STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA
COUNTY OF WAKE
IN THE GENERAL COURT OF JUSTICE
SUPERIOR COURT DIVISION
95 CVS 1158
HOKE COUNTY BOARD
OF EDUCATION, et al.,
Plaintiffs-Appellees,
)
)
)
)
and
)
)
ASHEVILLE CITY BOARD
)
OF EDUCATION, et al.,
)
)
Plaintiffs-Intervenors,
)
)
)
v.
)
)
STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA; )
STATE BOARD OF EDUCATION, )
Defendants.
)
MEMORANDUM OF LAW AS AMICI CURIAE
THE AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION FOUNDATION,
ADVOCATES FOR CHILDREN’S SERVICES OF
LEGAL AID OF NORTH CAROLINA, CAROLINA LEGAL ASSISTANCE,
NORTH CAROLINA JUSTICE& COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT CENTER,
THE RURAL SCHOOL & COMMUNITY TRUST, AND THE UNIVERSITY OF
NORTH CAROLINA SCHOOL OF LAW CENTER FOR CIVIL RIGHTS
The American Civil Liberties Union Foundation, Advocates for Children’s
Services of Legal Aid of North Carolina, Carolina Legal Assistance, the North Carolina
Justice & Community Development Center, The Rural School & Community Trust, the
University of North Carolina School of Law Center for Civil Rights (together “amici
curiae”) submit this memorandum of law by leave of court granted on October 4, 2004.
I.
Interest of Amici Curiae
Amici curiae are grateful for past opportunities provided by the Court to comment
on key issues in this lengthy litigation, including: (1) the nature of the right to a sound
basic education first recognized in 1997 in Leandro v. State of North Carolina, 346 N.C.
336, 488 S.E.2d 249 (N.C. 1997) (hereinafter “Leandro I”); (2) the scope of the State’s
duties under Leandro I; and (3) the proper measure of liability. The court has since
reached its judgment in four careful opinions expounding its findings and conclusions on
these issues. On July 30, 2004, the North Carolina Supreme Court upheld virtually all of
the court’s judgment in its decision in Hoke County Board of Education v. State of North
Carolina, __ N.C.__, 599 S.E.2d 365 (2004) (hereinafter Leandro II). At this point,
attention appropriately turns to the long-awaited issue of remedy.
We believe amici’s daily experience in protecting the needs of at-risk children of
North Carolina may provide a useful remedial perspective as the court considers its next
steps. As amici curiae for these children, we will examine current proposed remedies
closely with an eye toward their actual utility in meeting the pressing needs of those
children least likely, (without both substantial additional resources and pedagogical
reforms), to receive a sound basic education. We are grateful for the court’s continuing
concern for these neglected children and by no means assume that, without our input,
their needs would go unmet. Yet we hope the expertise of amici might be of assistance as
this court undertakes its new responsibilities for shaping remedies in this complex case.
II.
Summary of Argument
In this memorandum, we have three principal objectives. First, we applaud and
reinforce the court’s conclusion, reflected in its Notice of Hearing and Order respecting
2
an October 7th hearing, that plaintiff school districts will require new State resources
immediately in order to meet their basic Leandro obligations to school children. This
continued hearing is a fully justified and long-awaited initiative. The Leandro complaint
was filed in 1994, over a decade ago. The North Carolina Supreme Court first recognized
Leandro rights in 1997, seven long years ago. This court’s extensive findings and
conclusions came in April of 2002, now two and one half years ago. The North Carolina
Supreme Court has twice spoken, unanimously endorsing both the basic principles of
Leandro and, most recently, this court’s finding of serious and continuing Leandro
violations. There is presently no reason for further delay. The time has arrived for
tangible action.
In confirming this welcome direction, however, we urge the need for careful and
continuing judicial oversight. Our review of the recent history of this case underlines how
perilous remain the rights of at-risk and other children. We note below the thoughtful,
multi-pronged agenda of eight remedies initially put forward by the State Board of
Education (“SBE”) and the Department of Public Instruction (“DPI”) in their June 7,
2004 Supplemental Report. Yet their initial approach has already been distorted by the
summer’s political pressures. What has emerged more recently is a narrower remedial
response, one that addresses some important Leandro goals while slighting others and
commingling previously discrete funding sources.
With that danger in mind, our second objective is to reinforce the court’s
conclusion, reflected in its Notice of an October 25th hearing, that full implementation of
Leandro will require a comprehensive statewide plan, one thoroughly tested by the
adversary process and subject to approval by the court. There is reason to doubt the
3
State’s capacity, buffeted by winds from the ‘political branches,’ to carry out this
planning task fully and faithfully on behalf of North Carolina’s children. However, we do
not in this memorandum propose any alternative plan. Instead, we suggest a few basic
substantive and procedural elements that must be present in any comprehensive plan.
Our third objective will be to reinforce the court’s broad equitable powers to
accomplish everything that Leandro requires. The rights of North Carolina children will
be vindicated most smoothly if all three branches of State government cooperate closely
and without discord, each assuming responsibility for the tasks assigned under the North
Carolina Constitution. Yet if any State partner fails to meet its obligations, this court has
not merely the power, but the constitutional duty, to take every step necessary to assure
that the Leandro rights guaranteed to all North Carolina children are neither neglected
nor trodden under foot. The North Carolina Supreme Court has recently assured this court
that it possesses full residual authority to make Leandro real:
Certainly, when the State fails to live up to its constitutional duties, a
court is empowered to order the deficiency remedied, and if the
offending branch of government or its agents either fail to do so or
have consistently shown an inability to do so, a court is powered to
provide relief by imposing a specific remedy and instructing the
recalcitrant state actors to impose it.
Leandro II, __ N.C. at __, 599 S.E.2d at 393.
Having first identified the sources of this power, we will mention the specific
remedial tools available to the court—mandamus, a judicially supervised planning
process, the appointment of a special master, and if all else fails, the issuance of a
legislative injunction. Each of these tools is available, if needed, to ensure that the
guarantees of the North Carolina Constitution will be enforced.
4
ARGUMENT
I.
