Educators and students urge county to restore school supports and staffing

Educators and students used the county’s public-comment period to press commissioners for stronger school funding and restored positions in Alamance-Burlington Schools. Medora Burke Skoll, president of the Alamance-Burlington Association of Educators, cited state rankings and staffing shortages and urged commissioners to restore positions lost in reductions-in-force that supported multi-tiered supports for students.

Tabitha Boswell, vice president of the same organization and a classroom teacher, described classroom strain from vacancies and doubled-up special-education assignments and said the county must invest in staff and targeted interventions rather than short-term fixes. Sawyer Jones, student-body president at Walter Williams High School, told the board he intends to return to Alamance County to teach and called for investments in student support services — nurses, counselors and central-office staff — to improve outcomes and teacher retention.

Commissioners acknowledged the concerns and discussed budget tools including a possible quarter-cent sales-tax option to augment school support and noted pressures from state funding shortfalls; commissioners said more work is needed to balance taxpayer capacity and school needs ahead of the budget.