Language, culture and over 7,100 miles separate Eastern North Carolina from China, but a quote by Chinese economist Li Yining is as relevant among the rice fields of the People’s Republic as across the tobacco fields of this region: “The unbalanced distribution of education resources is one of the major reasons behind the excessive income gap between the urban and rural areas.”

Looking at this from a local perspective, the unbalanced distribution of education resources in counties involved in the ongoing Leandro lawsuit has produced a lost generation of children. We’re talking about thousands upon thousands of children in these five counties (Cumberland, Halifax, Hoke, Robeson and Vance) learning in school districts where the percentage of poor students passing end-of-grade tests decreased by 10 percent over the past decade, according to the state Department of Public Instruction (DPI).

The Leandro case involves the aforementioned counties suing the state claiming they did not have enough funding to provide an education equal to that of more affluent counties. Their argument was that “the quality of a child’s education ought not be dependent upon the wealth of the family and community into which that child was born,” according to a Duke Law School summary of the case.

Not only were these students barely passing end-of-grade tests in 2002, but they have continuously been denied the sound, basic education promised to them in our state constitution. This is no different in Sampson County, where only 60.5 percent of low-income students passed end-of-grade tests last school year compared to 80.3 percent of their more affluent peers, per DPI numbers. Such numbers paint a grim picture for this lost generation of students.

But there is one solution that has worked across North Carolina to remedy such a problem – public charter schools. These non-traditional schools are very popular within our state – 65 percent of voters favor them, according to a recent poll by the Civitas Institute and The Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice. But unfortunately, many students in rural counties have limited access to these schools - more than half of North Carolina’s 107 public charters are in the state’s 15 urban counties. Though the state Board of Education has approved 34 public charters this year, students in rural counties often lack the ability to attend these schools – just 13 public charters exist in the five Leandro areas and those surrounding them. None currently exist in Sampson County. However, families continue to demand more quality options for their children across our state as more than 30,000 remain on public charter waiting lists statewide.

To be clear, no one is advocating that public charter schools are somehow inherently better than traditional public schools. However, these schools are unique from traditional schools in that they can create their own curriculum and implement other measures such as longer school days and summer classes. Most importantly, these schools produce results – 65 percent of public charters met all of their state mandated benchmarks last school year compared to 46 percent of traditional schools, according to DPI. Over a quarter of all public charters were Honor Schools of Excellence in 2011-12 in contrast to 10 percent of traditional schools.

The combination of continued failing test scores for low-income students, the demand for quality educational options, plus limited access to quality schools has created a unique opportunity for leaders in Sampson County. This opportunity involves turning an unbalanced distribution of academic resources into effective solutions that will help reclaim a lost generation of our area’s most needy students by creating more public charter schools.

(Editor’s note: Darrell Allison is president of Parents for Educational Freedom in North Carolina, which supports greater educational choice for all parents and students across the state. For more information, please go to www.pefnc.org.)