The October 7, 2004 Hearing:
A Promising, Though Potentially Incomplete First Step
The Court has now noticed two hearings. The first, scheduled to commence on
Thursday, October 7th, is designed to address “some unfinished business (the subject of
the July 23, 2004 hearing that was continued).” (Sept. 9th Memo, at 1).1 The unfinished
business, the court has made clear, is “the ‘present status’ of the Defendant’s . . .
compliance, acting through its executive and legislative branches, with the prior
judgments and order of this Court and particularly, the failure of the legislative branch of
government to fund the $22,000,000 request by the Department of Public Instruction for
Disadvantaged Student Supplemental Funding.” (Sept. 9th Notice, at 1).2
The record of the State’s effort at remediation already constitutes a mixed history,
marked both by important highpoints and troubling pitfalls. We note that last spring, the
State Board of Education and the Department of Public Instruction put forward a solid
and balanced initial response to the Leandro needs of Hoke County and similar districts.
Yet the political process has since compromised that approach, and the special needs of
low-performing children once again appear to be falling by the wayside.
In its June 7, 2004 Report (the eighth in its series of 90-day reports to the court)
State Board Chair Howard Lee and former Superintendent Michael Ward provided an
accounting of eight strategies developed by its Local Education Agency Assistance
Program (hereinafter “LEAAP”), acting pursuant to this court’s earlier mandate to work
1
Fax Only Memo of the Court to Robert W. Spearman et al., dated September 9, 2004, entitled Hoke
County Board of Education v. N.C. (hereinafter “Sept. 9 Memo”).
2
Notice of Hearings and Order Re: Hearings, dated September 9, 2004, filed in Hoke Co. Bd. Of Educ. v.
State of North Carolina, No. 95 CVS 1158 (Super. Ct., Wake Co.) (hereinafter “Sept. 9 Notice”).
5
with Hoke County schools.3 Those strategies comprised eight specific plans, each tailored
to the identified needs of the Hoke County system:
•
a recruitment annuity to draw teachers to hard-to-staff schools ($250,000
initially, and $3.14 million in total);
•
continued administrative training through the Principal’s Executive
Program for principals and other administrators ($34,000);
•
a lateral entry coordinator to support and retain more lateral entry teachers
($79,500);
•
a Project Achieve director to oversee promising programs to empower and
retain teachers, using the Brazeros, Texas model ($79,500)
•
a professional development specialist to assure higher quality, more
targeted teacher training to address Hoke County’s student needs
$79,500);
•
financial consultation with Hoke County district leadership to assist them
in employing best practices to maximize the use of available resources
($44,185);
•
DPI assistance in the development of a district wide vision statement built
upon the district’s extensive and complex improvement plan ($5,000); and
most significantly,
•
A variety of supports targeted directly at poor, low-performing students,
offering them high-quality, well-designed “personal education plans,”
including instructional resources, tutoring, and classroom support for
3
Letter from Howard N. Lee and Michael E. Ward to The Honorable Howard Manning, Jr., dated June 7,
2004 (hereinafter “the June 7th Report”); see also attachments.
6
Limited English Proficient students, transportation to after-school
programs, materials and equipment, etc. ($223,844,660 statewide).
(June 7th Report, at 1, and Attachments). The last of these eight categories was titled
“State Board of Education Expansion Request for Disadvantaged Student Supplemental
Funding” (June 7th Report, Attachment 8a). In explaining the unique importance of this
DSSF, Lee and Ward stated:
One of our most significant strategies will be providing LEAs with
resources and guidance to implement high quality, well-designed Personal
Education Plans (PEPs) for those students who are not identified as special
needs learners and who have not yet achieved grade-level proficiency. . .
High quality PEPs offer significant promise for assuring student
proficiency, and meeting the exacting standards of the federal
government’s No Child Left Behind legislation. . . Our expansion
request to the General Assembly includes over $22 million for this
purpose. This amount represents 10% of the total $220 million that would
be needed to fully fund this new allotment category.”
(June 7th Report, at 2). In other words, as announced in a press release the next day, the
State Board’s “expansion budget request. . . to the General Assembly includes $22
million to implement these Personal Education Plans.”4
The SBE and DPI leaders went on to inform the court that their LEAAP teams
had moved beyond Hoke County in order to offer their assistance to five other school
districts. They noted (much as the court had hoped and contemplated in its earlier orders)
that the “objective of each LEAAP team is to identify particular areas for improvement in
each of those LEAs.” (Id.). Lee and Ward observed that different school districts might
well have different underlying problems; for example, “the Hoke County LEAAP team
identified historically high teacher turnover as a significant obstacle to improved student
performance,” and it therefore “developed strategies designed not only to reduce teacher
4
SBE, For immediate release, “State Education Leaders Support Teacher Recruitment Bonuses and
Assistance to Lowest-Performing Students,” June 8, 2004, at 1.
7
turnover . . . but also strategies to improve the effectiveness of the new teachers Hoke
County must hire to fill its vacancies. . . .” (Id.). Lee and Ward expressed their hope
that the basic Hoke County template might have broader application, however, despite
these district-specific problems, and that “the LEAAP program can also work in other
LEAs that may need a different combination of strategies and assistance.” (Id.)
The court responded to this letter on June 24, 2004, by expressing its general
approval of the LEAAP process and describing as the “brightest spot in your Report” the
“SBE/DPI’s new Disadvantaged Students Supplemental Funding category,” which
seemed to the court “right on the mark in terms of assisting disadvantaged at-risk students
in meeting their goal of obtaining a sound basic education.” (June 24th Letter, at 2).5
As the court well knows, however, the General Assembly chose to fund neither
the $22 million designated for the DSSF nor any other categories of additional funding
sought by the SBE and DPI in 2004 on behalf of Hoke County and other high-needs
districts. After the General Assembly adjourned, the court called a July 22, 2004 hearing
to explore this failure. At the outset of the hearing, the State reported that Governor
Easley had somehow located $12 million in the budget that could be applied to meet
pressing Leandro needs. The General Assembly itself took no additional steps toward
compliance.
Following the July 22nd hearing, the court wrote to Robert Spearman, attorney for
plaintiffs, asking for further information on Spearman’s oral disclosure during the hearing
that some substitute teachers were still serving as full-time teachers in Hoke County and
other plaintiff school districts. (Sept. 9th Notice, at 2). On August 20, 2004, Mr. Spearman
5
Letter from Hon. Howard E. Manning, Jr. to Robert W. Spearman, Tom Ziko, and Ann Majestic, dated
June 24, 2004 (hereinafter “the June 24th Letter”).
