News-Record.com

I would also like to point out that other BIG losers in all this are the students who are being bused across town to Southwest. They will spend forever on a bus, their parents do not have public transportation to attend school events, sports, open houses, or even volunteer. Their plight at home will be the same, their days just got longer and their parental support less than it already was. Shame on you Guilford County School Board!! Shame on you for not thinking this through and for forgetting the very children you claim you are trying to help. Shame on you for your backdoor dirty politics at the expense of Children that you are supposed to be pledged to help. Shame on you for letting down the entire city of High Point. You know in your hearts that what you did was crooked and deceitful. I hope that the press makes a point to show that the Parkview area parents are just as upset at the Southwest parents. Apparently the school board does NOT care about anyone or any child, only their own selfish social/political agendas. Shame, Shame. How embarassing to live in this county! Well...it won't be for long! My child is either going to private school or we are moving out of this county. Walter Childs in all his wisdom suggested we go to the schools and visit. Well guess what? I had already done that, weeks ago when all this started. I went with an open mind, but it was not a difficult conclusion for me that they were not going to use my daughter to try to help fix their problems. She is not up for grabs to be used for their agendas. It will be very interesting to see how many students from the "Penny Road" area that was added back to the C3 map (to move to Welborn Andrews) actually show up. Is there a way to track that? That would be a very interesting statistic, don't you think? Right now, I don't know of even 1 middle schooler planning to stay in Guilford county schools this fall from our neighborhood ("Penny Road" area").

Amen Anette, well said! I too saw the story on Fox 8 and it really does show you how it's hurting the kids in more ways than one.
I guess they'll try this plan, then after it fails too, they'll go back to the county and say "See? We tried to make things better and it didn't work, so we need MORE money...again."
Voters, wake up. This effects you whether or not you have kids in school.

In your list of losers, "the disadvantaged" need to be in the #1 spot. It would be a great front page story and give the opportunity for those residents to finally be heard. I asked the board 2 years ago if they would go into the poor communities and find out how they felt. They said "no". Unfortunately, some things never change!
Maybe all public officials and community members who support this plan can take turns providing transportation to sick children, parent/teacer conferences, sporting events, etc.
Please do this story and give these residents a voice. It appears those that the board are supposedly advocating for, will be bearing the greatest burdens.

I'm touched by the sudden rush of concern for disadvantaged students. I'm also puzzled because just a few weeks ago this same blog was filled with vitriol at the very idea that High Point officials would try to assist residents who needed transportation to a re-districting hearing.

my house on n.centennial st this furniture market:priceless
my freedom of speech, my yard, all the market
goers that go by:again, priceless
any ideas for slogans??????????????????

Emery:

I have said from day 1, my purpose in fighting school board is to help the poor students. A couple of Board members have taken a study presented by Grier, run it all over kingdom come and pretty well abandoned it as unfeasible. Well in the run TG piqued the interest of a clique in High Point that saw a way to use this to their advantage. Now these parasites have grown to create a self destructive monster that consumes the City that hosts them.

Busing a few kids here and there does not address the real issues of education. Integration is not a good or bad concept, but it is a substantially irrelevant issue compared with the many more important ones in actually educating a child.

Morality
Safety
Responsibility
Example
Positive Reinforcement
Conducive environment
Quality Resources

I do not believe race or money educate. There are many more ignorant whites than I believe any other race on the planet. As a CPA I can easily say there are even more ignorant rich white kids than you can imagine. Take away the TV, the Video Games, the game boy, give them a book or a local library and these rich kids may learn. I feel more for the “poor” rich kid who’s parents provide all, rather then the “poor” kid in the worst part of town who’s parent(s) work to feed them and who fight to get to a school play at the cost of a vacation day to see their child do something important to them. These kids have a better education in how to live life. I believe we need to revisit priorities. Money or lack there of, plays little part in living a quality life, and even less in education.

Parental involvement in schools, but more important in children’s lives, is much more important than who a child goes to school with. Good teachers will teach wherever they are and whoever will listen. Let’s provide families (parents and children) and teachers, good safe, conducive environments with the materials and resources they need, in the neighborhoods they know and have chosen, step back and watch real miracles happen as teachers have been doing for millennia.

Emery Would,
If anyone opposed the board assisting residents in transportation, it wasn't me. You have got some nerve thinking you know how we feel. I am not a racist, nor do I care if my child goes to a predominantly minority school. However, if you cannot guarantee that she will be as safe and get the same (as good as) an education as she would have gotten at Southwest, I would allow her to attend Welborn. But, sadly that guarantee can't be made, therefore she will not be used to try to fix their problem. The study quoted by Dot Kearns supports that disadvantaged children will do better in middle class schools, but it also admits that the reverse is NOT true. Sorry, but you can't guilt me into sending my kid to a school that needs help in other ways. Nice try.

