Former Wake County Republican Party Chairman Claude Pope isn't pinning most of the blame for the 2011 loss of the GOP majority on the Wake County school board on Democrats.

Instead, as noted in today's article in the Wilmington Star-News, "Pope says the Republicans lost the majority mainly because of intraparty discord among members of the board." Pope, now running for state Republican Party chairman, says he's hoping this kind of discord won't repeat itself at the statewide level.

The article doesn't go into detail on what the discord might be. But things you could point to include the fighting between Debra Goldman and her fellow Republican school board members.

The Wake County legislative delegation should expect to hear more today from people opposing bills that would change how Wake County school board members are elected and take away their control of school construction.

WakeUP Wake County is urging people to show up again like they did at the March 25 public hearing. The new hearing takes place before the Wake school board will discuss during Tuesday's work session supporting the current election districts instead of going to the ones in S325, the school board election bill.

With WakeUP Wake, the Great Schools in Wake Coalition and the Wake County Democratic Party urging people to show up March 25 to oppose the school bills, you can guess what the turnout was like. Here are some of the comments from the March 25 hearing.

Don Mial's application for the District 1 vacancy on the Wake County school board should look familiar, especially if you live in state House District 39.

A lot of Mial's application letter matches what's on his campaign website from his unsuccessful run last year in the Democratic primary for House 39. His school board application includes a few wording changes, but whole sentences are the same as the website, including references about expanding pre-kindergarten programs and addressing the achievement gap.

What's new in the application is Mial, 62, talking about what it was like being a minority student in Raleigh as the school system slowly began to integrate.

The Coalition of Concerned Citizens for African American Children and Martin Street Baptist Church are getting distinctly political tonight with a showing of a documentary attacking the Koch brothers.

In a Sunday email message on the CCCAAC listserv, CCCAAC President Calla Wright invites people to attend the screening of "Koch Brothers Exposed" that's being sponsored and shown at Martin Street Baptist.

Liberal filmmaker Robert Greenwald has produced a series of short documentaries, now compiled into one long one, attacking the conservative Koch brothers. Greenwald came out with a film last year that tried to link the 2009 election of the Republican majority to the Wake County school board to Charles and David Koch.

Wake County school board vice chairman Keith Sutton will face the heat as a guest at tonight's community engagement meeting sponsored by the Coalition of Concerned Citizens for African American Children.

Agenda topics will include an update on Walnut Creek Elementary School, bell schedule changes, the impact of round one of the student assignment plan on Southeast Raleigh and the school-to-prison pipeline.

The meeting comes after Sutton has faced criticism from some CCCAAC members about the demographic composition of Walnut Creek's enrollment.

Thursday night's community mass meeting at Martin Street Baptist Church dealt with the new Wake County student assignment plan, getting mediation for the school board protesters and assailing the conditions at Walnut Creek Elementary School.

As noted in today's article, most the focus of the meeting led by the state NAACP and the Great Schools in Wake Coalition was on complaints about the assignment plan. The crowd of around 50 people, mainly supporters of the old diversity policy, were urged to contact school leaders to change the plan.

"If you let the plane fly in the air and you don’t make those course corrections that you feel need to be made in order to make it a more successful plan for all students so we have a fair and diverse and well-funded education for all students, then shame on us if we don’t advocate for the changes to make it happen," said Patty Williams of Great Schools in Wake.

SEE UPDATE AT END OF POST

The state NAACP and Great Schools in Wake Coalition are teaming up to host a "community mass meeting" on Thursday to discuss Wake County's new student assignment plan.

The meeting will be held at 6 p.m. Thursday at Martin Street Baptist Church, 1001 E. Martin St. in Raleigh. It comes after both groups had unsuccessfully urged the school board to delay implementation of the new plan by a year.

The meeting also comes after GSIW released a new fact sheet on feeder patterns on Thursday that levels several complaints about the new plan. Among the complaints is the charge that the plan's use of feeder patterns "are creating segregated schools."

"Middle schools including, Carnage and Durant Road, will likely become more segregated, poorer, and overall proficiency will decline dramatically," says the GSIW fact sheet. "Where there is concentrated poverty, recruiting and retaining teachers is difficult, and schools are costly to run. Racial segregation undermines student achievement and will not allow WCPSS to apply for federal funding for magnet and other programs, as we have in the past."

Here's a recap of today's press conference in which speakers urged the Wake County school board and DA's office to use mediation instead of trials for the protestors arrested at board meetings in 2010.
 
Speakers said seeking mediation would heal the community, save taxpayer money and not tie up court dockets. You also had speakers from the Great Schools in Wake Coalition who both called for mediation while simultaneously defending the new Democratic board majority.

“I’m here to encourage the school board to take up mediation instead of ripping us apart,” said the Rev. Duane Beck, co-chair of Congregations for Social Justice and pastor of Raleigh Mennonite Church.

The Democratic majority on the Wake County school board is now taking public criticism over rejecting mediation with the protesters who were arrested at board meetings in 2010.

The Rev. Earl Johnson, pastor of Martin Street Baptist Church, announced today that he will hold a press conference on Tuesday to voice dissatisfaction with the school board's action. Democratic board members have tried to argue their decision doesn't mean they want trials but prosecutors say it's causing them to seek them.

Johnson will call on the school board to now ask for mediation.

Was Tuesday's adoption of a new Wake County student assignment plan the culmination of years of study and discussion or a rushed decision?

As noted in today's article, school board members and administrators defended the vote as being necessary to avoid delaying implementation of the plan. But critics, particularly during the public comment section, urged the board to hold off adoption until the newly elected members have their say on the plan.

"The voters spoke," said Robert Hyman. "You lost the election. In effect, the chair of this board has been fired. You owe it to the new board to discuss it with them before you completely lose your moral authority and your legitimacy.”