Is it a higher value for Wake County students to attend their neighborhood school or for students from low-performing nodes to be able to get into a high-performing school?

That issue is at the heart of changes being proposed to bump up the importance of student achievement in the selection process for the new student assignment plan. If implemented, the changes could result in students from low-performing nodes taking away openings at the high-performing schools from the families who live near them.

“We want to make sure that low-performing students and minority students get a good shot at some of these schools,” Democratic board vice chairman Keith Sutton said last week. “We want to make sure the plan is successful. We don’t want to create more high-poverty schools.”

Former Wake County Superintendent Del Burns apparently has a lot to say about the school system in his new book "Preserving the Public in Public Schools."

But, as noted in today's article, Burns' new book isn't officially about Wake. Instead, he writes about the fictional Crestwich Public Schools, which is Wake in all but name.

The book talks about Crestwich/Wake's merger, adoption of magnet schools, busing for diversity, student reassignment, the impact of a new majority sweeping into office and a lot of other things.

Did the Wake County school board make a mistake in 2010 by voting to open Mills Park Middle on a traditional calendar instead of as planned on the year-round calendar?

As noted in today's article, the answer was yes Tuesday from several Carpenter Elementary parents who blamed the decision to open Mills Park on a traditional calendar as a big reason why they're feeding into East Cary Middle in the new student assignment plan.

Without Middle Park as a year-round school, the plan gives the Carpenter families calendar continuity by sending them to East Cary. But parents said it's their seventh closest middle school located on the other side of Cary.

Jamil Smith, producer of the liberal "The Rachel Maddow Show" on MSNBC, questions whether the Wake County school board election results "really matter" because the old diversity policy isn't being reinstituted.

In a post today on The Maddow Blog, Smith writes that the GOP board majority "has been pushing a nouveau-segregationist 'neighborhood schools' plan. He writes that "on its face," Kevin Hill's victory "would seem to spell the end for the idea of resegregating the county's schools."

But Smith then points to how Hill and other members of the new Democratic majority "aren't saying that they'll reverse what the Republicans did" when they dropped the socioeconomic diversity policy. He points Kevin Hill saying they'll only make a few tweaks to the new student assignment plan.

The Huffington Post is calling the Wake County school board election results a case of how "voters repudiated the Tea Party agenda backed by North Carolina's notorious political boss, Art Pope."

In a piece today for the liberal Huffington Post, Michael Carmichael writes that Democratic election victories across North Carolina were a "landslide." But Carmichael says "the coup de grace took place in Boss Pope's backyard." He writes that the election victory by Kevin Hill is "a major embarrassment" for Pope.

"In the run-off for the controlling seat on the Wake County School Board, progressive Democrat Kevin Hill defeated Pope's Tea Party Republican candidate, Heather Losurdo," Carmichael writes. "Hill stalwartly opposed the Pope-orchestrated re-segregation of Wake County Schools, while Losurdo supported the return to 'neighborhood schools,' a code for the end of cultural, racial and ethnic diversity."

The state Republican Party is telling voters in a last-minute campaign mailer that Wake County school board candidate Heather Losurdo has "the right priorities for our children."

The mailer says that "Heather believes in neighborhood schools and parental choice and will use proximity as the number one priority for school assignment." The GOP also says "the new Choice Plan will be the foundation for providing parents and students with stability and provide an opportunity to improve every school."

The mailer says "Heather will listen to the people and be responsive." Referencing the Bedford reassignment controversy, the mailer also says that "in contrast, Heather's opponent responded to over 300 parents concerned about busing their children to another school by saying he intended to 'stonewall' them."

Tuesday's District 3 runoff election between Wake County school board member Kevin Hill and challenger Heather Losurdo pits two very different candidates with differing life experiences and views.

As noted in today's article by Thomas Goldsmith, Hill is the long-time Raleigh resident and career educator who has made some decisions that he feels are data-driven even when they've been unpopular with constituents.

As noted in today's article, Losurdo is the relative newcomer who had a challenging childhood and early adulthood that she says has helped shaped her into a better person.

Let's start the day of campaign mailers with this piece from Wake County school board candidate Heather Losurdo that charges "7,000 children will be ripped out of neighborhood schools if Kevin Hill has his way."

In the mailer, Losurdo says the good news from the school board is that they "voted Tuesday, September 18 (it was actually Oct. 18) to throw out the old school busing plan and put in the Neighborhood Schools plan developed by Superintendent Tony Tata." She notes that two Democrats voted for the plan.

Losurdo says the bad news is that Hill voted against the plan. She charges "he wants to keep the wheels on the buses turning round and round."

Wake County school board candidate Heather Losurdo is promoting her runoff endorsement from the Wake Schools Community Alliance in this new campaign mailer.

In the mailer, Losurdo quotes from the WSCA endorsement which had blamed incumbent Kevin Hill for "failing graduation rates," "600 teachers fired," "26,000 students reassigned," "'Wacky Wednesday' PLTs" and "mandatory year-round schedules." The mailer quotes how WSCA said Losurdo "has consistently supported neighborhood schools, advocated for the use of EVAAS" and "called for civility and consensus-building on our School Board."

"Wake County's Leading Independent Education Reform Organization Supports Heather Losurdo," says the mailer. "So should you."

The mailer is interesting considering how Losurdo's supporters were dismissive of the WSCA before the runoff when the group endorsed Jennifer Mansfield.

The North Carolina Republican Party is calling Wake County school board member Kevin Hill "unfit for office" in a recent campaign mailer.

Calling it a 2011 School Board Candidate Report Card, the state GOP gives Hill "unfit for office" grades on listening to parents, getting along with others and putting children first.  They also give him "F" grade on neighborhood schools, saying he "will revive forced busing."

He gets an "F" on Superintendent Tata for voting against hiring him. They also give him an "F" on common sense, saying he was "a leader in the Majority on the school board when 'Wacky Wednesday' and having school on Memorial Day were allowed."

"Summary" Kevin Hill is failing us," says the front of the mailer. Click here for the back of the piece.