Emery Would,

You have missed the point!

Some residents do not have personal transportation. I believe the point some were making is public transportation won't be available to residents needing it in order to travel to North High Point.

Did you catch Fox8 News last night?

The residents themselves are upset over the lack of transportation to North High Point where their children will now be attending school.

Where they will not have the means to pick up or take their children nor attend athletic events, pick up from afterschool practices etc.

Anyone want to take a guess at how much a taxi both way will cost the residents????

Emery Would,

I was not one of those parents who denied this transportation either. As I recall, the person that mentioned this initially changed his mind.

A lot of good it did anyway! Bring them to a forum where no one listened.

For the record, parents since January 2004 who fought the Choice Plan have ALWAYS asked about the students who would be bused OUT of what they know. The parents who were against the Choice Plan fixed lottery have always asked "show me the educational merit of the choice plan?" That question was never answered. The proof is in the fallen test scores and rise is suspension rates at the schools. IT FAILED MISERABLY.

For the study Dot quoted about socioeconomics, you can look on various government web sites that disagree with this.

Annette, remember Walter and others saying that there are more important life lessons children can learn by going to a poor school. If you walked the halls of some of our schools, heard the language and the disrespect, you would not want your child to learn this behavior.

Did anyone notice that even after offering free, public transportation to the forum at Providence Place, they still didn't come?

Also, didn't Walter say he had heard from the parents at Parkview and they liked the idea of being bused? (Remember the "statement" he read?) Who the hell did he talk to? Walter Childs is a liar.

What forum was that that where Vickae, the African American executive, spoke? She said it best about High Point schools.

Walter doesn't speak hardly all year. Next he write this long dissertation. Yeah right. I got a view of the ocean in Boone, NC. I'm glad I am not one of "his people" he is speaking for. Just point me to the next bus.

As I understand the issue that the school board hoped to address with redistriciting was that education of all students is difficult or near impossible when a school is predominantly minority, that being defined as in excess of 50% minority.

Now that may or may not be true, but as I study the redistricting of High Point schools based upon Map C3, we see the following results:

SCHOOL BOUNDARIES IN HIGH POINT
PERCENT MINORITY
SCHOOL 05-06 06-07
Central 63% 62%
Andrews 79% 68%
Southwest 44% 54%
Ferndale 82% 73%
Welborn 81% 68%
Southwest 48% 61%

These three high schools and middle schools in High Point will be predominantly minority schools in 2006-2007. So, my question is what was solved by moving almost 600 students? With this change, we will have all predominantly minority schools, and by definition, failing. This change does assure that all High Point schools will be equal, and by the board's definition, failing.

So, we will spend more money busing students around the city, and we will create more chaos and unhappiness for the affected parents and students.

My conclusion is that we didn't solve any educational problems with this redistricting. The school board has not served the interests of any of the students and parents in High Point. Where are the added resources needed to address the educational needs of these students? Some of those resources will be used to fill the gas tanks of yellow buses. I am of the opinion that we need a new school board and a new superintendent that actually are capable of addressing the educational problems of this city and school district. We can begin by electing some competence in this year's election. We are fortunate that Marti Sykes and Susan Mendenhall took an early out, giving voters an opportunity to replace them with competence. Let's take advantage of that opportunity and not blow it this time around.

fyi - Anita was quoted out of context in the newspaper. She has sent this correction for me to post, at her request, on the Chalkboard.

"Those People" in todays News and Record do not refer to the parents.  Those people are the elected officials in High Point (all of them).  When the parents pull their kids out and put them in private school, this issue will be back again."  Anita

THANK YOU, ANITA, and AMEN.

Emery Would,

YOu have no clue of what its like to have your child go to a school 11 miles from your home.

Yes, my daughter goes to Central, and we live within walking distance from SW. It has been very draining on me and my husband making 2-3 trips a day. I have nothing against the school, but I resent the fact that Emeywood folks are quick to advocate forced busing when they would not put their own children on a bus themselves.

I did not move to North High Point for my child to be a commodity for a school that is controlled by old, money High Point. It is funny how you want us at your school as worker bees but you control what goes on.

If I had my way, my daughter would be back at Southwest, but I wouldn't move her in her junior year.

But you can betcha as the furniture market goes to Vegas, that you will not have my youngest daughter even if I have to scrub toilets. She will go to private school or we will move!!! That's right this NC transplant wants outta here!!!!!!! I have never lived in such a pathetic town in my life.

I would like to invite Gilda to join us during the next furniture market. I have the final draft of a flyer ready. It will be placed on every car that uses the shuttle service. We will also be placing professionally printed signs along the Eastchester corridor from the airport to Main St. With these and a few other ideas, the market visitors WILL get the message of what High Point is all about.

