Some of the groups who've spent the past three years fighting efforts to eliminate diversity from Wake County's student assignment policies are now focusing on statewide education issues.

As noted in today's article by John Frank and Lynn Bonner, several liberal advocacy groups have joined to form Public Schools First NC. Their goal during the legislative agenda that opens today is to counter "the growing threat to privatize and weaken North Carolina’s public schools."

Members of PSFNC include the Great Schools in Wake Coalition, the Coalition of Concerned Citizens for African American Children, the Raleigh-Wake Citizens Association and the N.C. Justice Center.

Wake County school board member Jim Martin took a decidedly less rah-rah approach to the reporting of the school district's latest test score results.

During Tuesday's board meeting, Deputy Superintendent Cathy Moore gave this presentation that highlighted academic gains made in the 2011-12 school year. While repeatedly saying he appreciated the advancements that were made, Martin said he was concerned that the data was being presented in the "rosiest" way possible without the deeper analysis he felt was needed.

Martin said he was also trying to prepare the public for next year when Wake's test results are expected to drop with the introduction of new tests under the common core curriculum. He pointed back to how test scores dropped after the state renormed the end-of-grade exams in the middle part of the last decade.

Wake County school board member Debra Goldman announced tonight that she plans to nominate Tony Tata for North Carolina Superintendent of the Year.

The Central Carolina Regional Education Service Alliance is soliciting nominations for regional superintendent of the year with the winner vying for the state recognition. The state award is given annually by the N.C. Association of School Administrators and the N.C. School Boards Association.

Goldman said that Tata, who has been Wake County's superintendent since January 2011, deserves the recognition. Fellow Republican board members Chris Malone and Deborah Prickett joined Goldman after she urged other board members to support the nomination.

Bill McNeal was the last Wake superintendent to win the state title. He went on to become National Superintendent of the Year.

Wake County school board chairman Kevin Hill raised nearly $70,000 in his successful reelection bid this fall.

A new report filed today shows that Hill, a Democrat, raised $68,598 and spent $54,322 in the District 3 race. Heather Losurdo, a Republican, hasn't filed her final report yet. But she had reported raising $82,357 through Oct. 24.

Before this year, only one candidate had raised more than $50,000 in a Wake school board race. But at least four candidates hit that mark last fall during the high-stakes election.

Wake County school board member Keith Sutton has raised nearly $20,000 in his bid to keep the District 4 seat.

The new campaign report filed today shows Sutton having raised $19,892 as of Aug. 30 with $12,272.86 on hand. No report has been filed yet by opponent Venita Peyton.

Sutton's biggest individual donor in the new report is Capitol Broadcasting CEO Jim Goodmon, who gave $1,000. It's Goodmon's first recorded school board contribution this season, but he is one of the hosts for a Wake County Democratic Party fundraiser being held next week.

The state NAACP is questioning whether the blue and green plans will avoid resegregating Wake County schools or promote student achievement more than old diversity policy.

In an open letter released today to Superintendent Tony Tata, the Rev. William Barber, president of the state NAACP, says school leaders shouldn’t abandon the old efforts of trying to balance schools by family income levels. Barber also asks for a meeting with Tata before a possible school board vote on June 21 on which of the plans to use.

In the letter, Barber raises three questions:

UPDATE

Tata said at today's news conference that he hadn't yet had a chance to review Barber's letter or decide whether to arrange a meeting with the NAACP before next week's vote.

Cash Michaels is standing behind "the good old days days of WCPSS high achievement" under former Wake County Superintendent Bill McNeal.

In a blog post Friday, Michaels, editor of The Carolinian, takes on critics who downplay the high scores that Wake enjoyed in the early-to-mid 2000s when the district's passing rate on state end-of-grade reading exams was more than 90 percent overall and more than 80 percent for black students.

Critics of the old diversity policy have argued that the tests were easy and that large gains were also made statewide. But Michaels shoots back that Wake was still doing better than the rest of the state and with less money

Is it "a slap in the face" to Wake County teachers to say that some of them set low expectations for students?

That's a contention Cash Michaels makes in the second part of his series in The Carolinian looking at Walnut Creek Elementary School. In this week's article, Michaels contends that teacher morale has gotten worse since the GOP school board majority took steps such as ending the diversity policy and questioning the expectation levels set by teachers.

“I sincerely appreciate the hard work of all of our teachers and principals,” said Democratic school board member Kevin Hill in the article. “I take serious offense every time I hear a member of the board talk about a culture of low expectations (in the system) for our children. I think it’s a slap in the face to our teachers and our principals.”

Student assignment and diversity accounted for much of the questions that Wake County Superintendent Tony Tata faced Thursday night at the meeting organized by NC HEAT.

As noted in today's article, Tata talked several times about the task force that will hold its first meeting this afternoon for developing a new long-term student assignment plan. He repeatedly said that a focus of the task force will be on figuring out a way to avoid leaving schools with high concentrations of low-performing students.

"It’s clear that for me the student assignment plan really has to address avoiding high concentrations of low-performing students," Tata told the crowd. "That’s the framework and prism from which I’m addressing.”

The state NAACP has released a copy of the opening statement from yesterday's meeting with Wake County Schools Superintendent Tony Tata.

In the press release today, the Rev. William Barber, president of the state NAACP, says they were "pleased to have this interchange" with Tata. But Barber also reiterates support for Wake's old socioeconomic diversity policy, which he calls a "nationally recognized, successful plan."

Here's his statement: