November 16, 2012
The Honorable Beverly Perdue
Governor, State of North Carolina
Office of the Governor
116 West Jones Street
Raleigh, North Carolina 27603-8001
Dear Governor Perdue:
The State Board of Education thanks you for your continued efforts to support our public
schools and efforts to initiate solutions that will bring needed resources to all of our public
education institutions. Thank you for your education focus and leadership over these past four
years.
We appreciate the Office of State Budget and Management (OSBM) allowing us to delay
our submission until after the State Board’s November meeting. At that meeting, the
State Board of Education directed the Department of Public Instruction to submit the
2013-15 Biennial Budget information in the format requested by OSBM. The State
Board of Education, however, believed it was also important to submit a budget
document that outlined clearly what is necessary to implement the State Board’s adopted
mission and vision for North Carolina’s public schools. The attached document outlines
the Expansion items the State Board determined as critical to moving our public schools
to where they need to be to meet the needs of our 1.5 million students. The budget items
included represent funds for assessments to align with current standards, statutes and
policies; important funding to fully support currently underfunded initiatives; restoring
important funding necessary to support our teachers; and additional funding to support
some of our state’s most vulnerable children, who include children at our Residential
Schools for the Deaf and Blind. While the information is not listed in specific priority
order, we believe that it is important to include each item in any education budget that
will help public schools meet the needs of all our students and teachers. We would like
to emphasize a few of the items:
LEA Adjustment
The LEA Adjustment (negative reserve) is scheduled to increase $16,385,771 in
FY 2013-14 to a total of $376,124,279. The level of this negative reserve requires
the LEAs and charter schools to identify and return 4.6% of the funds
OFFICE OF THE STATE SUPERINTENDENT
June St. Clair Atkinson, Ed.D., State Superintendent | jatkinson@dpi.state.nc.us
6301 Mail Service Center, Raleigh, North Carolina 27699-6301 | (919) 807-3430 | Fax (919) 807-3445
AN EQUAL OPPORTUNITY/AFFIRMATIVE ACTION EMPLOYER
The Honorable Beverly Perdue
November 16, 2012
Page 2
appropriated to them before they can establish an operating budget. As you
know, this year’s LEA Adjustment of $359,738,508 removed 4,300 classroom
teachers from our schools, 444 Career and Technical Education teachers from our
public schools, and millions of dollars from support programs. These reductions
removed needed adults from our classrooms and necessary support for our
teachers. Until we eliminate this hole in the budget, our public schools will not be
able to provide the level of services required to ensure that our students obtain the
proficiencies to be successful. Please work to eliminate the LEA Adjustment.
Salary Increases
We know you are aware of the need for our teachers and school employees to
receive a pay increase. They have taken on expanded roles and more students as
they have had to manage the major budget reductions placed on our public
schools. We look forward to supporting all efforts to obtain a pay increase for
these valuable employees. A 5% pay increase for all public school employees is
approximately $325 million (a 1% for certified teachers is $52 million).
NC Pre-K
The State Board of Education no longer oversees the budget for our state’s pre-K
education program and, therefore, they did not include an expansion item to
address the program’s needs. (Via SL 2011-145, the General Assembly moved
the award-winning pre-Kindergarten More at Four programs from the Department
of Public Instruction to the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS),
renamed it to NC Pre-K, and substantially reduced its funding). First, we want to
thank you for fighting so diligently for early childhood education, including
finding funds to support an additional 6,300 slots this year. Second, as we do feel
that NC Pre-K is a highly valued educational program rather than a children’s
daycare, we respectfully request that we work to have it restored to DPI and to the
governance of the State Board of Education. We have the capacity to expand the
program to serve more children using fewer dollars than DHHS would require
given our structure and expertise in this area.
Beyond those three high-priority items described above, two other areas warrant special
attention:

The multiple years of cuts to textbooks have made it difficult for our public
schools to transition to digital material and obtain instructional support materials
in our classrooms. To successfully implement the classroom applications and
prepare students to be successful with our new standards, we must have funding
for these materials.
The Honorable Beverly Perdue
November 16, 2012
Page 3

Funding for the ACT, Plan, Explore, and WorkKeys that are in place this year but
are not currently funded for FY 2013-14.
While the first attachment is what the State Board of Education believes should be added to the
public school’s budget, the Department of Public Instruction is including three additional
attachments to comply with the OSBM instructions for submitting the 2013-15 Biennial
Budget.
 A capped request reflecting a maximum Expansion Budget increase of 2% ($154
million) and a listing of the Continuation Budget adjustments
 A two percent reduction to the State Public School Fund
Thank you for considering our supplemental budget items. If you need any additional
information, please let us know.
Sincerely,
William C. Harrison
WCH/JSA/pwp
Attachments
June St. Clair Atkinson