Two years ago, the 50,000-student Clayton County school system in suburban Atlanta became the first district in the country to lose accreditation in nearly 40 years.
Families subsequently bolted to other districts, the school system lost funding, real estate values dropped, and the state's Republican governor removed four of seven school board members.
"People were scared to death," said James E. Bostic Jr., a member of the State Board of Education in Georgia. "They lost something like 3,300 kids. It was a killer."
Now, the accrediting agency whose examination of the Clayton County school board set all that chaos in motion has turned its eyes on Wake County. The coming review is unusual; the organization, AdvancED, accredits 27,000 schools in 5,000 school systems nationwide and takes a hard look at specific local school board governance issues just two to four times a year, said AdvancED CEO Mark Elgart.
"Our goal is to help ensure that the Wake County public schools serve the best interest of the students and provide the best possible education," Elgart said.
A loss of accreditation can hurt a student's ability to get into college. In some states, like Florida and California, public universities will only accept students who graduated from an accredited high school. Some scholarships require recipients to hold diplomas from accredited high schools, and some public and private institutions factor in accreditation when evaluating applications, Elgart said.
"It would certainly raise a red flag," said Anthony Brooks, director of undergraduate admissions at N.C. Central University. "It's extremely important."
A special review team from AdvancED, the parent organization of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, plans to review all major policy changes adopted by the new Wake County school board majority, including abandoning the socioeconomic diversity policy.
The review will be AdvancED's second in North Carolina in the past 18 months. The agency is examining the Burke County school board's management of public meetings, the questionable termination of a superintendent's contract and other concerns.
In Clayton County, just south of Atlanta, the accrediting agency found a dysfunctional school board that "conspired to discredit each other through unethical conduct, intentional lies and deceitful actions," according to an August 2008 report.
The county is one of three Georgia school districts, including another in suburban Atlanta, that have been targeted for intense scrutiny by AdvancED. In both Clayton and Warren counties, Republican Gov. Sonny Perdue removed school board members.
Clayton County's accreditation was yanked for 18 months. It has regained it provisionally, but AdvancED is conducting progress checks every six months for two years to monitor improvements.
"By no means have they resolved everything," Elgart said. "But they are making progress."
Staff writer Thomas Goldsmith contributed to this story.