8
sent the court a letter reporting that at least 1452 teachers who lacked continuing licenses
were presently teaching students in these five low-wealth school districts, including 33%
of all the teachers (133 of 403) currently serving Hoke County (August 20th Letter, at 2,
tbl. 1).6 Moreover, at least 121 of those non-certified teachers in the five districts were
“long-term substitutes” whose minimum educational qualifications were no greater than a
high school degree. (August 20th Letter, at 3, tbl. 2). Mr. Spearman explained that “[t]he
absence of fully licensed teachers in these low-wealth districts creates severe problems,”
(id. at 3) noting that “the five plaintiff districts are unable to offer salaries that are
competitive with those of high-wealth districts.”
In the meantime, the State Board of Education held its August, 2004 board
meeting on August 4th and 5th in Raleigh. (SBE August Minutes).7 The first listed item on
its “action on first reading” agenda was entitled “Allotment Formula Proposal for
Disadvantaged Student Supplemental Funding (Late Item).” The Board was told that the
plan therein being presented for approval was based upon the formula earlier reported to
this court, a plan described as “reviewed and strongly endorsed by Judge Manning on
June 24, 2004.” (SBE August Minutes, at 9) The SBE minutes recite that the June 7th plan
had been subsequently modified in unspecified ways, “based on additional
review/conversation with the Governor’s Office,” and “a special telephone conference
with the Board on July 29, 2004.” (Id.)
6
Letter from Robert W. Spearman & Sarah L. Ford to The Honorable Howard E. Manning, Jr., dated
August 20, 2004 (hereinafter the “August 20th Letter”).
7
Minutes of the North Carolina State Board of Education, Raleigh, North Carolina, August 4-5, 2004
(Draft), available on line at:
www.ncpublicschools.org/sbe_meetings/draft_minutes/2004/0408_draftminutes.pdf
(hereinafter “SBE August Minutes”).
9
The revised plan stated that each of the 11 schools districts eligible for a portion
of the $12 million in new funds made available through the intercession of the Governor
(a list that include Hoke County, Halifax County, and Vance County—but not
Cumberland County or Robeson County—among the five plaintiff districts) must
complete and submit to the State Board an “action plan” and an accompanying budget
plan by September 15, 2004.8 After further approval by the State Board at its October,
2004 meeting, all approved funds would apparently be released to the districts.
Most significantly for our purposes, the plan’s revised “menu of recommended
strategies” included five major categories: (1) “recruiting and retaining teachers”
(including signing bonuses, performance-based bonuses, targeted salary
supplements/retention bonuses); (2) “personnel,” (including class size reduction, support
for lateral entry teachers, support for special instructional programs, classroom support
for Limited English Proficient (LEP) students); (3) “professional development activities”
(including best practices training and ‘refining PEPs’); (4) “extending instructional time”
(including tutorial services and transportation and other related costs for after-school
programs and/or Saturday academies); and (5) “instructional materials, supplies, and
equipment.”
This August version therefore revised several key features of the SBE’s earlier
June 7th model. First, the Disadvantaged Students Supplemental Fund—originally
restricted to funding personal education plans for students not performing at grade level,
and only one of several discrete funding sources—had been transformed into the sole
fund to address all of the resource needs for these money-strapped districts. Moreover,
8
Undated document entitled “Disadvantaged Student Supplemental Funding, Outline of Formula--$12
million” (annexed to this memorandum).
10
the SBE’s strong prior fiscal emphasis on targeting individual school children for PEP
assistance in needy districts had become, not an indispensable part of a district’s Leandro
duty, but apparently a fielder’s choice for the low-wealth districts (subject to SBE
approval). While no local plans have yet been approved prior to the SBE’s October
meeting, one announced account indicates that at least seven of the 11 districts, and
perhaps more, propose to devote most of their share of the DSSF funds to salary
improvements in order to recruit and retain good teachers. See
http://www.ncchild.org/Local%20Reaction%20and%20Funding%20Implementation.pdf
The State Board, acting pursuant to this new plan, wrote the court on August 10th
to assure that it will utilize
our LEAPP team assigned to HCSS [Hoke County] . . . to implement a
plan for targeting these funds to recruit and retain teachers, reduce class
size, or develop and implement effective Personal Education Plans for
students who have not demonstrated proficiency on the State tests.
(Sept. 9th Notice, at 6) (emphasis added). Yet even this new SBE assurance is limited, on
its face, to the Hoke County district, not to all 11 districts, and its striking use of the
disjunctive “or” seems to signal that funds for student PEPs have become merely one
alternative strategy, rather than a central SBE commitment.
Amici do not wish to be misunderstood: recruiting and retaining good teachers in
Hoke County and other districts is an immediate Leandro need. We agree with the court’s
repeated holding that Leandro requires a competent, certified, well-trained teacher in
every classroom. We recognize that the SBE in its June 7th Letter concluded that “the
Hoke County LEAAP team identified historically high teacher turnover as a significant
obstacle to improved student performance” in that particular school district. (June 7th
Report, at 2). Moreover, as the court emphasized in its recent notice of hearings, the
11
presence in the year 2004 of uncertified teachers in any of plaintiffs’ schools “is not just a
‘minor’ problem that the State of North Carolina can ignore or take its own good time to
remedy;” instead it is “a constitutional problem” (Sept. 9th Notice, at 8) that should be
addressed and corrected forthwith.
Yet this court has been equally clear that Leandro problems have no single
solution. Instead, a variety of important reforms must be undertaken at once to assure, not
only competent teachers but also well-trained administrators, as well as individualized
educational services to at-risk students and other necessary resources. In short, while
assuring a “competent, certified, well-trained teacher” and “a well-trained, competent
principal” are two constitutionally indispensable requirements under Leandro and the
court’s prior decisions, so is the immediate provision, to every school, of “the resources
necessary to support the effective instructional program within that school so that the
educational needs of all children, including at-risk children . . . can be met.” Sept. 9
Notice, at 3, quoting Leandro II, __ N.C. at __, 599 S.E.2d at 389. See also April 4th
Decision, at 50-52 (affirming that “at-risk children need adequately targeted remediation
services” such as “tutorial and expanded schedule programs”).9
Our examination of these recent alterations to the SBE’s June 7th plan underlines
three crucial points. First, enormous political pressures continue to bear upon all
educational funding systems, and those pressures understandably tend to drive funds
toward the system’s most visible and vocal constituencies. North Carolina’s lowperforming school children have never been among those powerful constituencies.
Indeed, these children have had few single-minded champions apart from the courts
themselves. Hence it is no surprise that the State Board’s original and well-intentioned
9
Hoke County Bd. of Educ. v. State of North Carolina, No. 95 CVS 1158 (N.C. Super. Ct. Apr. 4, 2002).
