NC NAACP Leaders and Coalition Partners to Hold News Conference and Deliver Open Letter to Speaker of the House and President Pro Tem against the Corporate-Sponsored School Voucher Program and Efforts to Defund Public Education

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

June 11, 2012

For More Information:             Rev. Dr. William J. Barber, II, President, 919-394-8137

Mrs. Amina Turner, Executive Director, 919-682-4700

For Media Assistance:             Rob Stephens, 336-577-9335 

NC NAACP Leaders and Coalition Partners to Hold News Conference and Deliver Open Letter to Speaker of the House and President Pro Tem against the Corporate-Sponsored School Voucher Program and Efforts to Defund Public Education

            DURHAM - Dr. Tim Tyson, Duke University professor and Chair of the NC NAACP Education Committee, Atty. Gene Nichol, Director of the UNC Center on Poverty, Work and Opportunity, Dr. Jarvis Hall, Director of the Institute for Civic Engagement and Social Change at NC Central University, Atty. Melinda Lawrence, Executive Director of the NC Justice Center and other partners will join Rev. Dr. William J. Barber, II, president of the North Carolina State Conference of the NAACP in a news conference on Monday afternoon to challenge the corporate-sponsored school voucher program brought before the General Assembly this week by the right wing extremist leadership.

            The news conference will begin at 1:00 PM on Monday, June 11, 2012 on the sidewalk outside the General Assembly.

"Our General Assembly leadership should be focusing on the promises of our Constitution, guaranteeing every child in North Carolina a high-quality, constitutional, well-funded, diverse public education," said Dr. Barber. "Instead, the current leadership continues to show a pre-meditated disdain for public education. In less than one term, they have massively defunded public education and driven North Carolina almost to the bottom."

He continued, "And now they are proposing a deceptive voucher scheme that will allow corporations to benefit from tax breaks by giving money to private schools. This new effort reveals an emboldened form of anti-public education fanaticism that has no shame in its commitment to tearing down public schools. If this is allowed, we will look back one day with deep regret at the harm it has caused our children and our state."

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Founded in 1909, the NAACP is the nation's oldest and largest civil rights organization. Its members throughout the United States and the world are the premier advocates for civil rights in their communities, conducting voter mobilization and monitoring equal opportunity in the public and private sectors.