Retired educator Patricia Saylor still thinks back to the day in May 2018 when tens of thousands of North Carolina educators marched to the state legislature in Raleigh. Teachers carried hand-painted signs that demanded better pay, stronger school funding, and pro-public school policies.
The memory Saylor says is burned into her mind is of standing in the sun among a dense crowd of teachers outside the legislative building, as lawmakers stood peering out the glass windows above them.
"I remember looking at these legislators and staffers, all men, all looking out their window and kind of pointing and laughing or smiling like they were just dismissive of the power of this group," Saylor said. "It didn't intimidate them at all. It didn't make them hesitate."
Years later, Saylor says many educators feel the state's public school funding and education policies haven't improved. That has inspired her and others to take a new strategy to seek change in Raleigh.
This fall, a group calling themselves NC Educators on the Ballot is urging current and former educators to run for office to challenge incumbent state lawmakers in next year's Republican primary elections. Saylor has become a lead organizer for the group.
"We were marching then, but now we're running for their seats," Saylor said.
NC Educators on the Ballot forms and begins recruiting candidates
The conversation began on a Facebook group called NC Teachers United that has 46,000 members. In July, Saylor suggested in the group that educators run for seats in the state legislature, and the post received 90 responses from people willing to help.
Saylor is a retired educator who worked at Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools and Durham Public Schools, but she was seeking out potential candidates from around the state, especially those in Republican-leaning legislative districts. She is not running for office for her district in Durham.
"Because for so many seats, the only path to Raleigh is through the Republican primaries, that's where we needed to go," Saylor said.
Now with a working group of organizers and a website, North Carolina Educators on the Ballot describes itself as a grassroots movement that's seeking to make state funding for public education a major election issue.
"It gives us an opportunity earlier in the primary to make this into an issue that I hope will follow to the general election," Saylor said. "We've said to candidates who don't think they can win: 'You may or may not win, but you can still have an impact.'"
The group has eight candidates who have declared their intent to run for House seats across the state, and Saylor says they have about 45 more current or retired educators who are seriously considering running for office.
"This is only the beginning" says one candidate
Lisa Espy, a school counselor in New Hanover County Schools, is one of the educators who responded to Saylor's callout for volunteers.
"We've lost federal money. We've lost state money. Local governments aren't giving enough," Espy said. "They're not hearing us. They're not getting it. Maybe it's time we get in the seat."
Espy is the vice chair of the New Hanover County Association of Educators, and has used her experience with the association to reach out to other educators. She helps with data and outreach.
One challenge the group has faced is that the annual pay for a state lawmaker is $14,000 a year. That's been a barrier to some teachers who would like to run for office but can't afford it. So the group is also recruiting educators who are retired or are nearing retirement.
Another challenge, Saylor says, is finding candidates to run in Republican primaries and ensuring they're registered as Republicans within 90 days before official candidate filing begins in December — a requirement to run for a party's ticket in the primary.
For example, Polk County Schools band director Christopher Wilson has declared his intent to run for a Republican-leaning House seat that represents Henderson County. Wilson says he was previously registered as unaffiliated, but is changing his party registration to Republican to run in the primary. Wilson says he does not consider himself particularly aligned with either party, but he was willing to change his registration to run for the party that typically holds power in his district.
"I always vote my conscience," Wilson said. Meanwhile, he says Republicans in his district have urged him to drop out of the race, arguing he's not a true Republican. Wilson says that makes him more motivated to run.
Saylor says other candidates in their group do consider themselves Republicans, but may feel disillusioned with the party.
"One candidate who's running said that she was a longtime Republican who had left the party a few years ago and registered as unaffiliated," Saylor said. "She commented to me that she would really like to see people like her reclaim the Republican Party."
Regardless of whether he and other candidates succeed in unseating incumbents, Wilson says he hopes NC Educators on the Ballot is beginning a movement that will return each election cycle to get voters talking about public education.
"We're going to make an impact, "Wilson said. "This is just the beginning."
