What's the cost of new CPCC high schools?

Update: CMS has now posted applications that include budgets of $5.2 million for the first five years for each new school. That includes the value of tuition-free college courses the students are expected to take.  See the Harper proposal here and the Levine proposal here.

The school board is scheduled to vote tonight on creating two new "middle college" high schools on Central Piedmont Community College campuses.

But do members know how much money they're signing off to spend?  Under "fiscal implications,"  the agenda lists modular classrooms,  textbooks, principal and faculty.  But there are no dollar amounts.

Maybe I'm being picky here,  but I didn't think  "fiscal implications"  was supposed to be a yes-or-no question.  I thought the point was to disclose and discuss how much public money is at stake.

When Heath Morrison was hired to lead Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools last summer,  he promised transparency.  When the board held a retreat last September,  most members said they had done a poor job of examining all the implications of their decisions and vowed to do better.

So what's up with the new small schools on the Levine and Harper campuses?  Is the board going to approve applications for the state's cooperative innovative high school program without knowing how much it costs to launch these schools?  Or is CMS withholding the information from the public?

On Friday and again on Monday, I emailed Board Chair Mary McCray,  Deputy Superintendent Ann Clark and Communication Chief Kathryn Block to ask about the cost and why it's not on the agenda.  Monday evening I got this explanation from Clark, still without specifics:  "The costs  associated with this program are funded from the local career technical education budget to cover textbooks and bus passes. Staffing is assigned based on the number of students and the state pays for a principal as long as the student count exceeds 100 students."

Morrison has been talking about expanding the middle college model for some time.  There are good reasons for cloning the approach that debuted with Cato Middle College High in 2007. But I have yet to hear the board conduct an in-depth public discussion of the pros,  cons,  costs and benefits of creating two more school that will serve about 200 juniors and seniors each.  Maybe they've held those talks privately,  or maybe it happened in a public forum I missed.  It seems like the kind of thing taxpayers,  employees and families might want to hear.

Happy anniversary, school board

I was pestering board Chair Eric Davis with what seemed like the millionth question about Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools' monster review of student assignment on Tuesday when it hit me: It's just one year since he and four other board members were elected.

Davis, Rhonda Lennon, Richard McElrath, Joyce Waddell and Tim Morgan were all voted onto the school board -- and to their first elected office -- this time a year ago. And what a year it's been.

Say what you will about this crew, but you can't call them slackers. They've plunged into what seems like a nonstop season of budget cuts, tackled some major policy issues and pushed through the current quest to revamp schools. They've created a schedule of meetings that's hard for me to keep up with, and it's my full-time job. Some of them have full-time jobs apart from the board, as well as young children to care for.

And they do seem committed to tackling tough issues with dignity. They've clashed with each other and with constituents over race, class and how to educate children, but they haven't resorted to ugliness, at least from what I've seen.

For the most part, citizens have responded in kind. For all the pain and anger floating around the proposed school closings, it's been inspiring to watch high-school students ask questions that would make a reporter proud. Parents and teachers have brought in-depth research and well-told stories to the table.

I couldn't help grinning last night when an adult speaker at Olympic High said his mother had seen him on TV speaking at a previous forum and was distressed by his behavior. He apologized, and explained how he'd been caught up in the heat of the moment.

"My points were valid," he said. "My tone was not."

What a great example of admitting a mistake while standing firm on what's important. I suspect everyone will need to take a deep breath and regroup after Tuesday's vote, however it turns out.

Because as demanding as this year as been, all signs point to a rockier one ahead.