Vocational education's occupational hazard.

• Author: Payton, Kathy
• Position: State budget cuts' effect on education

Everybody in North Carolina's educational establishment is screaming bloody murder about state budget cuts, but the cries from those in vocational education might be the shrillest around. After all, they've had plenty of practice complaining about doing a lot with a little.

"We are constantly fighting for our survival," says Loretta M. Martin, a consultant in the vocational-education division of the state's Department of Public Instruction.

The vocational-education folks in public schools contend that they made do with a pittance long before the budget-cutting machine went to work. Why, they ask, did vocational education get only about 5% of the $3.9 billion the state spent on public education during the 1989-90 school year, when 66% of students in grades 7 through 12 took at least one vocational course?

Meanwhile, the community-college system, the state's other bastion of vocational education, is also wailing about how cheap the General Assembly is. North Carolina once led the nation with its innovative community colleges. Now, the state spends a measly $3,300 per student, a third less than the national average, according to a 1989 study.

Community colleges need $135 million over a six-year period, they cry. The General Assembly, which has heard the howls from all quarters, essentially agrees that community colleges need more than they're getting. But in May, the colleges were still waiting for a check.

Can we really afford to write off half of our citizens?" asks Commissioner of Labor john C. Brooks. "Every year that goes by, we do less, not more, in vocational education."

So why does vocational education get short shrift? It has no united voice. With responsibility split among junior highs, high schools, community colleges and the Department of Labor, which oversees an apprenticeship program, it's not surprising that these groups have trouble focusing on common goals.

But Brooks says the state can't keep pretending there's not a problem. The proof is all around, he says. Recently, Brooks climbed aboard an elevator in High Point. During the slow trip to the next floor, he glanced at the steel-framed inspection certificate bearing his own signature. Although elevators are required by law to be inspected every six months, the certificate was dated 1987.

Blame the legislature, Brooks says. The state hasn't had a formal training program for elevator inspectors for the past 20 years, he says, "and we let the legislature know that, and the...