With songs both musical and a capella, the congregation at Kings Park International Church welcomed a crowd of about 500 parents, teachers, educators and community leaders from across North Carolina. The topic for the Tuesday night meeting was education and school choice.

The event was organized by the Partners for Educational Freedom in North Carolina.

Osco E. Gardin, Jr. is a pastor at the Elizabeth Missionary Baptist Church in Monroe, North Carolina. He was a speaker at the event.

"I want our next governor to support school choice," said Gardin.

Gardin said many people are already using false addresses to have their children attend better schools.

"That's school choice any way you look at it," Gardin said. He called for a change to the present system.

Former Raleigh School teacher Deanna Randle asked audience members to fill out declaration forms calling for school choice.

She said the new policy would "make you [the parent] the CEO of your greatest investment, and that's your child's education."

Gubernatorial candidate Pat McCrory also spoke at the event.

"The status quo is unacceptable," McCrory said.

"Its time to try some new things and the new thing is choice," he said.

Gubernatorial candidate Bev Perdue was invited to the event, but declined the invitation, according to organizers.

According to the National Education Association's website:

"NEA and its affiliates have been leaders in the fight to improve public schools - and oppose alternatives that divert attention, energy, and resources from efforts to reduce class size, enhance teacher quality, and provide every student with books, computers, and safe and orderly schools."

The NEA, according to its website, says the school voucher system holds public and private schools to different standards. The NEA has the following objections:

The Educational Case Against Vouchers

- Student achievement ought to be the driving force behind any education reform initiative. See what research says about the relationship between vouchers and student achievement.

- Americans want consistent standards for students. Where vouchers are in place -- Milwaukee, Cleveland, and Florida -- a two-tiered system has been set up that holds students in public and private schools to different standards.

- NEA and its affiliates support direct efforts to improve public schools. There is no need to set up new threats to schools for not performing. What is needed is help for the students, teachers, and schools who are struggling.

The Social Case Against Vouchers

- A voucher lottery is a terrible way to determine access to an education. True equity means the ability for every child to attend a good school in the neighborhood.
Vouchers were not designed to help low-income children. Milton Friedman, the "grandfather" of vouchers, dismissed the notion that vouchers could help low-income families, saying "it is essential that no conditions be attached to the acceptance of vouchers that interfere with the freedom of private enterprises to experiment."

- A pure voucher system would only encourage economic, racial, ethnic, and religious stratification in our society. America's success has been built on our ability to unify our diverse populations.

A comprehensive list of objections can be found here.

Baker Mitchell, the founder of the Roger Bacon Academy of Charter Schools in Wilmington said, "Ladies and gentlemen there is no magic. .. there is only good curriculum and bad curriculum."

Mitchell said school choice ensures students get the best education possible.