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Public hearings are starting soon on the Wake schools reassignment plan. Where do you stand?

Read the story here. What do you think about this decision?

The Wake County school board has tentatively agreed to changes today affecting more than 1,000 students as part of a plan that will send more than 10,000 students to different schools this fall. Read the story at newsobserver.com. Discuss the issue here.

Wake County commissioners shocked school leaders last weekend by saying they want to put the next bond issue on the ballot this year instead of 2008 or 2009 as originally planned. Read the story at newsobserver.com. Discuss it here.

The Raleigh City Council approves a new policy that will allow middle schools to qualify for a school crossing guard. Until now, with one exception, the city has only placed guards at elementary schools. Read this story at newsobserver.com. Discuss it here.

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More than 22,000 students quit high school in North Carolina last year, the largest number of dropouts in the state since the 1999-2000 school year. Dropouts last year numbered slightly more than 5 percent of all high schoolers in the state -- a four-year high, according to figures released Wednesday by the state Department of Public Instruction. The jump comes even as the state has focused more sharply on high school improvements that include efforts to keep more students in school. Read the story at newsobserver.com. Comment on

Wake County school board members agreed today to consider requesting a bond issue this fall as a possible way to eliminate mandatory year-round schools. Read the story at newsobserver.com and discuss it here.

The Wake County school board dropped some proposed changes to its student reassignment plan this morning in preparation for a final vote this afternoon. Several of the changes were based on comments made by parents at a public hearing on Monday. (Story link.) What do you think?

I will have students in two different high schools on the traditional calendar next year, and another child in year round elementary school -- or not, since technically the calendar issue is still in play. If the Board does override the County Commissioners and switch to year round, the overwhelming demand for track 4 at the elementary school guarantees that most of us will get stuck with a schedule that conflicts badly with the traditional calendar.

In twelve years of Wake County education, the one thing I have come to count on is that my family's needs will be the board's lowest priority.

The Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools has released four student-reassignment plans for the opening of Elementary School No. 10 in August 2008. The plans would move a quarter of the district's nearly 5,000 elementary school students and can be viewed at the district Web site, www.chccs.k12.nc.us.

ARE YOU AFFECTED BY THE PROPOSED REDISTRICTING MAPS? If so, please tell us what you think about the plans here.

Cary News sports editor Tim Candon believes the NCHSAA should modify its playoff formatting and has redesigned the 4-A girls' basketball playoff based on his formula.

• Read Tim's column:

How useful are national rankings of universities and colleges?

Which Triangle area high school boys and girls basketball teams are the best ever? Discuss it here (or click here to send your picks directly to our Sports Department for an upcoming story.)

The N.C. Board of Education just released statewide graduation rates. The highlights: 68 percent of all of the state's high school freshmen graduated four years later. In the Triangle, the numbers are better:

• Chapel Hill-Carrboro: 90.2 percent
• Wake County: 82.6 percent
• Johnston County: 74.5 percent
• Durham County: 68.8 percent
• Chatham County: 67.1 percent
• Orange County: 66.5 percent

So what do you think schools ought to do ensure that more students graduate? Weigh in