12
plan to create a “disadvantaged students” fund was transmogrified, over the summer of
2004, into a veritable “teachers’ recruitment and retention” fund and/or “superintendent’s
discretionary fund.”
Second, the inevitable existence of these powerful forces makes this court’s
continued supervision absolutely indispensable if Leandro rights are to be fully honored
and implemented. Though there are many within North Carolina’s public school system
who are well-meaning and far-sighted and who contribute greatly to children’s education,
it is the state judiciary alone that has thus far fully understood what Leandro promises to
every child and requires of the State.
Third, meeting the demands of Leandro will require simultaneous attention to a
complex set of interrelated needs at different levels—to children themselves, to
classrooms, to individual schools, to school districts, to the State as a whole, to its
colleges and schools of education, indeed to its pre-school readiness and child health
agencies—and therefore, careful and comprehensive planning for remedial
implementation is indispensable. Everything cannot be done at once, of course, but a
thoughtful series of priorities, one that does not leave at-risk children themselves behind,
must go forward at full speed.
For all of these reasons, amici applaud the court’s success in prompting the
Governor to find an initial $12-to-$22 million installment toward the total that will
ultimately be needed to make Leandro meaningful. That is an important step forward.
However, we caution the court not to accept the revised DSSF formula, or the 11 local
school district plans already put forward under the August revision of the June 7th plan, as
an adequate template for all future State funding. If significant new funds are not directed
13
to individualized services needed to assist the lowest performing children themselves,
Leandro may quickly fall short of its intended goal (as the State Board of Education itself
acknowledged in its June 7th Report).
II.
The Objective of the October 25th Hearing:
A Comprehensive, Transparent, Adversarially Tested Plan
The court, observing that “it is time for the DPI and the State Board to outline and
present its plans,” has noticed a second hearing for October 25, 2004, in order “to provide
the State of North Carolina the opportunity to present its plan and outline as to how the
State of North Carolina, acting through the Executive and Legislative branches, will
address the constitutional educational deficiencies and how it plans to remedy them under
the guidelines set forth in this case.” (Sept. 9 Notice, at 11).
The time for remedial action, amici fully agree, has now arrived. Indeed the
October 7th hearing will, we trust, soon begin to speed initial funds to Hoke County and
to other needy school districts. Yet the size, scope, and complexity of the statewide task
is vast, and therefore no comprehensive remedial response can proceed without a wise,
well-considered, and balanced statewide plan.
The court has certainly given the State ample advance notice that such planning
will be necessary. It first directed the State to undertake a planning process over three
years ago, in its March 26, 2001 interim decision. (March 26th Decision, 83-84).10 The
State responded to that order by noticing an immediate appeal, although the court quickly
clarified that its March 26th decision was an interlocutory order, and therefore non10
Hoke County Bd. of Educ. v. State of North Carolina, No. 95 CVS 1158 (N.C. Super. Ct. Mar.26, 2001).
14
appealable.11 In its fourth and final decision on April 4, 2002, the court directed the State
“to keep the Court advised of the remedial actions taken by the State by written report
filed with the Court every 90 days, or as otherwise may be directed by the Court.” (April
4th Decision, at 111). Since that time, the State has complied with the directive, while
simultaneously pursuing a broad (though ultimately unsuccessful) appeal to the North
Carolina Supreme Court.
The 90-day reports have prompted the State Board and Department of Public
Instruction to engage in some meaningful consideration of their Leandro duties. Indeed,
as we noted earlier, the SBE’s June 7th Report included a commendable, multi-pronged
response to the immediate needs in Hoke County. Yet even that SBE approach fell far
short of a comprehensive statewide plan. Considered on its own terms, for example, its
Disadvantaged Students Supplemental Fund employs a formula based upon a $250 per
child allocation. Yet the State has never submitted evidence to support this base amount,
nor are amici aware of any research-based rationale anywhere that would justify the
sufficiency of this particular dollar figure (which is crucial, not only to the formula, but to
the overall funding goal).
Moreover, if the purpose of the DSSF fund is to assure that children not presently
performing at grade level are reached and assisted, it is unclear why the State formula
allots $250 for every child in each district, using the district’s overall ADM figures, rather
than allotting $250 for each low performing child. If and when this current DSSF formula
is applied, not to the initial cohort of small, fiscally needy, and low-performing districts
such as Hoke County, but instead to high-wealth and higher performing districts such as
11
See Tico A. Almeida, Refocusing School Finance Litigation on At-Risk Children: Leandro v. State of
North Carolina, 22 Yale L. & Pol’y Rev. 525, 541 (2004) (recounting this sequence of procedural events).
15
Chapel Hill/Carrboro or Wake County, the apparent result will be to funnel large amounts
of State assistance to districts that are far wealthier and may have lower percentages of
children performing below State EOG standards. (This brief reflection on the DSSF
funding formula is not amici’s final or comprehensive word on this fund; we offer it
simply to illustrate the need for a more careful and transparent planning process, one
open to adversarial testing, before a statewide funding formula and related policies are
approved by this court).
More broadly, even the generally admirable remedial design of the June 7th
Report omits major features that will be central in any comprehensive plan. For example,
North Carolina children are now guaranteed competent, certified, and well-trained
teachers as a central holding of Leandro. The DSSF resources presently available will
apparently be employed by the 11 selected districts, in great part, to increase teacher
signing and retention bonuses to lure teachers from higher paying districts. Yet a
comprehensive plan must surely contain effective measures to increase the overall supply
of North Carolina teachers, rather than simply assist some school districts in bidding for
next year’s round of graduating teachers. If North Carolina cannot substantially increase
the 3000 teachers it now produces each year, the hiring race among competing districts to
fill an average 9000 open slots yearly will always be a cruel game of teacher “musical
chairs” with lots of loser districts. In short, any comprehensive plan for North Carolina
must consider additional incentives to lure college students into the teaching ranks, as
well as other policies that will ease financial and administrative barriers for promising
out-of-state and lateral entry teachers.
