THE CASH STUFF FOR MARCH 28, 2024

                                                                     MAURICE GREEN

DEMOCRAT MO GREEN

PREPARES FOR FIGHT IN 

NC SCHOOLS SUPT. RACE

By Cash Michaels

Contributing writer

Calling it a fight for “the soul of public education,” Maurice “Mo” Green, the Democratic nominee running to be elected the next NC superintendent of Public Instruction, told reporters during a March 21st press conference at NC Democratic Party (NCDP) headquarters in Raleigh that North Carolina can’t normalize the dark vision that his opponent, controversial Republican MAGA nominee Michele Morrow, has of public education in the state.

“She calls [public schools] indoctrination centers and would defund them by sending taxpayer dollars to unaccountable private schools,” Green told the press, as NCDP Chairwoman Anderson Clayton looked on.

“My opponent didn’t send her children to North Carolina’s public schools and now she is encouraging others to do the same,” Green added, noting that Morrow has homeschooled her five children since moving to North Carolina.

She has also called for getting rid of the State Board of Education, saying that it’s really not needed if she’s elected. Then, Morrow says, she could work directly with the Republican-led NC General Assembly to further change public education.

Green, 56, on the other hand, has a distinguished record of leadership in education.

He is “known statewide as a champion of public education” and a strong supporter of teachers. Green spent seven years, from 2008 to 2015,  successfully leading the Guilford County Public School System, the state’s third largest public school system, before going to work for the charitable Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation.

At the time, Guilford County Schools had 127 schools, over 72,000 students, about 10,000 employees and an over $600 million budget.

Green was the first African-American superintendent of the unified Guilford County School System.

“There is much to celebrate about public education in North Carolina and its transformative power,” Green said when he announced his intention to run for NC superintendent. “However, it is long past time for our state to truly fulfill its promise to each of its students – that no matter who you are, you will receive high-quality educational opportunities that will prepare you to be successful. We can make that happen if we invest fully in public education, ensure safe and secure learning environments for our students, enhance parent and community support, and revere our educators.”

During the Georgia native’s Guilford County superintendent tenure, Green became known for his listening and learning tours, saying that effective leaders do a lot of listening. 

He called those outreach efforts “Mo Wants to Know” tours.

According to Guilford County Schools, Green was responsible for high school graduation rates increasing from 79.7% in 2008 to 89.3% in 2015; reducing high school graduation gaps; and having students contribute more than one million hours of public service and $21 million in economic impact in the community. Those accomplishments were recognized with district, state and national honors.

Green is also credited with leading Guilford County Schools’ first strategic plan in 2012 to achieve educational excellence, and then using that foundation in a 2016 plan that focused on enhancing character, service, family, community and organizational excellence.

Interestingly, so dedicated was Supt. Maurice Green to his job, that when he resigned to take a position in philanthropy, it was noted that he always refused to accept his contractually annual three-percent raise.

Before going to Guilford County Schools, Green served in Charlotte-Mecklenburg Public Schools in 2001, ultimately becoming a deputy superintendent.

The Duke University alum is also an attorney, having clerked for judges in North Carolina’s federal Middle District, eventually becoming a partner at the law firm of Smith Helms Muliss & Moore LLP in Charlotte.

But now Green wants to be elected NC superintendent of Public Instruction so he can do for North Carolina students what he did for Guilford County pupils.

He has major endorsements from top Democratic Party figures in Gov. Roy Cooper, former Gov. Jim Hunt and former Gov. Beverly Perdue, in addition to former NC Schools Supt. June Atkinson, and other educational leaders.

Congresswoman Alma Adams endorses Maurice Green, as does former Congressman G.K. Butterfield, Congresswoman Kathy Manning and Congresswoman Deborah Ross.

Green also has strong endorsements from the North Carolina Association of  Educators, the Durham Committee of the Affairs of Black People, the Black Political Caucus of Charlotte-Mecklenburg and the Raleigh-Wake Citizens Association, among others.

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NC HBCUs SEE RISE

IN APPLICATIONS

By Cash Michaels

Contributing writer

When the U.S. Supreme Court outlawed race-conscious affirmative action policies in college and university admissions in June, 2023, meaning that predominately-white schools will now be admitting less Black and other students of color, many observers then suggested that HBCUs (historically Black colleges and universities) would likely see an influx of African-American student applicants as a result.

Now, almost a year later, there are indications that that prediction may be coming true.

Here in North Carolina, according to published reports, more Black students are indeed applying to attend several of the state’s top HBCUs.

Five North Carolina HBCUs - NC A&T University, Elizabeth City State University, Fayetteville State University, NC Central University and Winston-Salem State University - all report dramatic increases in student applications over this time last year prior to the U.S. High Court ruling.

NC A&T has experienced a 12% bump in applications.

ECSU boasts a 9% increase.

FSU notes an 18% increase in student applications.

NCCU is enjoying a 27% hike in student applications and student interest, the largest of any of the five HBCUs in the UNC System.

WSSU, interestingly, received a 3% decrease in first-time student applications, but a 41% increase in possible graduate student applications.

Much of these increases, especially in NCCU’s case, reportedly came from strong  recruitment efforts once the Supreme Court decision came down.

NC HBCUs also credit “Common Application.”

According to “Diverse,” an online publication, “The Common App is a one-stop application process that allows students to apply to over 1,000 member institutions by filling out one form, which significantly simplifies the often-daunting process of applying for college.”

          The “Diverse” story continued, “When Common App was initially created over 40 years ago, the majority of its member institutions were private, many highly selective. But in the last decade, the nonprofit has worked to purposefully center more equitable access to postsecondary education by connecting with more Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs). Now, 134 MSIs and 30 Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), including NCCU, are members. This deliberate effort has increased not only the diversity of the applicants using the system to apply but the number of applicants connecting with HBCUs.”

Recruiters at NC HBCUs say using Common App helps to get their institutions name out nationally so that students from across the country can find their schools to consider, and make application.

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THE CASH STUFF FOR MARCH 21, 2024

WAKE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM

CONSIDERS IMPLEMENTING

CROWN ACT PROTECTIONS

By Cash Michaels

Contributing writer

If there is one thing Black students are proud of is their ability to self-express their cultural identity through varying hairstyles. But there have been times when school personnel who don’t share the same need for cultural identity or expression have punished those students for violating a school district’s dress or grooming code.

In Wake County, the Board of Education’s Policy Committee has begun exploring how to allow students to express their race-based “individuality and culture” through their hairstyles by modifying the school system’s dress policy, and adopting the Crown Act.

The proposed Wake policy language, if adopted by the entire Wake School Board,  reads, “Students may dress and style their hair for school in a manner that expresses their individuality and culture, including length, braids, locs, twists, tight coils or curls, cornrows, Bantu knots, afros, geles and headwraps.”

The committee also wants the proposed student’s freedom of hairstyle cultural expression policy to fall under an anti-bullying protective policy as well.

“Crown” stands for “Creating a Respectful and Open World for Natural Hair,” and is part of a national movement to adopt such protections, primarily in the workplace.

According to published reports, more than 20% of Black women, ages 25 to 34 in the workplace have been sent home because of cultural discrimination pertaining to their hairstyles.

Not yet a state or federal law, the Crown Act is designed to prevent hairstyle discrimination in the workplace, and even in schools. Crown Act protections are already in force in Durham Public Schools, as well as Wake, Durham and Orange and Mecklenburg county governments.

Raleigh, Durham, Greensboro and Carrboro city governments have adopted Crown Act protections as well.

A bill to make the Crown Act state law was introduced in the NC House in February 2023 were it passed, and then sent to the state Senate, where it has stalled.

In Wake County Schools, proponents believe Crown Act protections would help Black students particularly, maintain a pride about themselves and appearances.

