McCrory Responds to the NY Times
Published July 13, 2013
by Governor Pat McCrory, NY Times Editorial, July 12,2013.
Re “The Decline of North Carolina” (editorial, July 10):
The North Carolina I’m leading today is on a powerful comeback. After just six months of problem-solving leadership and making the tough decisions that we were elected to do, there is significant movement on vital reforms to tax policy, energy, education, economic development and transportation.
While it may not be apparent to the very liberal worldview of The Times, North Carolina’s new focus on reform is paying off. Already companies have announced plans to create more than 9,300 jobs in the state and invest more than $1.1 billion in facilities. The jet engine manufacturer GE Aviation is bringing its advanced materials production to a new facility near Asheville.
My reforms have stepped on the toes of the political right and the left who are vested in the old ways of doing business. But in my 14 years as mayor of Charlotte, I learned that it didn’t matter whether a good idea came from a Republican or a Democrat. What mattered was whether it solved a problem and did so at a cost taxpayers could afford.
This collaborative, problem-solving, focused leadership transformed Charlotte from a regional hub into a leading national metropolitan center.
This focus on pragmatic problem-solving is now fueling North Carolina’s comeback to prosperity as well.
PAT McCRORY
Governor
Raleigh, N.C., July 12, 2013
July 13, 2013 at 1:52 pm
dj anderson says:
"While it may not be apparent to the very liberal worldview of The Times, -- article
That was a slap in the face, and I expect a reply to come, not that anything is wrong with being "very liberal."
July 18, 2013 at 6:04 pm
dj anderson says:
Does anyone envy being a teacher, being shut up all day in a classroom alone with a couple of dozen adolescent teens? They are underpaid even in Mass. @ $70K average pay. Many of us have a most important person in our past who was a teacher, and (maybe a most destructive figure as well.) Still, how does the argument go to pay more than the $30K starting pay & $46K average in NC while asking:
How is it that the Dakotas are both in the bottom 5 in teacher pay, but in the top ten in math & reading scores?
What does it mean when California is first in teacher pay, but in the bottom ten in scores.
Then again, Mass. is 2nd in teacher pay at $70 average, but first in reading and math scores
With teacher pay and teacher job protection not proven factors in student scores, and since NCAE via its ACT has politically tied itself to one party, the losing party, why would a Republican GAssembly want to further enrich teachers or protect weak teachers? NCAE bet on the wrong horse. There's a political consequence to that, just opposite of when you win.
Here's the perception of the non-aligned, independent minded voters:
Democrats are for higher teacher pay, increased benefits, more job security, saying that makes for better education.
The Republicans are for more efficient schools and accountability, saying that makes for better education.
That might keep the teacher union vote, which the party already owns,
but it won't win the independent minded voter that will decide the election. Democrats need to change.
Democrats, siding with the NCAE, want physical education teachers to make the same as Physics teachers, and they've had their way.
Democrats want the master's & PhD levels to pay the same for all fields, and to pay more at each level of degree in every subject.
Democrats want National Board Certified teachers to make more even without evidence that students of those teachers score better after certification than before.
Republicans want to give all students at underachieving schools vouchers to attend private schools without requiring the private schools to have open book audits. Democrats don't support vouchers.
Republicans want more Charter Schools. Democrats don't.
Wouldn't bi-partisanship create better schools? We've never tried it. Look at Wake County, for example.
Obama undermined local democrats by coming to Mooresville system to hold it up as an example, when that system is in the bottom ten in funding, but the top ten in performance, and did that with technology of laptops to every student and expensive software, and funded that by cutting the number of teachers and increasing class size.
Maybe the NCAE is too much aligned with fearful teachers, and should go with performance based pay and job security, and wine and dine republican support. Maybe Democrats should not be so influenced by a group whose primary concern is the teacher, not the student. Students have parents, and parents vote.
"U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan has called for teacher salaries that start at $60,000 and eventually rise to $150,000" -- Huffington Post
So, how does that come to pass? All state workers will want the raises the teachers get.
NC would have to pay $6,000 more per teacher per year to be back at national average which Jim Hunt tried. If we didn't include DC, Chicago, Massachusetts, Connecticut -- those highest paid schools, and paid the median average, then it would not take $6,000, but again, why would Republicans do that for democrat voting/supporting teachers and simply have the same teachers back?
The NCAE could start wining and dining Republicans and promising ACT support next year, but they won't, will they?
Democrats are going to have to change, for the times have changed.
