More to come later, but the Wake County school board voted 5-4 against a motion from board member Debra Goldman to pull the student assignment directive off tonight's meeting agenda.

Goldman said the directive should be referred to policy committee first. Other board members said there's been lack of notice to the board and public for a vote tonight.

But board chairman Kevin Hill said it was time sensitive to act now so they can make changes for the 2013-14 school year.

The vote went along party lines with the five Democrats voting against Goldman's motion and the four Republicans voting yes.

UPDATE

It's not likely the board will vote before 10:30 p.m. so stay tuned. At 9 p.m., they've got one more information item and five action items before getting to the assignment directive. Since Goldman was unsuccessful about getting the Richland Creek Elementary item off the agenda, expect plenty of questions on that one too.

At 10:22 p.m., the school board went into recess so some members could use the restroom. Hill said he intends to continue the meeting past 11 p.m.

After an houe-discussion, Hill called for a 11:48 p.m. recess.

The recess is stretching to 30 minutes as Democratic board members wordsmith the directive. Board attorney Ann Majestic had raised concerns that it was specifying too many things.

The Wake County school board re-elected Kevin Hill today as board chairman and Keith Sutton as vice chairman on a pair of 5-4 votes.

Hill defeated board member Debra Goldman. In her nomination speech, board member Deborah Prickett said Goldman is noted for her efforts to bring transparency and efficiency to the district and is a "family friendly board member."

Sutton defeated Prickett, who was nominated by Goldman. In her speech, Goldman said Prickett is in the forefront at her community for getting feedback and solutions.

The term is officially for one year but could change if the General Assembly passes local legislation allowing Wake to move the annual meeting to December.

Is the Wake County school board taking a budget gamble by hopefully only temporarily using up the fund balance to keep a pay raise for teachers?

David Neter, Wake's chief business officer, said that they're expecting to receive enough additional state money to offset getting $4.9 million less than requested from county commissioners. For fiscal purposes, Neter recommended today temporarily pulling a proposed $5.2 million pay raise for teachers and then retroactively restoring it once the state budget with the additional dollars is adopted.

But during the work session, the staff recommendation was rejected 5-4. Board members said it would send the wrong message, even temporarily, to drop the pay raise.

UPDATE

After the motion to use up the fund balance failed at the regular board meeting, the board went back and approved the staff recommendation to temporarily remove the teacher pay raise. Board members reiterated they plan to restore the raise if, as it appears, they get more state funding than expected.

How much of the proposed changes in Wake County's grading policy should be decided by the school board as opposed to the staff?

As noted in today's article, questions about what's a board decision and what's a staff call permeated Thursday's discussion at the student achievement committee meeting. It's making it look like that if the grading policy is changed, it will have more of the board's input into how it will be implemented.

Click here for the revised grading policy and revised R&P presented at the meeting. Click here for a handout showing grading practices in other districts.

Is it redundant or unfair to make student achievement as part of the guiding principles of Wake County's magnet school program?

As noted in today's article, a bipartisan group of board members rejected Wednesday including student achievement in the guiding principles. Only school board member Keith Sutton voted for its inclusion while board members John Tedesco and Deborah Prickett were absent.

The proposal on the table was to amend the current first guiding principle to say that magnets "reduce high concentrations of poverty, support diverse populations and increase student achievement."

More to come later, but the Wake County school board voted today against making student achievement one of the principles of the magnet school program.

Democrats Kevin Hill, Jim Martin, Susan Evans and Christine Kushner were joined by Republicans Chris Malone and Debra Goldman in not supporting its inclusion. They argued that student achievement is already part of the system's mission statement and that it's unnecessary to add the wording just for magnets.

Only Democrat Keith Sutton voted for including it in the principles.

The board preliminarily agreed to keep the principles of expanding educational opportunities and maximizing use of school facilities. No decision was made on the principle of keeping schools diverse after Goldman objected to having the vote without all the board members present or getting public feedback first.

Is the Wake County school system's decision to play "Big Brother" a wise investment or money that could have been better spent elsewhere?

The school board's vote Tuesday to enter in a contract with Everyday Solutions to install GPS monitoring devices on all district school buses was hailed by supporters as an initiative that would save money and improve safety.

But opponents on the board called it a "toy," saying the $1.3 million expenditure in the first year could have been used for other areas such as more money for teacher assistants and assistant principals whose pay was cut last year.

Is the Wake County school board looking after its interests or being a bully by joining the lawsuit against the proposed online charter school?

As noted in today's article, the issue went 5-4 along party lines with the Democrats backing the N.C. School Boards Association's request that it take part in the litigation. The Republicans voted no, questioning the propriety of the decision.

"I think it’s anti-charter school and I don’t think we belong in it," said school board member Debra Goldman, the GOP nominee for state auditor.

Here's a running update on some of the votes from tonight's Wake County school board meeting.

The board voted 7-2 to pay $1.7 million over the next five years to install  GPS units on all the school buses. Only board members Susan Evans and Christine Kushner voted no.

The board unanimously approved extending the waiting lists for the school choice student assignment plan from June 29 to July 18. The board also unanimously voted to make the new career technical and education high school a full-day standalone model.

Over the objections of some board members, the board will go into closed session first to discuss whether to join the litigation against the N.C. Virtual Academy. Board member Debra Goldman was the most vocal critic, arguing they should have the discussion in open session to be transparent.

The vote to move the start time for Middle Creek Elementary School to 8:30 a.m. for this fall was approved unanimously and with some melodrama.

During public comment, Middle Creek parents supporting the change thanked Superintendent Tony Tata for bringing it forward. Board member Susan Evans said the credit should go to board member Jim Martin for "pleading their case."

Martin thanked Evans but said that Tata and other people had worked hard on  it too.