"This is really about creating a culture in our district where we are telling students from a strength-based approach of what we believe and also how we believe in them,” Wake School Board Vice Chair Monika Johnson-Hostler told the Raleigh News & Observer.

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VOTER ID LAWSUIT TRIAL

TO FINALLY START MAY 6TH

By Cash Michels

Contributing writer

After a five-year delay, and with North Carolina elections already using it, a federal trial on the constitutionality of voter I.D. has been ordered to begin on May 6th. It will be a bench trial with no jury.

Federal Justice Loretta Biggs, an African-American, issued the order March 13th, denying a 2021 motion by the NC State Board of Elections for a summary judgment.

“State Board Defendants argue that Plaintiffs’ evidence does not show discriminatory intent…., Judge Biggs wrote. “Plaintiffs argue that there is more than sufficient evidence in the record for each factor to defeat summary judgment with respect to discriminatory intent. Plaintiffs are correct, at least with respect to the historical background and whether S.B. 824 bears more heavily on one race than another or its impact.”

Senate Bill (S.B.) 824 is the 2018 voter I.D. law plaintiffs are suing to stop, alleging that it was racially discriminatory. State lawmakers in the Republican-led NC General Assembly quickly passed the measure after voters ratified a Constitutional amendment mandating voter I.D. become law.

But plaintiffs allege that given North Carolina’s history of racial discrimination, and especially the racial bias the courts found in the passage of the 2013 voter I.D. law before knocking that down, this 2018 legislation was no different, and should be declared unconstitutional as well.

“Assessing whether Plaintiffs have shown that racial discrimination was a substantial or motivating factor behind enactment of S.B. 824 is fact-intensive, and at this stage, the Court cannot weigh the evidence or make credibility determinations,” Judge Biggs wrote. “Even after affording the state legislature a presumption of good faith, in light of the evidence in the record on the historical background and impact of S.B. 824, State Board Defendants have failed to show that there is an absence of evidence to support that racial discrimination was a ‘substantial’ or ‘motivating’ factor behind the enactment of S.B. 824.”

“Should Plaintiffs succeed in showing discriminatory intent, the burden would then shift to State Board Defendants to show that S.B. 824 would have been enacted without racial discrimination.” Biggs continued.

Even though the state Board of Elections are the defendants in the case, Republican legislative leaders have also been allowed to file motions in defense of the 2018 voter I.D. law, thanks to a June 2022 ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court. The five-year delay in going to trial is the result of several appeals that needed to be heard and determined in the case.

Judge Biggs also wrote that she saw things in the 2018 voter I.D. law that raised concerns in her mind.

"There is sufficient evidence in the record to suggest an inequality in the opportunities enjoyed by non-white and white voters to elect their preferred representatives,” she wrote.

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THE CASH STUFF FOR THURSDAY, MARCH 14, 2024

                                                               MICHELE MARROW
 

MAGA SCHOOLS SUPT.

CANDIDATE CONSIDERED

‘LOOMING THREAT’

By Cash Michaels

An analysis

If Republican Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson is elected governor next November, there’s a very real possibility that he’ll have a partner in government who shares his MAGA conservative vision of education for North Carolina.

Her name is Michele Morrow, and when the smoke cleared after the March 5th primary last week, Ms. Morrow, a Donald Trump supporting/home schooling far-right MAGA activist, shocked North Carolina’s political observers by defeating Republican conservative incumbent Supt. of Public Instruction Catherine Truitt, 52 to 48 percent in the unofficial results from the GOP primary. 

She claimed that Truitt was responsible for “our students' minds are being poisoned with politically biased, racially divisive, sexually explicit and academically weak content.”

The win certainly rattled the Republican political and business establishment, which had endorsed the one-term, classroom experienced Truitt.

       “Tuesday’s primary election results were a startling warning of the looming threats to North Carolina’s business climate,” the NC Chamber of Commerce wrote in a newsletter to its membership after the primaries. “While we celebrate the victories of Chamber-backed candidates, many of the races we were watching turned for candidates that do not share our vision for North Carolina.”

