"And my vote would be no," she said.
On a school board in North Carolina, a solitary no was louder than a chorus of yeses.
Our School Board appears to be marching as to war. Connect the dots.
July, 2016: NC House Representative for District 113, Republican Chris Whitmire, successfully sponsors a bill that will make our Transylvania County Board of Education elections partisan by 2018.
November, 2018: TC voters approve a $68 million school bond for increased safety and new classrooms, among other things.
November election, 2020: the Board is now made up of three Republicans and two Democrats.
November election, 2022: Two-term Transylvania County School Board member, Democrat Marty Griffin loses to Republican Chris Wiener, whose yard signs read, “Christian Constitutional Conservative”. There are now four Republicans and one Democrat on the Board.
January, 2023: TC School Superintendent Jeff McDaris announces his retirement, to be effective in June.
May 15, 2023: the one Democratic TC School Board member, Ron Kiviniemi, resigns. This leaves a Board of four Republicans. By the 2018 law, another Democrat must be appointed by the Board.
May 25, 2023: School Board holds a special public meeting to announce the new Superintendent of the Transylvania County Schools, who has been selected by the Board previously during recent closed sessions .
I was present at this meeting on May 25, as well as at a previous meeting for public input on the selection of the new Superintendent. Both meetings were held in the Media Room of Brevard High. The following quotes are from my transcript of the May 25th meeting video. The audio was not always clear, but I’ve made it as accurate as possible.
Chair Tawny McCoy: The Board received applications from all across North Carolina as well as different parts of the country. The board considered many qualified candidates and … narrowed it down to four finalists who were interviewed by the Board. We’ll find out tonight who our final candidate is and we are pleased to have them here.
Vice Chair Kimsey Jackson: To say the last four months have been interesting is an understatement. I move that the Transylvania County Board of Education hereby elect Dr. Lisa Fletcher as the next Superintendent, effective July 1, 2023.
The motion is seconded. The vote is taken.
Chris Wiener: Yes.
Tanya Dalton: Yes.
Vice-Chair Kimsey Jackson: Yes.
Chair Tawny McCoy: And my vote would be no.
Her words seem to hang in the air. These are four Republicans. McCoy continues,
So the motion is passed, three to one. I would like to ask Dr. Fletcher if she would please stand. And we would like to hear a round of applause.
Applause; Chris Wiener stands.
Chair McCoy: Dr. Fletcher, you have joined a great team … who care about the students of Transylvania County. And now that you are a part of this amazing team I want you to know I look forward to working with you and the continued success of the Transylvania County schools. I welcome you to our community.
Kimsey Jackson: Ms. Fletcher, I welcome you, too. I would like to say in my 37-year career … I faced a lot of interesting situations and had a lot of personal decisions and spent a lot of … money; all that had to be justified. Nothing I did was as intense as the last four months. … I think the Board made an excellent choice. I am ready to support you in every way I can.
Tanya Dalton: Thank you for accepting this position. I’m happy to have you here and I look forward to working with you.
Chris Wiener: I do want to add to the regards of everyone else. After breakfast Jesus said to Simon [“Do you love me?”] and he responded three times in the affirmative. And three times the Lord said to him, “Feed my lambs, shepherd my sheep …” I know that we have found a candidate who’ll take care of our kids, will shepherd the sheep and feed the sheep. …
Dr. Lisa Fletcher was given the microphone.
Dr. Fletcher: I want to thank the Board … I am humbled, actually. ... Your school system has always been one of the [strongest] in Western North Carolina. Being a native of WNC, that is something you always look for in schools. I’m excited to begin working with the staff, the students, the Board and all the community stakeholders so we can continue growing the students and the school. Thank you very much.
Superintendent Jeff McDaris: It’s a great family and I look forward to working with you for 36 more days. But I’m always only a phone call away. I think you’re going to enjoy the wonderful school system and the wonderful community.
The meeting was adjourned and the public was invited to meet the new Superintendent.
Because the Board’s deliberations were in closed session (secret), I don’t know why they chose Dr. Fletcher over the many other applicants.
Her formal education includes Southwestern Community College and Montreat-Anderson College (whose mission is “Christ-centered higher education regionally, nationally and globally”), and Western Carolina and East Carolina Universities. Her studies include business administration, accounting, college administration and educational leadership.
Dr. Fletcher has worked as the Director of High School Curriculum in Cherokee County Schools, overseeing district-wide textbook adoption, as well as curriculum development for all high school students.
What does Dr. Fletcher’s curriculum look like?
I believe that when the School Board holds closed sessions and gives no helpful comments to the press, the public is left with little understanding of their personnel selection. If I’m interested, I can search the internet about their choice — and come to an unreliable conclusion, which I’m doing here.
But to come back to firm ground, here are more dots to connect:
June 21, 2022: U. S. Supreme Court’s 6-3 Carson v. Makin decision requires states to fund private religious schools if they fund any other private schools.
May 23, 2023: NC Governor Cooper declares a Public Education Emergency, referring to six bills in the General Assembly that, he says, if passed would use public money for private schools, politicize schools, and bring culture wars to classrooms.
Now more than ever, parents and other voters who care about well-funded, open-minded public education for all our children need to pay attention to political events. After all, the July, 2016, bill did make our county’s school board elections partisan.
I know I’m just connecting a few random dots, but I worry that, for some of us, our nation’s freedom of religion might mean the freedom to impose their religion on the rest of us.
But I’m asking. What is Dr. Fletcher’s vision for our county’s public schools?
And why did the School Board Chair say, “And my vote would be no”?
Thanks for this compendium. Didn't Ron Kiviniemi vote "no" also before announcing his resignation? Another question: Is there any way to undo the partisan school board bill?
Perhaps the School Board Chair's no vote reflects the same concerns as Gov Roy Cooper's concerns.
Connect the dots and I think we have an answer.