separate but unequal.

Meanwhile, most of the Wake County 3rd-grade proficiency results are horrifying.

Only four show a proficiency rate of 75% and up. One school, Bugg Elementary, had only a 20.10% proficiency rate in 2018-19 and over the last five years has never risen higher than 41%.

Imagine if the Board’s constant efforts to propel magnet schools were applied to failing schools like Bugg Elementary?

#2 – More “academic options” and outside contractors

In an article at WRAL, the Wake School Board says they want to increase integration through more “academic options.” The board is using RTI International again to do it.

Wake County Board of Education members are exploring how different academic options might help schools become more integrated. Tuesday’s discussion was part of the board’s ongoing efforts to balance student diversity across schools.

The board has been working with facilitators from RTI International, who are leading the discussions about how to define diversity in schools and what data should be examined.

Michael Martin with RTI told board members that data show “a lot of equity with course offerings” across Wake County schools, but there are “some very stark differences” in how students perform.

Board member Jim Martin goes on to say there should be course offerings that “inspires a kid.”  The most concerning part reported by WRAL:

One question to answer, according to board Chair Keith Sutton, is whether academic programs and offerings impact integration at schools. If so, he said, what can the board reasonably use as a lever to entice parents to send their children to different schools.

The Board knows that its Socioeconomic Index reassignment plan, which uses economic factors as a proxy for race, has to be more than just busing kids from one school to another.

This could also be a soft-pedal segway for the introduction of the Social Justice Standards into the classroom. Those standards, which contain zero academic content or value and are 100% straight-up progressive indoctrination, were created by Teaching Tolerance, an offshoot of the controversial Southern Poverty Law Center.

Related Resources:

1-21-2020 Board Meeting video
1-21-2020 Work Session video

What starts with Parents changes everything.

Sick of your student being constantly reassigned?

Tired of the district ignoring parent concerns and parental rights?

Fed up with social justice propaganda replacing academic subjects?

Upset with the invasion of student privacy?

Tired of the board’s attacks on school choice and charters?

If you answered yes to even one of the above, consider a run for School Board. 2020 is an election year for all nine Wake County School Board seats.

The candidate filing period opens in June.