State Board of Education Launches School Choice Sneak Attack

The State Board of Education this morning launched a sneak attack on school choice in North Carolina.
 
Last month, the state legislature enacted a law – overriding Gov. Roy Cooper’s veto – to make it easier for new charter schools to earn approval to open. The law comes as the waitlist for charter schools swells to 77,000 student names.
 
But this morning, Cooper’s appointees to the State Board of Education latched onto a dubious technicality to scuttle the entire purpose of that law. The Board contemplated a policy that gives itself the power to withhold funding from newly-approved charter schools.
 
Sen. Deanna Ballard, a candidate for Lt. Governor who previously chaired the state Senate Education Committee, said, “Bureaucrats will resort to anything to block parents from having a choice in which school their children attend. This sneak attack on school choice uses a legal trick to threaten funding for new charter schools even as tens of thousands of children sit on charter school waitlists. Parents, not bureaucrats, should have the power in deciding which school is best for their children.”
 
The Lt. Governor has a seat on the State Board of Education. If elected, Sen. Ballard will use that position to continue fighting for school choice policies she championed in the legislature.