The Wake County Board of Education didn\u2019t withdraw from its high schools\u2019 accreditation Wednesday night, but it is one step closer to making that decision. The board discussed withdrawing accreditation in a controversial closed meeting, which took place during a public hearing on reassignments Wednesday night at Millbrook High School.<\/p>\n
Wake County high schools are currently accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS,) a regional branch of AdvancEd. Accreditation is a method of quality assurance which adds value to high school diplomas in accredited districts and increases students\u2019 chances of being admitted into college and getting scholarships and financial aid.<\/p>\n
AdvancEd requested an investigation into the Wake County school system\u2019s decision to drop its long-standing diversity policy. The back and forth started months ago and correspondence between the two organizations has been indicative of a relationship on the rocks. Neither organization wants accreditation to be dropped, but neither wants to cave in to the other\u2019s demands.<\/p>\n
Rather than telling Wake its accreditation would be dropped, AdvancEd\u2019s president wrote to the school system\u2019s attorney, saying that Wake should consider withdrawing its own accreditation if it does not plan to proceed with the investigation in a more open manner.<\/p>\n
The majority members of the board have explained their resistance by saying AdvancEd is using too broad a scope in its investigation of the school system, which is the result of a request made by the pro-diversity NAACP. Board member John Tedesco claimed that even some of the pro-diversity members on the board agree.<\/p>\n
Ultimately the board voted to extend the fraught correspondence with AdvancEd, by sending a letter asking the organization for clarity on the scope and process of the investigation.<\/p>\n
Board member Kevin Hill split with the minority in voting to send the letter, but said that he did not agree with Tedesco\u2019s assessment that the scope of the investigation is too broad for accreditation purposes. Hill added that he would not move to withdraw Wake County schools from accreditation in any future vote.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn general, I think we would do well in the investigation,\u201d said minority member Anne McLaurin. \u201cWe might learn there are some places we can improve, but that would be a good thing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dhruv Jain was one of a dozen students to speak out against losing accreditation. \u201cAs students all we can do is watch. It\u2019s a debacle of partisan politics. If nothing is wrong, you should have nothing to fear.\u201d<\/p>\n
Board member Debra Goldman has split with the majority on several crucial reassignment votes but still supports neighborhood schools in theory.<\/p>\n
In explaining her vote to continue the back-and-forth with AdvancEd and her disagreement with the scope of the investigation, she said, \u201cPlease know that what is in my heart is to do the right thing by the children of this county.\u201d But, she added that the investigation goes \u201cbeyond the scope of accreditation\u201d and that AdvancEd is \u201cnot allowing [Wake County schools] due process.\u201d<\/p>\n
Like the majority of the major decisions in the past year, the decision to have a closed meeting was split along party lines. McLaurin, who voted against the closed meeting, said, \u201cOpen process is very important. I\u2019m not scared of talking openly without a lawyer.\u201d<\/p>\n
News and Observer reporter Thomas Goldsmith stood up before the crowd at Millbrook High and voiced that newspaper\u2019s opposition of the closed meeting to a standing ovation. He said, \u201cWe didn\u2019t feel the attorney-client privilege argument stood up in this situation. Procedural advice has often been given in public meetings.\u201d<\/p>\n
The board was greeted by 50 high school students chanting, \u201cSave our education. Keep accreditation,\u201d as it emerged from the closed door session to vote publicly on continuing the correspondence with AdvancEd.<\/p>\n
Roughly half of the speakers at last night\u2019s meeting addressed specific assignments, which was the initial purpose of the evening. With four more public hearings in the next two weeks set to address the three-year assignment plan, it\u2019s unclear what the major focus of public comment will be.<\/p>\n
Public hearings will be held at:<\/p>\n
Heritage High School Thursday Jan 13 at 6pm<\/p>\n
South East H.S. Wednesday Jan. 19 at 6pm<\/p>\n
Garner H.S. Thursday Jan. 20 at 6pm<\/p>\n
Cary H.S. Monday Jan. 24th at 6pm<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Wake County Board of Education didn\u2019t withdraw from its high schools\u2019 accreditation Wednesday night, but it is one step closer to making that decision. The board discussed withdrawing accreditation in a controversial closed meeting, which took place during a public hearing on reassignments Wednesday night at Millbrook High School.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24024,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[15,23,55],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5131"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24024"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5131"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5131\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5131"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5131"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theraleighcommons.org\/raleighpublicrecord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5131"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}