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when necessary to our friends; with courage to resist public pressure as well as private <br />greed; and with courage to stand up and do the right thing? Second, were we truly <br />citizens of judgment, with the perspective judgment of the future as well as the past; of <br />our own mistakes as well as the mistakes of others; and with wisdom enough to know <br />that as part of a majority, we were not always in the right; and with candor enough to <br />admit that? Third, were we truly citizens of integrity; citizens who never ran out on either <br />the principles on which we believe or on the children across our community -City as <br />well as County -who believe in us; citizens who neither have political or economic <br />advantage who could ever divert from the fulfillment of our sacred trust in educating our <br />kids. Courage, judgment, integrity, dedication -these are qualities that we as parents <br />can never hope to instill in our children unless we can demonstrate them ourselves. I've <br />heard the arguments against merger -one of higher taxes, lower properly values, longer <br />bus rides, the argument that there's na correlation between school funding and student <br />achievement. But in the end, it doesn't matter who's right about these issues. All that <br />matters is what are we going to do for our kids? Are we going to provide equal <br />educational opportunities for our kids? I think that there's only one solution that will <br />ensure equal opportunity to the excellent education that all our kids deserve, and that is <br />to merge the schools. <br />Spencer Chambless: Good evening, my name is Spencer Chambless. I ga to A. L. <br />Stanback in Orange County Schools. I desire to serve my country in the U. S. Army. <br />But there's this one little problem. Military academies such as Westpoint and Annapolis <br />don't come down to visit Orange County high schools. They do go to Chapel Hill high <br />schools. Why don't they came to Orange County high schools? Well, the reason is that <br />we're just not given the chance to show Westpoint or Annapolis that we are worthy and <br />that we are just as good as the Chapel Hill students dawn the street. Sa please, Orange <br />County Board of Commissioners, give Orange County kids the same opportunities as <br />our Chapel Hill neighbors. Thank you. <br />Lixin Yao: I noticed the four proposals put forward by you, and I'm open to tax <br />adjustment and school district collaborations. However, ane paint, important issues <br />need to be decided by public voting. And I am against any merger proposals. Since <br />there is still one proposal out there for merger, I'm going to talk more about it tonight. <br />My family and I moved from Seattle to the Triangle at the beginning of this year. Before <br />we made the decision to move, the State of North Carolina sent representatives to <br />Seattle and they showed us many good things about North Carolina. One of the most <br />impressive shavings was the performance of students at Chapel Hill-Carrboro City <br />Schools. And we decided to move here partially because we knew our kids could go to <br />the schools in the City school district. However, we never expected that a century old <br />school district could disappear. And this is a surprise to us. And I think the merging of <br />the two school districts is not attractive to employees of businesses who are considering <br />moving to Research Triangle Park. Right now the State is trying to attract businesses <br />and we need to be serious about what we want to do about school merger. And there <br />are six school districts in Cane County, Washington State, where Seattle is. Most <br />districts are very goad, a couple are just average. But nobody in Cane County wanted to <br />merge the six school districts. With this situation going on there, Cane County schools <br />are ranked the best in Washington State. And Washington State is ranked number ane <br />this year nationwide in SAT scares, where more than 50°~ of students took SAT. I <br />believe in education, a smaller system works really better than a larger system. Merger <br />is not the solution. Now I chatted with my colleagues at work recently about merger. <br />And I said I'm not sure about that yet because they have not made the decision yet. And <br />