How about,
Welcome to High Point, where education takes a back seat to politics.

HP Resident, that sounds too nice

"Welcome to Hellpoint
Home of Rotten Schools and Rotten Politicians" was floating around.

"Leave the Busing to Us"

"Bring us your tired, your poor, your weak....we will take advantage of them." with upside down Statue of Liberty. that one for the General

Is Fantasia coming to tell her story? all of her story?

Emery Would,
No sudden concern......
if you will read my post again, the questions and advocating for the disadvantaged began TWO YEARS ago. Doesnt't appear sudden to me.

Kay,

Thank you. Even BEFORE two years ago, in the 1999 redistricting process, people on the mapping committee met with people from the Montlieu areas and other black communities. They did not want to be bused then. They do not want to be bused now.

Why didn't Walter go and ask them?

Or did he ask them and he doesn't care?

Where is the NAACP now?

Where are the black ministers and leaders of the black community now?

Swing Low, sour chariot (Yellow Bus)
Coming for to take me away from home
Swing Low, sour chariot
Coming for to take me away from home

I looked over 68
And what did I see,
Coming for to carry me away from home
5 school board members and Mayor Beckeee
Coming after me
Coming for to carry me away from home

Swing low, sour chariot
coming for to carry me away from home
Swing low, sour chariot
coming for to carry me away from home

If you get to Southwest
before I do
Coming for to carry me away from home
Tell all my friends
They're coming for them too
Coming for to carry us away from home

Swing low, sour chariot
Coming for to carry us away from home
Swing low, sour chariot
Coming for to carry us away from home

Now I'm never up these days
and I'm always down
Coming for to carry me away from home
But still my soul
Feels American Idol bound
Coming for to carry me away from home

Swing low, sour chariot
coming for to carry me away from home
Swing low, sour chariot
coming for to carry me away from home

Joe Alston the president of the High point NAACP thinks this was a great idea. See FEB 23 News and Record.

Go Figure!

So much for "his people."

You redistricting opponents have surely made some blunders in the past. The failed attempts to blackmail local businesses into displaying your yellow stickers, for example. The unsettlingly homorerotic "Grier-ended" bumper stickers. The exploitation of crying children at board meetings.

All of those failed to do anything, but strengthen the board's resolve to do it's best to tick you people off.

So, when all else fails, you've finally found the most diabolically effective tool ever employed by an opposition group. That's right, I'm talking about the yard sign. I'm sure the people down at Guilford County Schools headquarters and City Hall are shuddering at the thought of the awesome power of these crude, but simple signs. They're probably re-drawing maps right now at the thought that "Save Our Schools" messages could proliferate throughout North High Point like hippies at a Grateful Dead concert.

Oh, and to add to the already white hot heat of these signs, you're threatening to stick them up during the furniture market!!! No doubt the buyers who return to High Point again and again despite $400 hotel rooms, hugely inflated restaurant prices and zero parking will vow to never ever return once they fix their eyes on these signs!!!

Oh, and please don't get me started on the fliers. I know that when I return to my rental car at the end of a long working day, I always love to spend a lot of time getting all heated up about some flier that I have to actually remove from my windshield. Ball it up and throw it away? Never. Fliers always spur me to immediate action. Once I read a flier, man, I'm on the phone complaining the highest officials, faxing, e-mailing, getting in touch with the aggrieved group to get heavily involved in their struggle. Oh, I've got immense respect for the mega-ton power of the printed flier.

The great thing about all this is that if these tactics get the results, I'm pretty sure they will, Las Vegas will triumph and High Point will be left without all the money the furniture market brings here. So that means less money for the city, creating the need for even higher property taxes to cover our costs.

So, again, I have newfound respect for all of you.

Where is The Great High Point's ward 6 council member who gained office and has done nothing for her ward and the school's...... mmmm!!!!!!

Emery Would

you do get it, you do, you do

we people of North High Point do not care to finance the mayor's market anymore

the city doesn't care about ruining our schools and our children's future

there will be no more market

remember the mayor's work force study

we don't have a work force who can read and write

we would rather give our taxes to surrounding counties

haven't you heard the latest, we have formed a communist commune that's moving to Vegas and sharing equally in one of those bright new showrooms

you can stay in the City of the Dead with your kitty cat and keep paying those high taxes to support Emorywood's Old Guard

when Garth gets in, it's OVER

when the next at-large board members is from Greensboro, it's OVER

appointed school board members, yeah right!

visitors may not like the flyers on their windshield that I heard the North High Point flyer committee (division of the North High Point seasonal display committee) is working on, but I bet the mayor will love all the positive PR

IS IT JUST ME OR IS IT JUST A COINCIDENCE THAT THE HPE FRONT PAGE READS "SIMEON STADIUM DEAL ADVANCES" 3 DAYS AFTER THE SECRET MAP VOTE

Big Dog,

Funny you should ask that. All she would say was the focus was on school safety. She had no idea which map would fly. That was weeks ago.

