GREENSBORO (May 5, 2026) – North Carolinians – and especially Guilford County residents – connect these dots:

News Item, May 1: State vouchers send $31 million to private schools in Guilford County.

News Item, April 15: Guilford Schools ask for $25 million budget increase to pay teachers more, enhance security.

DO YOU SEE what’s happening here?

The state legislators you elect are putting $31 million of your tax dollars into vouchers for students to attend private schools – the majority of them in Guilford County religious schools, by the News & Record’s accounting.¹

And average teacher pay in North Carolina is estimated to rank 46th in the nation, in part because the General Assembly still hasn’t adopted a budget for the fiscal year that began 10 months ago.²

In turn, the Guilford school board is turning to the Guilford County Commissioners for $25 million in additional local support for the schools the vast majority of our children still attend.

We haven’t seen a more clear example of the diversion of funds for public schools to private schools.

The General Assembly – the only legislature in the nation that hasn’t adopted a budget for 2025-26 – is shifting the cost of public schools to the counties.

Is it any wonder we have a teacher shortage? Our children must contend with long-term substitutes and, increasingly, unlicensed teachers.

Wealthy counties like Wake and Mecklenburg might be able to take up the legislature’s slack. But can Guilford and Forsyth? Can rural counties like Alleghany, Camden, Chowan, Gates, Graham, Greene, Hyde, Jones, Pamlico, Perquimans, Swain, Tyrrell and Washington?

THERE’S A REASON our state constitution calls for “a uniform system of free public schools.”³

And lest they forget, legislators lay their hands on The Bible and take an oath at the beginning of each term to uphold that constitution and that uniform system of free public schools.

The NC Supreme Court’s 1997 decision in the Leandro case guaranteed each child in North Carolina the “opportunity to obtain a sound basic education.”

That ruling still stands and is binding precedent, despite the current Supreme Court’s recent dismissal of the case.⁴

North Carolina has long been an amalgam of wealth and struggle, but the North Carolina Constitution forbids a public school system of haves and have-nots.

Yet the General Assembly you elect has already voted to divert $675 million of your tax dollars to exclusive – as in they exclude certain populations – private schools in 2026-27.⁵

You have a chance in November to hold them accountable for it.

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1 https://greensboro.com/news/local/education/article_c726b687-f0c9-41ba-9da5-81311db6294e.html.
2 https://www.wunc.org/education/2026-04-27/nc-falls-46th-teacher-pay-national-ranking; https://www.newsobserver.com/news/local/education/article315546843.html.
3 https://www.ncleg.gov/EnactedLegislation/Constitution/NCConstitution.html, Article IX, Sec. 2.
4 https://publicedworks.org/2026/04/burley-mitchell-leandro-a-renewed-opportunity/.
5 https://publicedworks.org/2026/03/nc-voucher-funding-increases-for-2026-27/.