Majorities of the House and Senate agree that N.C. schools need legislative prodding to reopen, but they’re struggling to come to terms on how to do it. Both houses of the General Assembly have passed a version of Senate Bill 37, which would require school districts to reopen for in-person instruction in some capacity. But...
Carolina Journal is taking a brief look at each new member of the General Assembly — 10 in the Senate and 11 in the House. We look at where they’ve been, what they’re doing now, and what we might expect them to do as lawmakers. The 2021-22 session began in late January. Expect COVID-19 and the ongoing...
Carolina Journal is taking a brief look at each new member of the General Assembly — 10 in the Senate and 11 in the House. We look at where they’ve been, what they’re doing now, and what we might expect them to do as lawmakers. The 2021-22 session began in late January. Expect COVID-19 and the ongoing...
Gov. Roy Cooper’s call for more money for schools while also indicating he would veto a bill that could send students back to school has many in the state scratching their heads. Last week, Cooper held a news conference in which he called for boosted spending on educators for the rest of the fiscal year...
Most North Carolinians don’t approve of the state’s vaccine rollout. More North Carolinians favor getting the COVID-19 vaccine, but that doesn’t mean they can, according to an Elon University Poll of nearly 1,500 residents conducted Jan. 29-31. Elon released the poll just hours before Gov. Roy Cooper held a news conference announcing a new executive...
After a slow start, North Carolina is ramping up its COVID-19 vaccinations. Some 9.2% of residents got the first shot of COVID-19 vaccines by Monday, Feb. 8, when 970,162 people had received a first dose, according to the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services. Two days earlier, an average 8.6% of COVID-19 tests came...
North Carolina, which saw a tightening of the presidential race in the 2020 election, was among the states that saw an influx of money from Mark Zuckerberg in the months leading up to the voting. Donald Trump won the state by 177,000 votes over Hillary Clinton in 2016, but the Democrats cut the margin of...
The N.C. General Assembly passed a bill Thursday, Feb. 4, that provides more than $2 billion in COVID aid across the state, most of it to public schools. The bill now heads to Gov. Roy Cooper, who held a press conference Thursday calling for hundreds of millions in more spending. “We can and will turn...
The Democrat-controlled N.C. State Board of Education approved Thursday, Feb. 4, a sweeping rewrite of the state’s social studies standards that will now teach nearly every aspect of American history through the lens of racism and discrimination. The changes were approved over the strong objections of several Republican board members, who decried the new standards...
The Senate has tentatively voted to reopen schools, despite pushback from Democrats to block full in-person learning for older students. Republicans passed Senate Bill 37 on its second reading, 29-16, to give K-12 students the option to return to the classroom at least part-time. Students with special needs could choose full-time in-person learning. The Senate...
Both political parties are throwing their weight behind school reopening in North Carolina. Gov. Roy Cooper, a Democrat, urged schools to allow students to return to the classroom. Republican lawmakers also Tuesday, Feb. 2 moved to mandate in-person learning as an option for all K-12 students. Lawmakers introduced Senate Bill 37 to reopen schools for...
