The ABCs of NC school budgets: why more local districts face budgets that just don’t add up

Due South · Aug 14, 2025 · 50m

As the school year begins, the status of state and federal funding for our public schools remains murky while local funding for school districts seems increasingly fraught.

So how does school district budgeting work? Who holds levers of power to keep our schools operating? And why have school budgets – once something that many of us didn’t think about – become front page news for so many communities in recent years?

Due South co-host Jeff Tiberii and WUNC education reporter Liz Schlemmer are joined by a local school board member, a school district superintendent and CFO and a county…