How can one teach what one does not know? | Eastern North Carolina Now

By:  Hood Richardson

This is one of those statements that the answer the question begs is accepted as being true on the face of it.  I did a little research and discovered there has been very little philosophical work or challenge to this statement. 

The Beaufort County School Board, in an effort to stifle public comment, enacted a set of “policies” that fully puts them in control of complaints made by the public. The policies go like this:  No member of the public is allowed to speak during public comments unless the subject is already an agenda item.  There can be only four speakers during the public comment period which lasts only 12 minutes.  How many people know what is going to be on a school board agenda until the meeting starts? 

Is it any wonder than that most people do not feel welcome to present this views to the board.

Apparently, the only reason public comments are allowed by this School Board is “the Constitution says so” (Note the First Amendment’s Freedom of Speech and the Right to petition for a redress of grievances) and there is legislation, based on the constitution, that says the public has a right to speak.

Thus, if the board controls the subject upon which a speaker wishes to comment but it is not on the agenda then that person’s Free Speech has been abridged.  The limitation of the amount of time is contextual.  That is, whether restricting a speaker to three minutes is directly related to the context of the comments.  If the information cannot reasonably be conveyed in three minutes then it is incumbent on the chair, or upon appeal to the full board, to allow more time, sufficient for a reasonable person to convey essential information.  A good chairman would ask the person, when the three minutes is exhausted, how much more time they anticipate needing to present information the board needs but has not heard up until that point.  A judgment is then made by the chair and if the speaker appeals that decision to full board.  For purposes of creating a solid record, the chair must state for the record why additional time will not be granted.  That reason(s) must not be arbitrary or capricious and it is the duty of the chair to explain the reasoning sufficient to rebut a charge that a fundamental right was abridged.  The standard the courts would apply is a “compelling reason.”  “It’s just our policy…” is clearly not sufficient.

This position of the Beaufort County School Board and its Superintendent, is major “control freak policy”.  The Constitution says we have the right to petition our government.  The Constitution does not say when, how or that the subject must be acceptable to the governing body.  Kings and dictators only allow what they want to hear to be said in front of them.  Unless the school board decides the petition is something they want to hear, whatever is troubling the public will stay buried forever. 

Is this what the founding fathers intended?  I do not think so.  Considering the Attorney General of the United States, Merrick Garland, decided to declare parents petitioning school boards to be subject to the same laws used against foreign violent enemies, maybe our School Board is right in tune with the socialists and communists.

School systems are supposed to teach about the founding fathers, the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the American Revolution, historical heroes and the causes that drove our forefathers to take up arms against the King. This is all pretty basic stuff.   Lately there has been a lot of concern about what is really being taught in our public school systems, all over the United States.  The simple fact is that what should be taught is not being taught.  It would appear to me that the School Board ought to teach these principles by adhering to them in their public meetings.

Any person with minimal training in American Democracy would never have voted for this policy.  This brings us back to “If you do not know it you cannot teach it.”  How could this School Board ever supervise, or oversee the teaching of American Democracy?  This single policy proves their lack of knowledge to serve the public.

During the past two months the Beaufort County Conservative Republican Club has invited the three School Board members who may be running for reelection during the 2022 elections to attend our meetings and speak.  .  We have used emails, made phone calls and sent letters.  In summary we are being ignored.  We invited Butch Oliver a Republican, Terry Williams a Republican and Michael Bilbro a Republican.  We are still waiting on an acknowledgement from them of our invitation. They still have a standing invitation to speak.

Registration for the 2022 School Board elections begins on December 6 of this year and ends on December 17.  Our club is looking for qualified conservative candidates, whom we can support.  We will never know how qualified or conservative any candidate is unless they show up at our meeting. 

To date John Lacava has announced his candidacy.  We will not know which district he will run in until redistricting is complete. 

We will continue to have the same kind of government, at all levels, we have today until we sort thru the pile of elected officials to determine who is truly conservative and who is not. 

I continue to advocate that all voters take a vow to only return 10 percent of the sitting politicians to office during the 2022 primaries and the general election in November of 2022.   If we do this, we will begin to change government.  You have nothing to lose in voting out 9 of every 10 elected officials.  Those in office got us into the miserable state we are now in.  Communist sympathizers seldom speak up for Christianity or the Constitution, which gives us a good starting point to screen any candidate.