16
As a second example, this court earlier took the initiative to order prekindergarten programs for at-risk children, on the well-founded observation that many
such children will not receive a sound basic education if they are allowed to enter
kindergarten unprepared to learn. (October 26th Decision, at 43-43;12 see also, April 4th
Decision, at 4-5). While the North Carolina Supreme Court struck the specific order
mandating the State to institute pre-kindergarten programs “at this juncture,” Leandro II,
__ N.C. at __, 599 S.E. 2d at 395, it fully agreed with the court that these “prospective
enrollees” presently do have Leandro rights that are being injured by State inattention. In
light of separation of powers concerns, however, it determined that State executive and/or
legislative actors should be afforded the initial choice in how best to address and remedy
these unmet needs. Id., __ N.C. at __, 599 S.E. 2d at 394-95. While it is thus
“premature” for the court to direct a particular remedy, it is not at all premature to require
the State to present a plan on how it will propose to meet its Leandro obligations to “the
infant Zoe, the toddler Riley, the preschooler Nathan,” id. __ N.C. at __, 599 S.E. 2d at
379, along with its obligations to school-aged North Carolina children.
In sum, the sufficiency of any State plan can only be measured by its amplitude—
whether it begins, in some orderly fashion, to address all of the major elements that this
court has identified as essential, as well as all of the elements identified by the North
Carolina Supreme Court in its 1997 and 2004 decisions. Reasonable disagreements can
arise about the sequencing of particular funding or programmatic initiatives. Yet any
partial or disjointed plan that attempts a few positive changes while putting off until later
any effort to address other substantive needs is per se inadequate and unreasonable. ‘Way
does lead on to way,’ as Robert Frost once observed, and in this crucial Leandro moment,
12
Hoke County Bd. of Educ. v. State of North Carolina, No. 95 CVS 1158 (N.C. Super. Ct. Oct. 26, 2000).
17
remedial roads will soon diverge. The State’s planning choices will establish a pattern
likely to endure for a generation. If the State omits a major substantive goal, that indeed
may ‘make all the difference.’
Beyond its substantive goals, the State’s plan must also have clear, specific, and
meaningful tools for accountability. Just as the ABCs of Education now sets reasonable
goals for schools and students, so should the State’s plan set concrete goals for bringing
additional resources to at-risk students, as well as clear measures to ensure that these
goals are being steadily achieved, with consequences for local districts and a designated
role for the State in guaranteeing accountability by school officials. Not every
educational idea will work in practice; not every district will respond adequately to a
single set of methodologies; and the needs of students may change over time. The court’s
admirable use of student outcomes as one means of measuring whether the State has met
its Leandro duties should likewise be employed as the State carries out its remedial work.
The proof will be in the pudding.
Turning from issues of substance to those of process, amici have four suggestions.
First and foremost, while the initial responsibility for developing policy will lie with the
State through its legislative and executive branches, the court must closely supervise
every step. This lawsuit has been a ten-year demonstration that the State’s Leandro
obligations are anything but self-executing. State actors have a variety of politically
understandable but constitutionally unacceptable reasons not to pursue Leandro’s full
promise as their highest priority. While this court should allow the State the initiative in
any planning process, it must continue its vigilant oversight of the State’s work product.
18
Second, models from other states that have gone down this path may prove
helpful in North Carolina. States that are undergoing school adequacy reform have
employed a variety of planning processes to assure objectivity and comprehensiveness.
Some have created statewide, blue ribbon commissions (which can attract broader
participation and buy-in, but can also be slow to complete their work, and which
sometimes rely on traditional leaders who have themselves been impediments to
necessary change). At least 30 states, many in response to lawsuits similar to Leandro,
have developed comprehensive plans (sometimes referred to as “adequacy” or “costing
out” studies), using educational experts to consider (1) state or court-ordered educational
goals, (2) the educational needs related to those goals, and (3) the preferred methods to
achieve those goals. They then proceed to report honestly, without any hidden political
calculation, specific proposals in each district (and statewide) to address those
educational needs and to calculate the fiscal resources required to implement them.
Courts that have ordered ‘costing out’ studies have often found them valuable
mechanisms to create consensus around comprehensive plans.
Third, the key to any effective planning will be the independence and objectivity
of those conducting the analysis and developing the plan. These elements are crucial
because education planning and decision making have historically been based on political
expediency and compromise, rather than beginning with the educational needs of
students, especially at-risk students, who often come from politically powerless family
circumstances.
Fourth, and in view of the need for independence and objectivity, the court should
welcome a true adversarial testing, not only of the ultimate plan, but of all major
19
elements of any proposed planning process. Indeed, the greater the sense of transparency
and perceived fairness in the framing of relief, the wiser and more widely embraced is
likely to be the outcome. In that spirit, amici suggest that the court might well invite the
submission of alternative plans from the plaintiffs, education organizations, non-profit
groups, or others if the State’s initial efforts proves insufficient.
Another approach would be for the court to appoint a special master. The virtue of
this approach is that it assures a single-minded assistant who can respond to the directives
of a busy court and then pursue all of the challenges of building and overseeing a
complex remedy without competing obligations. The court is doubtless familiar with this
model.
In conclusion, we repose great confidence in this court’s knowledge of the law, of
the facts, of the political dynamics, and of what is at stake in implementing Leandro. For
those reasons, we urge the court first to require the State to undertake a thoroughgoing
remedial plan at once, and then to oversee actively the State’s development and
implementation of that remedial plan.
III.
The Remedial Phase of Leandro: The Court Possesses
Clear Judicial Authority And Ample Remedial Tools
To Order Full Leandro Relief
A.
The Three-Fold Source of The Court’s Authority To Act
This court now possesses both clear authority to act and a wide spectrum of
remedial tools to address the constitutional violations already identified in Leandro. Both
the North Carolina Supreme Court and the Supreme Court of the United States (in its
20
parallel sphere) have recognized several distinct but related founts of judicial authority to
vindicate constitutional rights and remediate constitutional wrongs.
The court’s most widely acknowledged source of authority lies in its inherent
power:
A court’s inherent power is that belonging to it by virtue of its being one of three
separate, coordinate branches of the government. For over a century the Court has
recognized such powers as being plenary within the judicial branch – neither
limited by our constitution nor subject to abridgment by the legislature . . .
Through its inherent power the court has the authority to do all things that are
reasonably necessary for the proper administration of justice.
In the Matter Of The Alamance County Court Facilities, 329 N.C. 84, 93-94, 405 S.E.2d
125 (1991). Under this fount of authority, the North Carolina Supreme Court has
frequently confirmed the responsibility of the judiciary to do everything “reasonably
necessary for the proper administration of justice.” See, e.g., State v. Buckner, 351 N.C.
401, 411, 527 S.E.2d 307, 313 (2000); Beard v. North Carolina State Bar, 320 N.C. 126,
129, 357 S.E.2d 694, 695 (1987).