Of course, remember the secret meetings between the city and Grier and Eric happened before the work session on Sunday.

Hey Emerywood, the costs are going up anyway. The best news I saw in the N&R was that the Vegas Market was 50,000+ this time. Time to think about what to convert all the downtown square footage into. Schools, holding cells, I don't really care.

By the way I have never interpretted Aunt Dottie eeking out a 52%-48% win last time as a devasting loss. Not to shabby to go from 0% to 48% countywide in under 8 months. Now there has been 2 years to think about the upcoming showdown
over the NHP/Old HP district. My only disappointment is that Ms. Mendenhall backed out of the fight.

Bigdog, our Ward 6 rep made a token speech before the School Board a month or so ago. Based on what happened the other night her kids are protected so she continues to drink the Kool-Aid Becky gives her.

You'll see her at a couple of ribbon-cutting ceremonies and holding the door open for Becky and Bernita, that's about all.

"Redistricting has nothing to do with politics. Redistricting is doing what is right for all students. I want school board members to do what is right not politically correct. I think it is time to have an appointed school board rather than elected, then public opinion can’t keep them from doing what is right for all of our students."

This was extracted from a letter to the editor in the editor in the HPE from a Central High parent. I can't believe the letter writers' statement that redistricting is not about politics, nor that the board is not politically correct. It was all about politics!! And, now that Central is losing its patron saint, Susan Mendenhall, and the District 2 seat will swing toward a Southwest representative, the parent now wants the board appointed, rather than elected. Yeah, right. My question is who would appoint? Emerywood parents? Terry Grier? Yeah, Terry Grier. He is the Wiz pulling the strings anyway, isn't he? That would be the perfect world for Terry Grier, appointing the people whose responsibility is oversight of him. Perfect!

Welcome to Hell Point
We not only take pleasure
in price gouging
We exploit our taxpapers
and their children too
so you can have a diverse
market experience
you won't find that in Vegas
we believe in equality
exploit market people and
homeowners equally

As Fantasia's main psychic...I just want to relate a little to you about her feelings in this matter.

ummmmmmm....ahhhhhhhhhh......ummmmmmmmmm....ahhh

I am so pleased that finally things are being righted in High Point after all the dispossession I felt and encountered while I was a young child growing up in that environment. Now more poor disencfranchised people such as my self was are able to attend better schools. For some reason justice eventually prevails as it has in this matter.

That's one of the reasons I left High Point and moved to Charlotte, people didn't appreciate me as a person and would not acknowledge my accomplishments.

We can be put down for just so long but can't be held down forever.

Please go out and buy my CD, that way you can help heal the wounds that were created during my years in High Point.

I have a dream that one day my children would be assigned to a neighborhood based and not be judged by how much money their parents have and by the color of their skin.

I have a dream that one day NOrth High Point will not have taxation without representation.

I have a dream that one day we will have a School Board who actually talks about improving education instead of social engineering.

I have a dream that the city council and mayor will become more involved in the education process and become more responsible in developing NOrth High Point.

I have a dream that NOrth HIgh Point should not have to pay for the sins of old money High Point.

I have dream that the County Commissioners do not give the SB additional funding.

I have a dream that all bonds ref. be voted down from now on.

I have a dream that Alan, Susan, and Marti will be voted out this NOvember.

I have a dream that I will be able to get out of this pathetic town!!!!!

We've let a lot of comments slide the past few months, thinking that you all would self-police yourselves. Some of you have, some of you haven't.

You may have noticed some comments have disappeared from the Chalkboard. I deleted them. I talked to my boss about this to make sure it was all right. This is why I deleted the posts:

*They were derogatory to average citizens who were named, or easily identifiable
*They used profanity

I really hate having to spend the extra time to police the blog for these comments, which have no place here anyway.

Private citizens are not fair game for saying whatever you want about them. Public and elected figures, such as the superintendent and school board, are a different matter all together. Say what you want about them. However ...

I will delete profanity (or attempts to disguise profanity) as I come across it - that includes sign on names.

Just wanted to give you a heads up to the new rules. I've gone back only through the past few strands to clean them out. If I missed a post, let me know. I'll delete it. The new rules apply from here on out.

I want you all to continue debating the issues. There are some good discussions going on at the Chalkboard. But we don't need profanity to make a point. And we don't need to drag an average citizen's name through the mud.

Thanks,

Jennifer