NORTH CAROLINA OPEN THREAD for Sunday, April 15th, 2018
153rd Weekly Edition
This is a weekly feature of North Carolina Blue. We hope this regular platform gives readers interested in North Carolina politics a place to share their knowledge, insight and inspiration as we work on taking back our state from some of the most extreme Republicans in the nation. Please join us every week as we try to Connect, Unite and Act with our North Carolina Daily Kos community. You can also join the discussion in four other weekly State Open Threads.
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Please jump the fold for news on North Carolina teachers and their attempt to bring attention to their goals and needs.
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A new “economic snapshot” from experts at the Economic Policy Institute makes clear why public school teachers — especially in states like West Virginia, Oklahoma and North Carolina — are ticked off about their pay. Here is an excerpt and the graph that sums things up.
We might have seen this coming, given last year’s report from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. In that report, researchers laid out how 29 states, including North Carolina, continued to fund their public education systems below pre-recession levels.
Now, with teachers in Kentucky, Oklahoma and West Virginia rallying over educator pay, left-leaning Think Progress says the states in question have more in common than the fact that they tend to vote for Republicans like President Donald Trump. They’re all so-called “right to work states,” meaning employers cannot require that workers join a labor union or pay dues.
In case you’ve missed the coverage, U.S. teachers are striking across the country, most notably in conservative states like Arizona, Kentucky and West Virginia. And today, fired up educators are making their case for higher pay in Oklahoma, one of the lowest-paying states for teachers in the country.
The advocacy comes at a time of growing scrutiny surrounding teacher pay, long a flash-point in North Carolina as well.
Of course, many of those protesting today face a different set of state laws than North Carolina, which does not allow for collective bargaining or strikes among state teachers.
What: A Daily Kos meet up for DK members and interested parties
When: Saturday, May 19th, 2018 — Time: TBD
Where: TBD
Why: Friends, tools and networking to win in November
Food: TBD
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