The Chamber warning to its membership added,  “…in Republican races, populist candidates enjoyed great success.” 

There is little question the Chamber’s dire missive was referring to Morrow as being one of those “…looming threats” and  “populist candidates [who] enjoyed great success.”

Just like with Mark Robinson, Ms. Morrow, 52, a married mother of five who lives in Cary, leaves a trail of controversial, and some say bigoted statements against LBGTQ and Muslim citizens, along with other negative indications about how she feels about diversity.

Where Morrow and Robinson both solidly link up is in their stated devout opposition to the truth about American racial history being taught in North Carolina’s public classrooms. Robinson has given lip service about doing something to stop it.

Morrow, if she’s elected the next state superintendent of public instruction, can do something about it.

On her campaign website, Morrow touts herself as "…the only candidate in the race for State Superintendent of public Instruction with a proven record of winning the fight for conservatism,’ adding that she is a “Lifelong Christian Conservative.”

Professionally, Morrow has been a rural registered nurse in Texas, and a missionary ‘in some of the poorest areas in Mexico.”

Currently, Morrow’s website says she works as “a child advocate with an organization dedicated to protecting children from pornography.”

Politically, Morrow’s experience takes on a different tone.

She lost in her 2022 bid for a seat on the Wake County Board of Education. 

Rhetorically, Morrow has urged parents not to send their children to public schools, calling them “socialism indoctrination centers” because they push a “woke agenda.” Like Robinson, Morrow says she’s opposed to what she thinks is “Critical Race Theory” being taught in public schools because it “teaches children to hate our country.”

For the record, most experienced educators confirm that Critical Race Theory is only taught in colleges and universities, not secondary public schools, and only documents how systemic racism has tainted historically American institutions.

Morrow has also vowed to fight to remove DEI (Diversity, Equity and Inclusion) policies from the state public education system.

She attended the Jan. 6th Capitol insurrection to protest the 2020 presidential election results, but says she did not enter the U.S. Capitol Building to riot.

Morrow has promoted various conspiracy theories about the COVID-19 vaccine. On January 24, Morrow issued a press release declaring her endorsement of former Pres. Donald Trump for president in 2024.

Among other “NC Christian Faith Leaders,” Morrow is endorsed by former state Rep. Larry Pittman (R-Cabarrus), who cosponsored the infamous bathroom bill, advocated that teachers be armed in the classroom, and supported police shooting Black Lives Matter protesters, calling them ‘vermin” and “thugs.”

Morrow has previously said that she advocates that teachers carry concealed weapons in the classroom.

If Morrow is elected as superintendent of public instruction in November, and Mark Robinson is elected governor, one of his constitutional powers will be to appoint the eleven members of the NC Board of Education.

One of Morrow’s constitutional responsibilities as superintendent would be to act as the secretary to the state board. That means she would attend meetings, update members on what’s happening in education across the state, and make recommendations. But she would also responsible for overseeing the state’s public school systems.

Morrow would report to “Governor” Robinson 30 days before the NC General Assembly convenes. In short, the two would work very closely together in shaping state educational policy.

Morrow faces Democratic primary winner Maurice “Mo” Greene, former superintendent of Guilford County Schools, in November.

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                                         RETIRED JUSTICE MIKE MORGAN

MORGAN “HONORED AND

THANKFUL” FOR CAMPAIGN

By Cash Michaels

Contributing writer

It was a long shot from the beginning, but retired NC Associate Justice Mike Morgan ended his attempt to win the Democratic gubernatorial primary for NC governor on March 5th with his trademark grace and dignity.

“I congratulate Attorney General Josh Stein, along with Governor Roy Cooper, on Mr. Stein's primary election victory,” Morgan posted on his Facebook account after it was clear that he would not pull off what would have been one of the most extraordinary election victories in campaign history.

“The strategies which Attorney General Stein and Governor Cooper crafted, in the gubernatorial race as well as other contests on the primary ballot, were executed to perfection,” Morgan continued, hinting that he was up against a Democratic Party machine there was no getting around..