Indeed, from North Carolina’s earliest days, the Supreme Court has exercised its
judicial authority to enforce the North Carolina Constitution even when legislative will
faltered. In Bayard v. Singleton, 3 N.C. 42 (1787), decided shortly after the
Revolutionary War, the North Carolina Supreme Court reviewed popular legislation that
authorized the State to confiscate land owned by former British loyalists, who were
widely despised in the newly independent state. Convinced that the statute violated the
North Carolina Constitution, the Court struck down the offending statute, acknowledging
that its decision would set it against the preferences of the General Assembly:
[N]otwithstanding the great reluctance they might feel against involving
themselves in a dispute with the Legislature of the State, yet no object of concern
or respect could come in competition or authorize them to dispense with the duty
21
they owed the public, in consequence of the trust they were invested with under
the solemnity of their oaths.
Bayard, 3 N.C. at 44. Bayard marked the beginning of a long tradition under which North
Carolina courts have applied the North Carolina Constitution to vindicate the rights of
North Carolinians, despite popular reluctance or dissent, and without contravening
separation of powers principles.
Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. (1 Cranch) (1803) is, of course, Chief Justice John
Marshall’s classic federal pronouncement upon separation of powers and the respective
roles of the executive, legislative, and judicial branches. Chief Justice Marshall wrote:
It is emphatically the province and duty of the judicial department to say what the
law is. Those who apply the rule to particular cases, must of necessity expound
and interpret that rule. If two laws conflict with each other, the courts must decide
on the operation of each. . . If then the courts are to regard the constitution; and
the constitution is superior to any ordinary act of the legislature; the constitution,
and not such ordinary act, must govern the case to which they both apply.
Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. 137, 177 (1803). In so deciding, Marbury clarified that the
judicial role might require a court to invalidate a law duly enacted by Congress, and
indeed in a proper case would authorize a federal court to issue a writ of mandamus even
to a high executive official—President Jefferson’s Secretary of State, James Madison—to
perform a duty owed to a citizen by right.
A second fount of judicial authority, potentially broader even than the first, lies in
a court’s obligation to remedy a constitutional wrong. In Leandro I, the North Carolina
Supreme Court acknowledged that ideally, “the legislative process provides a better
forum than the courts for discussing and determining what educational programs and
resources are most likely to ensure” the sound basic education required by the North
Carolina Constitution. Leandro I, 346 N.C. 336, 354, 488 S.E.2d 249, 259 (1997). Yet the
22
Supreme Court insisted that “the judicial branch has its duty under the North Carolina
Constitution,” and that if the State were unable or unwilling to deliver the educational
rights it owed the plaintiff children, “it will then be the duty of the court to enter a
judgment granting declaratory relief and such other relief as needed to correct the
wrong. . . .” Id. at 357, 488 S.E.2d at 261. More recently, the North Carolina Supreme
Court again reemphasized that this court is “empowered to provide relief by imposing a
specific remedy and instructing the recalcitrant state actors to implement it,” if the State
proves unable or unwilling to comply with Leandro’s mandate. Leandro II, __ N.C. at __,
599 S.E.2d at 393.
Such judicial authority to remedy adjudicated constitutional violations is
traditionally far broader than a court’s general inherent power. Felix F. Stumpf, Inherent
Powers of the Courts 37-38 (1994). Indeed, the decades-long struggle to implement
public school desegregation under Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U.S. 483 686
(1954) has provided particularly important lessons on the full scope of this remedial
authority. In Brown v. Board of Education, 349 U.S. 294 (1955), Chief Justice Earl
Warren initially instructed lower federal courts that they should
“be guided by equitable principles. Traditionally, equity has been
characterized by a practical flexibility in shaping its remedies and by a
facility for adjusting and reconciling public and private needs. . . Courts
of equity may properly take into account the public interest in the
elimination of such obstacles in a systematic and effective manner. But it
should go without saying that the vitality of these constitutional principles
cannot be allowed to yield simply because of disagreement with them.
Brown, 349 U.S. at 299.
Eventually in Griffin v. County School Board, 377 U.S. 218 (1964), the Supreme
Court faced Virginia school authorities who had closed their schools rather than
23
desegregate under the mandate of Brown. Justice Black’s decision for the Court
authorized the district judge to require these local officials to “reopen, operate and
maintain without racial discrimination a public school system,” adding that the district
court could even direct local taxing authorities to “exercise the power that is theirs to levy
taxes to raise funds adequate” for the effective operation of these public schools. Id. at
233.
Subsequently, in Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Bd. of Educ., 402 U.S. 1
(1971), Chief Justice Warren Burger examined at great length the remedial powers and
responsibilities of federal courts in vindicating constitutional rights. See generally,
Swann, 402 U.S. at 11-32. The Chief Justice emphasized that
[o]nce a right and a violation have been shown, the scope of a district court’s
equitable powers to remedy past wrongs is broad, for breadth and flexibility are
inherent in equitable remedies.
Swann, 402 U.S. at 15. These principles are equally applicable in the North Carolina state
context.
North Carolina’s Constitution contains yet a third fount of judicial authority, the
Open Courts Clause, art. I. § 18, which provides that “right and justice shall be
administered without denial or delay.” See generally State v. Godwin, 216 N.C. 49, 3
S.E.2d 347 (1939); Bolick v. American Barmag Corp, 54 N.C. App. 589, 284 S.E.2d 188
(1981), rev’d on other grounds, 306 N.C. 364, 293 S.E.2d 415 (1982). Professor Orth
notes that the Open Courts Clause “traces its pedigree to the oldest and most honorable
source in Anglo-American jurisprudence: the Magna Carta.” John V. Orth, The North
Carolina State Constitution 54 (1993). The Magna Carta was signed to assure that the
executive authorities, even the monarch, would submit to the authority of courts and the
24
rule of law. Thereafter, disputes were resolved through the impartiality of the courts,
which were independent of all other authority, even that of the king.
According to Professor Orth, Sir Edward Coke’s influential commentary on the
Magna Carta led in the seventeenth century to the modern guarantee of a legal remedy for
every injury. “Open courts were not enough, Coke pointed out; they had to be righting
wrongs and doing justice. ‘And therefore every Subject of the Realm, for injury done to
him in bonis, terris, vel persona [goods, lands or person]…may take his remedy by the
course of the Law…’” Orth, at 54, quoting Edward Coke, 2 Institutes of the Laws of
England 55-56 (1641).
