There is at least one metric of your school system's impact on your community that you may never have seen.

The traditional view is that a more successful community will emerge when the local school system scores well in North Carolina's annual statewide ranking. At year's end, attention almost always turns to standardized test scores, graduation rates, and the number of graduates going on to higher education. If the scores go up, so does hope.

Many people fail to recognize that one in seven North Carolinians works in or attends a public K-12 school.

We have almost one and a half million K-12 public school students in North Carolina, spread over 100 counties.

And they are being disrespected by actions in Raleigh.

In 50 of North Carolina's 100 counties, the public K-12 school system is the largest employer in the county. And in 40 of the other 50 counties, school systems are among the top 3 employers in the county.

The economic impact of our state's public school system is enormous.

If your county did not have your local school system, your elected officials would likely consider requesting state funding to make a new entrance to the interstate or lowering corporate tax rates to encourage the recruitment of new, higher-paying employers.

That is not how the North Carolina legislature behaves toward your area's largest employer. Our state legislature's level of investing in staff and operating expenses in North Carolina K-12 public schools now ranks 49th in America.

Our state legislature apparently views K-12 education as an expense, not an investment in one of our state's largest employers.

There is another challenge facing these large local employers—their buildings are falling apart due to actions by the state legislature. The legislature has refused to use state funds to assist with the construction and maintenance of local school buildings.

The Environmental Protection Agency has found that about half of all school buildings in America are polluted inside, which lowers student learning at least one letter grade.

Our partner not-for-profit organization, The Pollution Detectives, has surveyed more than 800 North Carolina classrooms in recent years and has found the same thing. The 10 best-scoring schools in North Carolina have an average building age of 17.4 years, while the average age of the bottom 10 scoring schools is 55.6 years.

If you live in a low-income area, your school buildings are likely more than 50 years old, and your local economy does not have the resources to finance building upgrades or replacements. And those students who need the most support get the least.

And the biggest driver of the local economy, which needs the most state legislative economic support, is also getting the least.

There are signs of hope that our North Carolina legislature will address some of these issues this week.  Please follow their actions, and offer support to those who are working to solve this mess.