Wake students excel

Regarding the Jan. 11 article “Wake schools criticize letter grades for schools”: Amy Auth and Sen. Phil Berger apparently failed to do their homework before commenting on the Wake County school board’s commitment to improving education for all students in Wake County, the largest school system in the state.

Wake County students have improved reading and math scores on state standardized exams for the past four years, and 2011-12 results were 3.6 percent and 6.2 percent above state averages, respectively. Wake County has increased its graduation rate along with all of North Carolina and is working on greater improvements in graduation and dropout rates, by implementing innovative data-driven programs to achieve continuous improvement for its 150,000 students with diverse needs and abilities.

In truth, Wake County students have outperformed the legislature and elected officials as students have achieved these above-average results with per-pupil funding that is 102nd out of 115 N.C. school systems – in a state where per-pupil funding ranks 44th out of 50 states.

Imagine what these students and teachers could accomplish if they were funded in the top 25 percent, which is where they rank academically.

Amy Lee

Raleigh