In sum, this court’s present authority to craft and implement remedies for proven
Leandro violations rests upon three separate and fully sufficient founts: its inherent
authority, its remedial authority, and the Open Courts Clause, which itself stems from the
most ancient and venerable of Anglo-American legal principles. King John’s solemn
promise, inscribed on parchment at Runnymede in 1215 A.D.— “to no one will we deny
or delay right or justice”—should surely be honored in 2004 for North Carolina’s
children in Leandro, who have waited patiently for more than a decade for ‘right and
justice’ to arrive.
B.
The Remedial Tools Available to The Court
In our earlier account of Marbury, we have already alluded to one important tool
available to this court: a writ of mandamus that “will lie to review discretionary acts
when the discretion appeared to have been abused or the action taken arbitrarily
capriciously, or in disregard of the law.” Alamance, 329 N.C. at 104, 405 S.E.2d at 135;
Ponder v. Joslin, 262 N.C. 496, 138 S.E.2d 143 (1964); Pue v. Hood, 222 N.C. 310, 22
25
S.E.2d 896 (1942); See generally John Cratsley, Inherent Power of the Courts 26-28
(1980). “In matters involving issues of discretion, mandamus will lie only to compel
public officials to take action.” Alamance, 329 N.C. at 105, 405 S.E.2d at 136. Using
mandamus, this court could order the State Board to create a plan to carry out their
constitutional duty to provide all North Carolina children with the opportunity for a
sound basic education.
A second tool that the court appears poised to employ is a judicially supervised,
remedial planning process. Such planning processes are fully appropriate, often employed
in complex remedial cases, and here will be a vital step toward providing every North
Carolina child with the opportunity for a sound basic education. As another state court
has noted:
In providing a remedy in similar cases involving the constitutionality of public
school finance systems, courts have taken a number of approaches including
detailing requirements and setting up timetables for compliance, appointing a
special master, or providing an initial opportunity to present a plan that assures
immediate attention to achieve constitutional compliance.
State v. Campbell County School Dist., 2001 Wyo. 19, 43; 19 P.3d 518, 565 (2001). See
generally Roosevelt Elementary School Dist. No. 66 v. Bishop, 179 Ariz. 233, 877 P.2d
806 (1994) (ordering a planning process); Campaign for Fiscal Equity, Inc. v. State, 100
N.Y.2d 893; 801 N.E.2d 326 (2003) (same); DeRolph v. State, 78 Ohio St. 3d 193, 677
N.E.2d 733 (1997) (same); Wyoming Campbell County School Dist. v. State, 907 P.2d
1238 (1995) (same).
Just as have in state courts in other school finance/adequacy cases (or in federal
courts in school desegregation cases), it is appropriate here for the court here initially to
invite State authorities to specify a plan. See, e.g., Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Bd.
26
of Educ., 402 U.S. at 7-11, 22-31 (reciting the long planning process for school
desegregation undertaken in Charlotte, and upholding the federal court’s eventual resort
to a plan designed by a court-appointed expert once school authorities’ plan had been
judged constitutionally inadequate); see also United States v. Montgomery County Bd. of
Educ., 395 U.S. 225, 227 (1969) (upholding a broad, detailed, judicially crafted
desegregation plans once a local district had defaulted on its constitutional obligations);
see generally Owen Fiss, The Civil Rights Injunction 14 (1978). If the State here is
unable to present an appropriate plan or to propose an acceptable planning process, the
court can itself structure the parameters, substantive scope, and timetable for a planning
process and direct the State to carry it out under judicial supervision.
A third alternative tool, one that might assist the court in supervising and
directing this planning process, would be the appointment of a special master. Other state
courts facing school finance reform have taken this approach. See generally, Lake View
School Dist. No. 25 v. Huckabee, 2004 Ark. LEXIS 69, at 1-2 (Ark. 2004, No. 01-836);
Idaho Schools for Equal Educ. Opportunity v. State, 2004 Ida. LEXIS 166, 171 (2004);
Campaign for Fiscal Equity, Inc. v. State, 100 N.Y.2d 893, 928-30, 801 N.E.2d 326, 34749 (2003).
North Carolina courts themselves have long used special masters or referees to
handle the minutiae of complex cases, including: investigating corporate debt, Lenoir v.
Linville Imp. Co., 117 N.C. 471, 23 S.E. 442 (1895); investigating allegations of
stockholder fraud, Abbitt v. Gregory, 201 N.C. 577, 160 S.E. 896 (1931); and
investigating the contractual basis of government employee retirement benefits, Bailey v.
State, 348 N.C. 130, 500 S.E.2d 54 (1998). North Carolina courts have clear power to
27
“appoint one or more referees, not exceeding three,” Rule 53(a)(2). This court would not
give up any of its oversight by appointing a referee. Instead,
[t]he order of reference to the referee may specify or limit his powers and may
direct him to report only upon particular issues or to do or perform particular acts
or to receive and report evidence only and may fix the time and place for
beginning and closing the hearings and for the filing of the referee’s report.
Rule 53(e). The court would use the Referee’s reports as reference tools, not as final
decision. “The judge after hearing may adopt, modify, or reject the report in whole or in
part, render judgment, or may remand the proceedings to the referee with instructions. No
judgment may be rendered on any reference except by the judge. Rule 53(g)(2).
Both the complexity and sheer volume of details in this case are substantial and
suggest that close judicial attention and potentially hundreds of hours may be necessary
to assure a full and fair remedy. Thus the court could decide to appoint someone acting
under its direction who could devote substantial time to Leandro implementation, lest the
hard-won principles be lost or fatally compromised in the fashioning of relief.
Finally, we note that if ever the General Assembly were to neglect its
constitutional duties, after careful time for consultation, this court has the residual
authority to issue a “legislative injunction” that could itself create whatever new
legislation was needed to implement a full remedy. When and if legislative inaction
continues to flaunt a court’s remedial orders after a finding of constitutional violations,
courts have broad powers to compel legislative compliance:
In cases where officials’ recalcitrance is the only obstacle to enacting enabling
legislation necessary to implement the court’s structural decree, the wisest course
of action is for the judge to order the legislation into effect herself… Allowing a
judge to order the necessary enabling legislation into effect herself, instead of
requiring her to waste time and judicial resources on coercing unwilling parties to
act, is the most efficient and effective way to respond to the human needs
embodied in constitutional freedoms.
28
Note: Implementing Structural Injections: Getting a Remedy When Local Officials Resist.
