How does the NC General Assembly celebrate National Teacher Appreciation Week? They pass a bill that undermines academic freedom and punishes creative teaching, of course. Sounds about right to us.

Use this form to send a letter now telling your NC Senator to vote against HB 755 and vote against teacher abuse!

House Bill 755, creatively titled “Academic Transparency”, passed the House Wednesday afternoon and will be sent to the Senate next week. This completely unnecessary and unimaginably burdensome law would require teachers and school districts to post online a comprehensive list of all teaching, classroom and assignment materials used by every teacher in every class session.

Every single book, article, video clip, song, webpage, or even any assignment or assessment would have to be documented, organized, collected and posted to the web. Every. Single. One. And to what end? So right-wing conservatives can cherry-pick examples of “liberal indoctrination”? So that legislators who have not taught a day in their lives can bully and undermine our professionalism? Not on our watch.

These Trojan Horse attacks on public education are happening all across the country, and North Carolina is not immune. Teachers need more time to focus on helping their students recover from a pandemic, not bogged down logging materials into spreadsheets to accommodate the overreaching leadership of the General Assembly.

Meaningless mandates like this do nothing to improve the quality of education, but instead undermine the professionalism of educators who have been working hard day in and day out through a global pandemic with the most limited of resources.

A recent poll found an overwhelming number of North Carolinians, nearly 70%, think that public school educators are doing a great job. Educators need time to plan for the many, varied needs of students. They do not need politically motivated obstacles thrown their way as they do the hard work of educating students under already difficult conditions.

Tell the Senate that North Carolina will not stand for yet another law that disrespects teachers and further undermines their ability to do their jobs.