“I am honored and thankful to have had the opportunity to run for the highest office in this great state. My candidacy, while insufficient to win the nomination for Governor, nonetheless won the votes, minds, souls, and optimism of many North Carolinians who continue to yearn for a level playing field for all people and a change from the status quo. I am humbled by the support and dedication which was demonstrated for my campaign, and I am renewed that we collectively maintain our pride in our effort."

The reaction to Morgan’s Facebook post was warm and encouraging.

“I am immensely proud of you for your presence and character displayed during your gubernatorial candidacy. I want to believe that more doors will open for you to successfully lead and shape our political landscape to a place of level fairness. All the Best ..”

“The people need you in an office. I hope to see your name on the ballot again. We are proud of you!”

“Continue to use your VOICE for what you believe. I can't wait to see what happens in your NEXT CHAPTER.”

On primary night, out of a five-candidate field, Morgan unofficially placed a distant second to Stein’s 70 percent, with just 14% of the vote. But that 14% was the result of tremendous hard work on the part of Morgan, his wife, and his campaign as he traversed the four corners of the state, meeting and greeting people at churches and community events, large and small, sharing his vision of the North Carolina he would work hard for if given the chance to represent the party next November.

Justice Morgan, who spent 44 years in state government (34 years of that on the judiciary) joined the race for the Democratic primary for governor “late,” in the minds of many political pundits who felt that by the time he left the state Supreme Court to oppose Stein, the party nomination was already a done deal.

Stein, a two-term state attorney general who is close to the outgoing Democratic Governor Roy Cooper, had announced his candidacy early in January, for the expressed purpose of warning off any other possible candidates. That strategy worked only to the extent that other well known Democratic politicians gave Stein the room he needed to establish his claim as heir apparent to Cooper.

And it certainly helped Stein that Gov. Cooper endorsed him, and apparently sent signals to the rest of the party that Stein was his “guy.”

Justice Morgan, however, ignored any such pronouncements - said or unsaid - and in September, left the state’s High Court to mount his campaign for governor.

Many observers, some admirers of Morgan, fretted his move, saying that he waited too long to challenge Stein, and that by the time he did, most of the Democratic Party’s leadership were already committed to the attorney general.

One pundit had written that he wished Morgan would have announced a candidacy for state attorney general instead, given his many years on the judiciary. 

But Morgan refused to hear any of it, and with next to no campaign war chest to speak of, mounted his challenge to the presumed Democratic frontrunner.

Morgan’s campaign was able to produce one extraordinary autobiographical video that told his story as a young Black student growing up in segregated New Bern in the 1960s, integrating the all-white school system, and learning the value of working with others in the community for the common good.

Morgan was the son of New Bern’s first black mayor, and his mother served on the local school board, so public service was in his blood.

Weeks before the March 5th primary, both Morgan and Stein were interviewed by the N.C. Black Publishers Association per its election coverage.

On the last question of the telephone interview, both men were asked “ Win or lose, you have to help bring the party back together. What will you say?”

“First I want to say how much respect I have for Justice Morgan and his decades of service to the state and our people,” Stein said then. “And I’m not going to attack any fellow Democrat because the stakes are too high for North Carolina.”

  “Whether it’s Justice Morgan or me,…or anybody who gets the Democratic nomination come March 5th, we all have to come together because [Republican candidate] Mark Robinson is simply wrong for North Carolina, and we have to do that.”

Morgan was also circumspect, if not optimistic about his chances of winning.

“I would say to those who would not vote for me ….that I am going to be the leader for all North Carolinians. My whole campaign has been about uplifting all North Carolinians. I respect the fact that there are those who did not support my candidacy. I understand the fact and respect the fact that there are those who support my chief opponent. When I win, that’s what I am going to be, especially as the Democratic nominee, a nominee for governor who everyone can be proud of going forward to being the next governor of our great state.”

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