Agenda - 03-07-2017 - 5-a - Orange County's Proposed 2017 Legislative Agenda

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34 PE-4: Support legislation providing flexibility to align K-12 and community college calendars. • Currently, community college classes start in early August while public schools begin in late August. • It would benefit both systems and the families involved if the systems were allowed to coordinate their school year calendars to best meet their needs. • Flexibility would allow for more effective use of continuing technical education resources, allow public school students to take community college courses during their normal school day, and improve efficiencies combining community college students, early college students, and high school students for instruction. Guiding Principles • The Association supports efforts to clarify State and county responsibility through legislation that recognizes the following: o the impact of changing technologies on basic educational needs and the job market of the future; o the impact of any changes on the facility needs of local school systems; o the need for county commissioners to have the authority to make sure funds appropriated for school facility needs are used accordingly; and o the challenges faced by counties, especially those near metropolitan areas, in balancing growth in school populations with stagnant county revenues. • Taxing authority for local public education should be vested exclusively with boards of county commissioners. • The State should define and support an adequate sound basic education in all local school systems and should appropriate adequate operating revenue to fully fund its education initiatives. • Effective classroom technologies and innovations provide greater choice, improve education, and should be available to all public schools and community colleges. • North Carolina's community colleges are critical components of the state's integrated efforts to prepare youth and adults for constructive participation in a constantly changing economy.