Wake County school board member Keith Sutton has been elected to the 16-member steering committee of the National School Boards Association’s Council of Urban Boards of Education (CUBE).
Sutton was elected to CUBE’s steering committee at NSBA’s recently concluded annual conference in Nashville. Tenn. In a press release Thursday, NSBA notes Sutton’s “extensive work in the areas of partnership management, diversity and inclusion, public affairs, and government and community relations.”
According to CUBE, it “supports urban school boards and fosters effective leadership for excellence and equity in public education, with a specific focus on underrepresented students. CUBE provides educational opportunities that engage urban school districts and district leaders, working through their state school boards associations, while addressing challenges in urban centers.”
CUBE gave Wake an award in 2009 for “demonstrating progress in educating children and acting as role models for excellence in school board governance.” CUBE had cited Wake’s policy of promoting socioeconomic diversity in student assignment.
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The CUBE award came as the board was poised to switch to a Republican majority, pending the outcome of the run-off election that would seat John Tedesco. Then-school board chairman Kevin Hill had taken the unusual step of stepping down from the board table to talk about the award.
“Making diversity one of the criteria for providing healthy schools across our county has helped us to attract excellent educators to all of our schools and brought academic opportunity to every corner of our community,” Hill said at an October 2009 board meeting about the CUBE award.
Critics of the CUBE award said it was a waste of time and taxpayer money.
The Republican board majority pulled Wake out of CUBE and NSBA, a decision that was later reversed by the current Democratic board majority.
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