The Sampson County Board of Education rejected a motion earlier this week to approve an Opportunity Culture Advance Teaching Roles grant, which would have brought approximately $877,000 in state funding to the school system without requiring local taxpayer dollars. Daryll Warren and Glenn Faison voted to approve the motion; Jennifer Naylor, Michael Elmore, James Jones and Krystin M. McPhail all voted against the measure.
Following the 4-2 vote, Faison requested members revisit the discussion at the regular July 27 meeting since fellow member Eleanor Bradshaw was absent from the Monday meeting. Members agreed to do so.
“I think anytime we can provide coaching, feedback, and support to teachers, that’s what’s necessary,” noted county schools Superintendent Dr. Jamie King about his support of the grant.
“ATR allows teachers to get feedback from a teacher that’s shown high effectiveness and high student data. It provides an economic impact to our local community by providing stipends for teachers who are teaching more kids or helping to coach teachers. All that comes from the state — that’s not any local funds. To me, ATR is a huge push in our district to improve and increase teacher effectiveness, provide better support and different career opportunities, so I hope that the board reconsiders where we’re currently at with ATR and the movement of that forward.”
Naylor, school board vice chairwoman, explained why she voted against the ATR grant.
“I was in public education for 13 years, and the last six of the 13, I served as a high school assistant principal. … (as) a board member, starting year three, I try to look at things from all different aspects.
“A hard question that I always try to ask is whether it’s the right idea for our district at this time, with the resources that we have…is it right for us, then is it right for the time, and then what kind of resources do we have to implement it.
She said colleague Krystin McPhail’s question to King about whether there was data to support the effectiveness of the grant was something she had wanted to know and planned to ask. “I really appreciate Dr. King’s honesty. He simply said it’s early, and we don’t…but as a board member, I’m sitting her and I’m thinking, ‘Do we continue this when we don’t have any measurable results that can be provided, and look at not only continuing it, but expanding it.”
Naylor attested that she wants to do what’s right, and it keeps her up at night weighing issues.
“When you’re looking at math, English, science, and things like that, this program is going to support, we have qualified candidates that don’t qualify for this position because they’re new… When we’re placing this (program) into the school, we’re setting expectations that they (the teachers) have certain data and they’re a certain type of teacher for the experience. That looks great on paper, but then it’s tied our hands where we’re not able to hire certified teachers to get them into classrooms, and it’s already difficult to fill those spots… We’re ultimately looking at how we’re going to handle higher class sizes, and this grant, from what I’ve seen, puts more on higher class sizes, and I’m not for that.”
Naylor said that, for her, every decision goes back to the kids.
“What does this look like in a classroom, and what does this look like for the teacher, because I’ve been there… The last few years, even before I was on the board, there was a big push to add instructional coaches to all of our schools, and I have questions around this model and how it overlaps with the instructional coaches.
And, Naylor pointed out, grant money ultimately runs out.
” The last thing I want to do as a former educator is throw another program out there where it’s something else that’s thrown on our teachers’ plates that they have to learn, and then it goes away because the money goes away,” she attested.
“I know on paper, it looks like we’re turning away $877,000, and it looks like it’s going all to the teachers, but when you do some research, you’ll see that that’s not necessarily the case. As I reviewed the grant documents, I’ve learned a lot about funding support, where all it’s going, how it’s getting contracted to services, and it’s not all going to teacher supplements. As a board member, I believe I have a responsibility to understand where every taxpayer-funded dollar is going for a program, and if it’s right for Sampson County.”
Naylor mentioned her opposition to the grant wasn’t something new, noting it was presented last year and she has consistently voted no because of the concerns she has.
“My biggest hope is that people will understand that it is not being for or against just one program. It’s about asking the same questions that I think our taxpayers would expect a board member to ask: does it work, is it sustainable, and is it the best fit for our district? While there’s research that shows this works for big districts in the state, that’s very different than the realities we’re facing in rural Sampson County, and is it ultimately here to help our students here in Sampson County?”
In other matters, school board members agreed to remove up to $300,000 from the fund balance in order to balance the 2026-27 fiscal plan, without any additional cuts.
“Educational institutions, being public entities, are required to have a balanced budget that we start July 1 with. Our board had discussed multiple cut options. Back in April or May, we began discussions with the board,” King told.
It was determined that around $300,000 needed to be cut. King elaborated that extensive conversations were held about which different areas could be cut to get to that number. The school board also listened to feedback from principals on some thoughts and ideas. King explained how the board came to a decision.
“Ultimately, since it’s now kind of after July 1, and we have the approved state budget and understand all of those implications, we felt like, because of the amount of vacant positions that we typically have throughout the year, we would have at least a $300,000 savings at the end of the 2026-27 school year. So I made the recommendation, and the board approved, that we take $300,000 out of our fund balance, with the thought that we will have at least $300,000 surplus at the end of the year.”
The superintendent stressed that the school board does not simply view vacancies as savings opportunities.
“Because we’re a public entity, you have to submit a balanced budget, and so although we know that this year we had over $500,000 savings from unfilled positions, that’s a savings for the district… We’ve never used that as a cost-savings mechanism necessarily, to not fill a position, because we need people…but, we felt like — just knowing where we traditionally are every year — if we said we would take $300,000 out of fund balance, we felt pretty comfortable that we would be putting at least $300,000 back in at the end of this current school year.”
King clarified that on July 27, the board will actually adopt the 2026-2027 budget, with one line item that will say ‘$300,000 from fund balance’ so that the budgets are balanced.
The school board also discussed and approved the Panorama contract, which was first brought to members last month. Panorama is an educational data platform that district leaders have said can effectively aid teachers and principals in identifying students who may be struggling by gathering multiple forms of student information together in one place. It was required for all schools to choose an educational data platform for the school year, and the school board was encouraged to decide as soon as possible to allow time for all student information to be properly integrated onto the platform.
“We hope that we’ll be able to have access to all of it and our student data by the first day of school,” King said optimistically.
The new Hobbton High School contract was also approved by the Board of Education and the Sampson County Board of Commissioners.
“We’ll start construction probably in a couple of weeks,” King commented, explaining that some things have to happen first before construction can officially begin. “We’ve got to put a fence around for security; we’ll get some equipment moved over there, but really, probably by the time school starts, there will be some movement on that site.”
King added that there will most likely be a groundbreaking ceremony in September.