In the last few years, Jackson County has poured significant investment into its public schools, including $9 million in much-needed repairs to roofs, heating and water systems; new teaching positions paid for through local funds; security upgrades; and, in the last budget year, six school counselor positions, four school resource officers and one juvenile crime detective. 

During a budget presentation to county commissioners May 22, Superintendent Kim Elliott, Ph.D., thanked the board for its continued support of the school system and made her case for another new position in the coming fiscal year. 

“It’s important that we make a huge impact this year in student performance,” she said. 

While the school system’s performance improved slightly in the 2018 N.C. School Report Card results, it’s still near the bottom of the pack when compared to the state’s other 114 school districts. In 2018 it ranked 75th out of 115 school districts compared to 77 out of 115 in 2017. 

To improve performance, Elliott is planning to take $200,000 from the school system’s fund balance, akin to a savings account, for programming, tutors and extending current employee contracts. She’s also asking commissioners for $88,000 to add a curriculum coordinator position to the payroll, as well as additional employment for teachers, staff and tutors. 

“This person is not an administrator,” said Elliott. “They’re going to work elbow-to-elbow with teachers. We have a very small class size thanks to the three teachers that you provided last school year. By maintaining those three teachers I have met (state) statute. But what I cannot do is have somebody that is well qualified to work elbow-to-elbow with teachers to look at curriculum in a way that it has not been examined before. We owe that to our fine teachers.”

Elliott also asked for a 2 percent increase in operations funding and told commissioners that in a future budget year — though not this one — she’d be asking for a one-time bonus for employees at a district-wide cost of $189,141. Teachers would receive $400 apiece and staff, $250. 

The curriculum coordinator proposal met with pushback from commissioners. 

“I know you go into really hard work to plan this budget, but I feel I wouldn’t be true to myself and my basic beliefs in education not to question the money for the curriculum coordinator,” said Commissioner Gayle Woody, a former art teacher in the school system, “when one of my gut beliefs is teacher-student interaction is the most important thing for student success.”

“I too am a teacher at heart,” said Elliott. “I will tell you that our class size is good. Therefore, I don’t need to ask for that additional teacher. One teacher makes a huge difference for 29 students. I’m looking for a bigger impact.”

The curriculum coordinator position, she said, would affect the district’s more than 3,000 students by working with the teachers who teach them. 

But how, asked Woody, would that be different from the lead teachers already employed in the schools? Isn’t it their job to ensure curriculum is being followed? Not always, Elliott replied — some lead teachers work as teacher coaches while others work as interventionists with small groups of students. 

“Right now some lead teachers do both jobs, and many of them only work with students, so teachers don’t have that elbow-to-elbow person,” she said. 

“I’m still unclear what this person is going to be doing,” replied Commissioner Ron Mau. 

“Me too,” said Woody.

Elliott told commissioners that getting this position in place will be important to improving test scores. Neighboring counties have this position — in fact, they have at least two such positions. 

“They all have at least two, and some have more,” she said. 

“Swain doesn’t because I talked to them this morning and they didn’t,” said Commissioner Boyce Deitz. “They may have hired one since I got off the phone.”

Henderson and Haywood counties definitely do, though, said Elliott, and their test scores are higher. Commissioner Mickey Luker saw the logic, seeing the position as one that would bring consistency across the district. 

“That makes total sense to me,” he said. 

“I know it’s worked in two other places, and I know that our teachers are just as good or better than those other two places,” Elliott said. “I’m only asking for one. If it works I may need to dip into fund balance and ask you for a second one, but I want to see if it works before coming in with a major plan.”

If it’s working, she said, that should be apparent when the test results for the 2019-2020 school year are released.