Forsyth school board candidates claim CHANGE supports 'forced busing'

A palm card for Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Board of Education candidate Jeannie Metcalf circulating outside the RJ Reynolds High School polling location this afternoon stated that the Winston-Salem chapter of Communities Helping All Neighbors Gain Empowerment, or CHANGE, supports "forced busing" as a replacement for the current school choice plan.

"The CHANGE organization got our election changed to nonpartisan in order to replace our parental choice assignment plan with forced busing," the card reads. "If we lose 2 conservative incumbents in this election, forced busing will be back."
The card is signed, "Your conservative school board candidate for 16 years — Jeannie Metcalf."

On April 24, incumbent school board member AL "Buddy" Collins sent out a message on the social networking website Facebook that stated the following: "CHANGE is a community organization whose undeclared mission is to defeat the incumbent school board and replace incumbent school board members with members who advocate forced busing to achieve some predetermined ratio of poor students with non poor students."

Collins goes on to say that voters who believe in parental choice in school assignment should vote for him and Metcalf as well as incumbents Donny Lambeth, Jane Goins, Marilyn Parker, Jill Tackabery and Vic Johnson.

"If any three of these members are replaced with individuals supported by CHANGE then a return to forced busing school assignment plan inevitable," the message states.

Last year, CHANGE scored a monumental legislative victory when the NC General Assembly passed House Bill 833, which made Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Board of Education elections nonpartisan. Last month, CHANGE, a community organizing group composed of 54 local church congregations, released the results of its survey of school board incumbents and challengers regarding three initiatives dealing with comprehensive family engagement, ending the general practice of out-of-school suspension, and finding an alternative to the current student assignment or “school choice” plan.

According to the survey, Metcalf said she did not support the group's initiative to end the general practice of out-of-school suspension except in cases meeting strict safety criteria, nor did she support CHANGE's proposal to explore alternatives to the current student assignment plan to increase diversity and improve student achievement.Collins' answer to the out-of-school suspension question was deemed "unclear," and he said "no" to exploring alternatives to the student assignment plan.

Neither Collins nor Metcalf returned calls for this story.