Khem Irby is proud of the things she and others on the Guilford County Board of Education have been able to accomplish in the last few years.
Irby, a Democrat who has been on the school board since 2018, is running for re-election in District 6 this year. She faces opponent Chris Gillespie in the primary election, which began with early voting on Feb. 12 and runs through the end of the month. The primary election will be held March 3. She has been endorsed by the Guilford County Association of Educators.
Her wins include opening up new schools, recovering from the pandemic, hiring a new superintendent, and shifting the school board to be majority Democrat.
“I think that’s a success for us when it comes to education,” Irby said. “Especially when it comes to how education is now.”
A former after-school care teacher, ACES, at Pearce Elementary School, Irby said she’s a public school advocate and co-chairs Dignity in Schools, a national campaign that challenges the school-to-prison-pipeline.
“I’ve been doing this over 25 years,” she said of her public education advocacy work. “I think that’s what really sets me apart.”
Challenges remain within the school district, Irby said.
She pointed to opportunity gaps between children of color and their peers, the bus driver shortage, and the big one: the state’s increasing voucher program.
In the last few years, the state has dramatically increased funding for voucher programs, which allow parents to send their kids to private and charter schools. That pulls money out of public education and hurts all aspects of the school district, Irby said.
“It’s about addressing teacher pay, pay for staff, and a pay scale for workers in North Carolina,” she said. “Most teachers work two or three jobs.”
While there’s not much the local school board can do about the state’s diversion of public education funding, Irby said, they can work to shift the messaging around school choice.
“I think we’re going to have to build a different narrative around public schools,” she said. “There’s a narrative that public schools are failing. That was the narrative that was sold. That public schools are not providing choice. But we need to build on the fact that Guilford County has provided choice.”
She points to how the district is expanding programs to allow students to receive college credits while still in high school.
“We’re doing school choice differently,” she said. “Our students and families are learning about those programs from an earlier time. They’re learning about careers and opportunities.”
She also pointed out how charter and private schools are not held to the same standards as public schools, which can hurt the child’s education. Meanwhile, in Guilford County schools, they work to educate all children, including newcomers and immigrant children.
“We serve so many students from around the globe,” she said. “We have two newcomer schools. We serve a whole international community.”
She also noted the exceptional learners schools the district offers.
“Charter schools and private schools do not offer that option,” she said. “We have to educate every child. We are offering more choice in Guilford County.”
To continue to advocate for public schools, Irby said, she wants to work to cap the number of charter and private schools that can open in the district. As the legislative chair for the school board, Irby said she’s developed relationships with state lawmakers and can work with colleagues across the aisle to champion public schools.
Irby is also concerned with school safety. She supports having scanners in schools, but said that safety is more than that.
“Safety has to be about the whole child,” she said.
Connecting with students and empowering them has to be part of the strategy, she said.
“Students are the ones that keep each other safe,” she said. “Because they know their peers. I think on a certain level, our students, their voice, is what we need to be paying attention to.”
With regards to the bus driver shortage and transportation gaps, Irby said she wants every principal to have a commercial driver’s license.
“They’ve already said they don’t like that suggestion,” Irby said, laughing. “But I told them that, or we have to go back to letting students drive buses again.”
Originally from New York, seeing the lack of public transportation was a big shock for her. If the district could help pay for more kids—particularly those in high school—to take public buses, that would free up the school bus drivers to focus on just elementary and middle school kids.
But she knows it’s not a simple task.
“It’s not an easy fix,” she said.
Still, she said, cooperation with other members of the school board as well as members of the county commission in recent years has made things easier.
Since 2018, the county commissioners and school board members have worked together on the joint capital/facilities committee to discuss how best to rebuild or renovate old schools. That’s been beneficial to both boards, said Irby, who joined the committee in 2022.
“Each group is learning more,” she said.
If re-elected, Irby said, she’s going to stay the course and continue to work on the projects she’s passionate about for the district. She wants to advocate for more public school funding at the state level, fight for better facilities, and encourage early access to career and college development.
“I’m passionate about this work,” she said. “And I just know that I’m the best qualified to continue serving our community.”
Correction: The original version of this article misstated the end date for early voting. It also mischaracterized one of the candidate’s initiatives. It has been updated.
