ICYMI: Anti-public-school candidates are a danger to North Carolina
Fayetteville Observer Op-Ed: Calls for death. Anti-Muslim. Dissing public schools. Morrow a wild pick for NC schools chief
“… our state’s attitude toward public education is sad and lacking. Now along comes Morrow to say, figuratively: “Hold my beer.”
Morrow of Cary has called public schools “indoctrination centers” and home-schools her kids. She yet won the Republican nomination for NC Superintendent for Public Instruction, i.e. head of public schools, having defeated incumbent Catherine Truitt 52% to 48%. In November, Morrow will face Democrat Mo Green, a former Guilford County Schools superintendent and former director of the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation.
Morrow has made numerous hateful or out-there statements on social media. She deleted the personal Twitter account where most of her wild statements live. But the internet, as ever, is forever, and the screenshots live on.
The tweet that has received the most attention comes to us from Morrow’s May 2020 Twitter feed, in which she expressed her deep thoughts on former President Barack Obama:
“I prefer a Pay Per View of him in front of the firing squad … I do not want to waste another dime on supporting his life. We could make some money back from televising his death.”
It’s not just the first Black president in Morrow’s crosshairs: She has called for executions for President Joe Biden as well as “vaccine-mongers” Bill and Melinda Gates, as CNN reported.
Who even sits around thinking such thoughts? …”
WRAL Editorial Cartoon: Searching for the soul of public education
Cardinal & Pine Op-ed: Michele Morrow poses a huge threat to NC public schools
“…Perhaps the most overlooked, but scariest thing about Michele Morrow as a candidate, is her complete ignorance of the workings of our public schools and special education. For starters, based on her own words, Morrow doesn’t know the basic definition of special education. She vowed in a candidate forum to “bring it back”.
What she implied was that special education was a place. She went on to say that allowing students qualified for special education into general education was leading to mediocrity in our schools. She described schools as a place for healthy competition and said disabled students were not able to compete with gifted and talented students. Of course, maybe it never crossed her mind that students with disabilities can qualify as gifted and talented as well.
For the record, special education is not a place. It is a range of services specially designed to meet the needs of any student with a disability. Those services are required by federal law to be in the least restrictive environment. Segregating students is unconstitutional. Her proposal is not only offensive, but also illegal…”
Fayetteville Observer Op-Ed: Wrong again, Mr. Robinson: Republican NC governor candidate misleads on education spending
“Every time Mark Robinson speaks, he shows he’s unqualified, unprepared and too uninformed to be governor of North Carolina.
The Raleigh News & Observer got a tape of the Republican candidate telling the East Wake Republican Club in December that “it has already been proven that school systems get better results on less money.”
Wrong, Mr. Robinson.
North Carolina’s experience in the 1990s proves that more money spent right – especially on paying teachers well and giving them the classroom support they need – produces better results…”