80 Geo. L.J. 2227, 2251 (1992). “It should not be necessary to establish the inadequacy
of alternative remedies before the injunction becomes available. . . .” Owen Fiss, The
Civil Rights Injunction 6 (1978).
In a case such as Leandro, such a consequence would come at the conclusion of
various intermediate judicial steps. First, the court would order the State to cease its
unconstitutional behavior. Next, the court would order the State to submit a plan to bring
its behavior into compliance. If the State were to fail to comply with that order, the court
could write its own plan. To implement that plan, if the General Assembly dug in its
heels and refused to appropriate necessary resources, the court has, as a last resort,
residual authority to enter an order with the full effect of legislation, which could require
the State Treasurer to raise and collect taxes to implement a Leandro remedy.
Such a legislative injunction, although rarely employed, can become necessary
upon the occasion of complete legislative default, as in the Griffin v. County School
Board case cited above. See generally, Missouri v. Jenkins, 495 U.S. 33, 50-52 (1990)
(discussing the circumstances that might justify a federal district court order imposing a
property tax increase for school desegregation funds, and concluding that comity in the
delicate state/federal area required a federal court in Kansas City first to pursue
alternative means for obtaining the funds). Under extreme circumstances, however, to
avoid toleration of a constitutional right without remedy, judicial action is fully warranted
and does not violate the principle of separation of powers.
The legislative injunction accords with the understanding of the legislative role as
deciding on the general distribution of rights and resources and the judicial role as
ensuring that this allocation is accomplished fairly, without prejudicing the rights
29
of particular groups or individuals… By mandating a particular action, the court
assures that the legislature cannot exercise its “discretion” not to act and thereby
impair individuals’ constitutional rights. This role for the court in defining the
bounds of legislative discretion falls squarely within the traditional understanding
of judicial authority.
Robert A. Schapiro, Note: The Legislative Injunction: A Remedy for Unconstitutional
Legislative Inaction. 99 Yale L.J. 231, 233-234. (1989) (emphasis added). We suspect
that such a tool will never become necessary in this case. Yet none should doubt that this
power is available to the court if the legislature were ever to default under its duty to
provide resources sufficient to implement full Leandro relief.
Conclusion
This court has wrestled with the complexities of Leandro for seven years. It has
heard the parties’ evidence, found that the constitutional rights of thousands of North
Carolina children have daily been violated, rendered its judgment, and awaited review by
the North Carolina Supreme Court.
That review is now completed. The Supreme Court has now upheld the court’s
findings and conclusions. The hour has arrived for the court to oversee a comprehensive
Leandro remedy. We trust that the State will appreciate its duty to devise a swift and
sufficient response to the constitutional deficiencies in North Carolina’s public school
system. We believe that remedial relief will begin to flow promptly from the October 7th
hearing. We hope that the State will unfurl a comprehensive plan at the October 25th
hearing that demonstrates its thorough understanding of what must be done. If the State
does not formulate a satisfactory remedial plan, however, this court has unquestionable
judicial authority and ample tools to do so itself. The children of North Carolina need and
deserve “right and justice” in the near future. We trust the court will assure it.
30
Respectfully submitted this the 4th day of October, 2004,
________________________
Seth H. Jaffe
State Bar No. 27261
P.O. Box 28004
Raleigh, NC 27611
(919) 834-3466
___________________________
Deborah Greenblatt
State Bar No. 2847
P.O. Box 2446
Raleigh, NC 27602
(919) 856-2195
Counsel for the American Civil
Liberties Union of North Carolina
Legal Foundation, Inc.
Counsel for Carolina Legal Assistance
_________________________
Sheria Reid
State Bar No. 24477
P.O. Box 28068
Raleigh, NC 27611
(919) 856-3192
____________________________
Gregory C. Malhoit
State Bar No. 6275
3344 Hillsborough St., Suite 302
Raleigh, NC 27607
(919) 833-4541
_________________________
Carlene McNulty
State Bar No. 12488
Counsel for the Rural School and
Community Trust
Counsel for North Carolina
Justice & Community
Development Center
__________________________
Lewis Pitts
State Bar No. 20592
201 W. Main Street, Ste. 400
Durham, NC 27702
(919) 226-005t1 ext. 422
_________________________
John Charles Boger
Member of the New York Bar
School of Law, CB # 3380
Chapel Hill, NC 27599
(919) 843-9288
Counsel for Advocates for Children’s
Services, Legal Aid of North Carolina
________________________
Anita S. Earls
N.C. State Bar 15597
School of Law, CB # 3380
Chapel Hill, NC 27599
(919) 843-7896
Counsel for the UNC School of Law
Center for Civil Rights
31
CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE
A copy of the foregoing Memorandum of Law was this day placed in the United
States mail, postage prepaid and addressed to:
Grayson G. Kelley, Esquire
Thomas J. Ziko, Esquire
Laura Crumpler, Esquire
Office of the Attorney General
N.C. Department of Justice
114 W. Edenton Street
Raleigh, NC 27601
Counsel for Defendants
John Gresham, Esquire
S. Luke Largess, Esquire
Ferguson, Stein, Chambers,
Wallas, Adkins, Gresham
& Sumter, P.A.
P.O. Box 36486
Charlotte, NC 28636
Counsel for North Carolina
Association of Educators
Robert W. Spearman, Esquire
Melanie Black Dubis, Esquire
Parker Poe Adams & Bernstein, L.L.P.
P.O. Box 389
Raleigh, NC 27602
Counsel for Plaintiffs
Thomas M. Stern
P.O. Box 2206
Durham, NC 27702
Counsel for North Carolina
Association of Educators
H. Lawrence Armstrong, Jr., Esquire
Hux, Livermon & Armstrong
P.O. Box 217
Enfield, NC 27823
Counsel for Plaintiffs
Ann L. Majestic, Esquire
Tharrington, Smith L.L.P.
209 Fayetteville Street Mall
P.O. Box 1151
Raleigh, NC 27602
Counsel for Plaintiff-Intervenors
Audrey Anderson, Esquire
Hogan & Hartson, L.L.P.
555 13th Street NW
Washington, DC 20004
Counsel for Plaintiff-Intervenors
This, the ____ day of October, 2004
______________________________
Carlene McNulty
32
APPENDIX:
STATE BOARD OF EDUCATION
Board Meeting, August 4-5, 2004
DOCUMENT
“Disadvantaged Student Supplemental Funding
Outline of Formula -- $12 million”
(undated, 4-page document)
33