At its meeting Sept. 5, the Buncombe County Board of Education unanimously (7-0) passed interim policies that broaden the school district’s interpretation of what constitutes a complaint as defined by Title IX, a federal law passed in 1972 that bars sex discrimination in education.
On Aug. 22, the Buncombe County Board of Commissioners called a first-of-its-kind joint meeting within the Asheville City and Buncombe County boards of education to identify the three elected bodies’ shared purpose.
Asheville City Schools (ACS) Superintendent Maggie Fehrman said the district was able to close its $5.7 million budget deficit just in time for the new school year, largely through cuts in central office and by consolidating the district’s two middle schools.
After the Asheville City Board of Education decided to consolidate the district’s two middle schools for the 2024-25 school year, the families of Montford North Star Academy students were left with a choice: Send their children to Asheville Middle School or leave the district.
While the programs will be eliminated, classes in those areas will still be offered, van Noort repeatedly told the board’s Committee on Educational Planning, Policies, and Programs before the board’s action.
Goodwill Industries of Northwest North Carolina’s Career Quest program uses a combination of video interviews and tours to introduce high school students to the Asheville job market.
Even after making some cuts to increased expenditures and allocating $3 million from reserves, the district may need to cut staff to close the $1.2 million budget gap, she said.
The Buncombe County Board of Education is not happy with the direction state legislators are taking in funding schools.
From child care centers to colleges, Glenda Weinert’s education experience has influenced students young and old. But it’s her business expertise and political leadership as former chair of the Buncombe County Republican Party that make her a unique addition to the Buncombe County Board of Education.
On June 10, the Asheville City Association of Educators delivered a letter signed by the Parent Teacher Organizations or parent teams from all eight of the district’s schools.
After several months of discussion, including a contentious meeting with the Asheville City Board of Education June 3, Mike Sule, who was spearheading the project, asked the board to remove the project from its agenda June 10.
At a rally in Pack Square June 6, the Buncombe County Association of Educators, an organized advocacy group for teachers, argued that the state of North Carolina and Buncombe County governments should allocate more funding for education.
Former Buncombe County GOP Chair Glenda Weinert, who is a current member of the Buncombe County Schools Foundation, received the most votes on June 6 in the opening round of an open-ended series of votes among the six sitting members of the board.
“We’ve been out of compliance for 14 years,” Housing Authority of the City of Asheville President and CEO Monique Pierre told a May 22 meeting of the HACA Board of Commissioners.
“Institutional neutrality promotes the open exchange of ideas and avoids inhibiting scholarship, creativity, and expression,” UNCA Chancellor Kimberly van Noort wrote in a public update to students and faculty earlier this month. “Compromising this position carries great risks.”
James Cassara, a volunteer at the YMCA of Western North Carolina, discusses the local nonprofit’s many services.
Samantha Maynard is a volunteer at Black Mountain Home for Children, a nonprofit that serves children as young as infants and as old as college age.
Frederick Carl DeTroia discusses the joys of working with young children through Big Brothers Big Sisters of Western North Carolina.
In a statement to the board at a special called work session May 15, an emotional Simpkins said she was stepping down for “personal reasons” and because of “some changes going on.”
Recent comments by the Buncombe County Board of Commissioners has some members of the Asheville City Board of Education questioning the future costs associated with the former Asheville Primary School site on Haywood Road.
Kate Wargo moved to Asheville in fall 2021 with hopes for a fresh start. Teaching elementary school during the COVID-19 pandemic had left her exhausted, anxious and depressed. “It was the first time I felt dehumanized,” she says of the previous two years teaching fourth grade in Pennsylvania.
