In 2011 the Education Action Team renamed itself the Covenant Schools Team (an organizing effort towards school and parent-family engagement)…

Based on the successful Alliance Schools Model (particularly with Austin Interfaith in Texas), CHANGE is organizing parents from two key Title-1 schools in the community (Petree Elementary School and North Hills Elementary School). CHANGE members are walking through neighborhoods developing deeper relationships with parents. Parents will go through training, orientation (a parent university), and will establish regular meetings with the school principal and classroom educators. CHANGE member institutions not already adopting a school will be asked to focus their energy on these Covenant Schools.

Click link for: CHANGE Education Timeline

Our History in Public Education

• In 2004, more than 150 leaders walked through every public school in the district and met with most principals to document equity needs in the Winston-Salem/ Forsyth County School System. CHANGE was the first Industrial Areas Foundation affiliate to successfully audit all schools in its local school system.

• As a result of the audit, Superintendent Don Martin took action to fix 56 health and safety items, worked with school staff to create baseline equity standards and committed to allot 50% of the next school bond to renovate or replace older schools.

• In 2005 when the school system proposed an $80 million school bond that would mainly build new schools, CHANGE turned out 400 people to ask the school board to include 50% of the bond funds to renovate or replace older schools. Subsequently, the school board voted to postpone the bond.

• In 2006 CHANGE leaders worked with school officials to craft a more equitable bond that met CHANGE’s standard of 50% for renovations and replacements for older schools. As a result, a $250 million school bond passed. Some of those renovations and replacements are now in progress.

• In 2007 CHANGE partnered with others to create a Community Bond Oversight Committee. We secured a commitment from Superintendent Martin to co-sponsor an annual public forum regarding the progress of the 2006 bond projects, which is ongoing.

• In 2008 CHANGE collected more than 10,000 signatures from citizens calling for non-partisan school board elections in Forsyth County. The campaign, titled “Kids Not Politics,” engaged members in the political process and led hundreds of leaders to meet with elected officials in Raleigh. Though state law has mandated non-partisan school boards since the 1970s, Forsyth has been operating under a local exemption. At the Fall 2008 delegates assembly, elementary school kids and teens presented the petitions to state legislators, who pledged to craft and introduce a bill to remove the exemption.

In March 2009, CHANGE held its first ever “Relational Day at the Capital” in Raleigh. Hundreds of CHANGE members met with nearly every member of the state legislature to increase our relationships with lawmakers. Some CHANGE leaders even had the opportunity to testify before House and Senate committees. For many, it was their first time speaking with an elected official at the state level. Leaders were particularly excited to discuss H-833, a bill that CHANGE leaders had written making school board elections in Forsyth County non-partisan and staggering the terms for board members so not all would be elected at the same time. Though state law has mandated non-partisan school boards since the 1970s, Forsyth has been operating under a local exemption. HB 833 passed just before the legislative session ended and school board elections are now non-partisan.

• In 2008 CHANGE conducted a spot-check audit of 14 schools – a major follow-up after four years to CHANGE’s initial audit of every school in the system. That earlier audit had led to a bond issue to replace or renovate several schools and the creation of baseline equity standards. Using those standards, the CHANGE teams determined that 13 of the 14 schools met the standards provided and reflected a “reasonable degree of equity.” However, the reviewers found the circumstances at Griffith Academy “disturbing and distressing.” They were concerned not only about the condition of facilities but also about the students who were sent there and the resources available to operate the school. CHANGE conducted a day-long public hearing on Education at the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship, which revealed the need for changes in school policies on discipline, including limitations on the number of students assigned to disciplinary settings like Griffith Academy.