The state’s two virtual charter schools should be shining examples of remote learning. But instead of basking in the glow of high demand, the schools are facing tough questions about their students’ academic performances.  For the fourth consecutive year, NC Cyber Academy  and NC Virtual Academy both have performance ratings of "D," said David Stegall, deputy state superintendent of innovation at a Charter School Advisory Board meeting this week. “It does concern me that they are not high-performing charter schools,” he said.

Last year, after four consecutive years of poor academic performance, state lawmakers rewarded North Carolina’s virtual charter school pilot program with an extension that allows its two schools to operate through the 2022-23 school year.  The pilot program created in 2015 was supposed to end after the 2018-19 school year. But lawmakers apparently saw something promising in N.C. Cyber Academy (NCCA) and N.C. Virtual Academy (NCVA) not reflected in their academic performances.

Millions of children will begin the new school year learning from home due to the COVID-19 pandemic.  The pivot to remote learning for U.S. schools has exposed a troubling digital divide between children from low-income families, mostly Black and Latinx students, and their peers from wealthier zip codes. > ...

On July 16, the Onslow County Board of Education weighed one of the biggest decisions it had ever faced. Should it bring nearly 27,000 students back to 39 school buildings for in-person instruction in the middle of the deadly COVID-19 pandemic that’s killed more than 1,800 people in North Carolina? ...

At least 50 North Carolina charter schools took money from the federal Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), created to help small businesses and nonprofits stay afloat during the COVID-19 pandemic. Because some charter schools also received COVID-19 relief money through the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act, critics have accused them of inappropriate “double-dipping.”

Cases of anxiety and depression are spiking among young teens feeling the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, says Charlene Wong, an associate professor of pediatrics at Duke School of Medicine.  Pediatricians across the nation and throughout the world report rising cases of adolescents suffering from anxiety and depression due to pandemic–related stress and uncertainty, said Wong, who specializes in adolescent and young adult care.

North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper directed school districts Tuesday to reopen schools with a mix of in-person instruction and remote learning for the state’s 1.5 million public school students.  The approach chosen by Cooper is Plan B from among three that districts were asked to prepare for when developing reopening plans. 

NC State evaluators warn, however, of basic problems in the program's structure Buoyed by a favorable independent evaluation and positive feedback from teachers and parents, the leadership at Southside-Ashpole Elementary School in Robeson County likely won’t change despite reported tension between the school principal and the superintendent of the Innovative School District.

Black North Carolinians express hopes and fears about the struggle against racism in America “You are going to get your ass killed.” Those are the words Carl Kenney Sr. used when his son Durham minister and author Carl Kenney Jr., joined students at the University of Missouri to protest alleged racism at the state’s flagship school.

Since Mark Jewell was first elected to be president of the North Carolina Association of Educators in 2016, he has been an outspoken leader of the 60,000-member teacher advocacy organization. He led two high-profile marches on the General Assembly that brought thousands of North Carolina educators to downtown Raleigh to demand better pay teachers and increased funding for public schools.