S.C. education leader

Jun 25, 2009 — The Sun News

Monique Newton

Jun. 25, 2009 (McClatchy-Tribune Regional News delivered by Newstex) -- Federal stabilization funds totaling $185 million will begin flowing to S.C. school districts on July 1, helping to ease, but not erase, a state shortfall of $500 million, said state Superintendent of Education Jim Rex on Wednesday at his annual State of Our Schools update at an S.C. Association of School Administrators conference in Myrtle Beach.

"We're going to see some improvement for a difficult situation," he said to his interviewer, anchor Judi Gatson from WIS News 10, and an audience of 800 school administrators. "But we'll still have cuts, we'll still have layoffs."

Rex urged school leaders to begin planning for the funds, which will save about 500 teaching jobs and 100 nonteaching jobs across the state.

Horry County Schools will cut more than 165 positions because of the decrease in state funding. The Georgetown County School District will eliminate 22 positions.

Horry County Schools will receive about $5.4 million of the federal funding, said Will Garland, chairman of the school board. The money will be put into the general fund balance and will be used to prevent the district from cutting deeper into district positions, but will not add any positions.

The event was broadcast live from the Embassy Suites at Kingston Plantation on the Web sites of WMBF in Myrtle Beach, WIS in Columbia, WCSC in Charleston, WBTV in Charlotte and WTOC in Savannah.

More than 500 people participated in a simultaneous online chat room.

In past years, Rex gave a formal address only to conference attendees. This time around, he fielded questions from Gatson, online viewers and a few members from the audience.

One question for Rex, an advocate of school choice, concerned the availability of transportation for low-income students to go to choice schools.

"It goes back to funding," he said. "Every public school system ideally would have a menu of choices and would have the wherewithal to get all of the students to school of their choice."

Rex said a lack of transportation cannot be used as an excuse to not provide school choice. He cited a number of school districts that made it work by carpooling and leasing cars.

He said he's working on getting a mandate from the state legislature that would require districts to offer school choice.

"By making it voluntary, we're beginning to create another equity issue in South Carolina because it's not required in all districts, and we have high-choice districts, low-choice districts and no-choice districts," he said.

Horry County Schools does not classify itself as a choice district, but it offers alternative schools, such as the Scholars Academy and the Early College High School, to students who meet qualifications.

An online chat room participant asked Rex if enlarged class sizes, a byproduct of the teacher layoffs, would reduce or compound challenges in schools.

"We are all concerned that it is going to have a negative effect on our test scores and graduation rates," Rex said. "Whether one year will give us that kind of negative effect, we're not sure of yet."

Rex said it's essential to have tax and funding reform to create a competitive school system.

"It's almost as if we have a premeditated campaign to make our state look bad," he said. "The image that South Carolina gets is not the South Carolina that I know and that all of us know, and it's embarrassing sometimes."

He said there's been inequality in the state's schools that's lasted generations as a result of their reliance on property taxes.

"We know that the inequalities are holding us back as a state," Rex said. "We have a lot of kids in South Carolina who frankly don't have a shot at the American dream."

And a 1 percent sales tax, which has been adopted by many counties, can suffer during a recession, he said.

Horry County passed a sales tax for education in 2008.

"All these roads lead to comprehensive tax reform," Rex said. "Most economists are saying to us that what we need is a broad base of revenue and low taxes."

Gatson's final question for Rex -- would he take a shot at running for governor? -- received a large reaction from the crowd.

"I have learned that this office has limitations," Rex said. "If you have the wrong person in the governor's mansion ..." Rex was interrupted by a thunderous applause.

"We do have way too much gridlock in our legislature," Rex said.

"I'm mulling it over and listening to a lot of people."

He said he will wait until this September to make a decision.

The event's multimedia format received positive reviews from attendees.

"It was excellent," said Beverly Gurley, a testing coordinator for the Marlboro County School District. "He hit the questions that were asked and he got some quality information for us about the stimulus money."

Joanne Avery, the deputy superintendent for Anderson School District Four, said Rex was powerful and presented his issues well.

"It was so interactive, so people here could participate, people in their homes could participate -- I thought it was outstanding," she said.

Robby Roach, principal of Clinton High School in Laurens County, said he has seen Rex speak five or six times, and was impressed.

"The message is always consistent," Roach said. "He has consistently touted school choice and tax reform, and those are two things that I agree with him on."

The event was part of the third day of events at the Summer Leadership Institute, an annual professional development conference sponsored by the school administrators association.

Contact MONIQUE NEWTON at 626-0310.

Newstex ID: 36009233