School Choice, AI & Trade Schools: A Blueprint for Fixing Education in Georgia | Dr. Nelva Lee

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Episode Summary

Dr. Nelva Lee, healthcare executive, former gubernatorial appointee, and candidate for Georgia Superintendent of Schools, unpacks why the education system is failing and offers practical reforms including school choice, AI integration, and revitalizing trade schools to prepare students for real-world success.

Key Topics: education reform, school choice, Dr. Nelva Lee, AI in education, trade schools, Georgia, vocational training, school superintendent, educational policy, student success

Conversation

Dr. Nelva Lee: 00:01.346 There you go.

Hey, we're on. Good to see you.

Evan Meyer: 00:10.158 Happy holidays. Good to see you.

Yes. Yes, likewise.

You're on Meijer side chats. We're here. We did it. We made it. It's great to have you on. I'm going to give a very short AI assisted introduction. Are you ready? Sounds good. You can verify and confirm anything after, but I think we nailed it. Okay. All right.

That's it.

Evan Meyer (00:40.29) Dr. Nelva Lee was an appointed board member to the Department of Community Health by Governor Kemp. She is the vice chairman of the board of Henry County Pregnancy Resource Center, a former Republican candidate for the state Senate in District 17, and a current candidate for Georgia Superintendent of Schools. She's the founder and CEO of Concrete Build Financing, Mideo Inc., which is a medical and court interpreting and translating agency.

has over 20 years of experience in healthcare and over 10 years in academia as an adjunct professor for various universities. She's authored several Christian books, volunteers at a local church, and she's a homeschool mom and a substitute teacher for a Christian school. It's really great to have you on today. Nice to

Thank you for having me, Evan.

So first of all, this is a podcast that aims to bridge the gap between people and their government. You've got a lot of wonderful experience. I think it would be great if we can jump into, if you want to cover anything that is just about your background, but really about the gubernatorial appointment. I'd love to understand what that was, your role there, and some of the lessons you learned, and how you see the opportunity.

So I was appointed by Governor Kemp to be on the board of Department of Community Health and that really stemmed from my experience in healthcare. So I have over 30 years of experience in healthcare. And what I learned was how slow government moves. So being the CEO of a company and you basically make decisions on the spot, you know, I make a decision today and we make changes tomorrow, basically. And government is not

Dr. Nelva Lee: 02:29.206 Not so much, right? You have, especially if you're on a board, such as Department of Community Health, every decision is really months away because you have your constituent, you have time for your constituents to in on every major change, right? You have to give them the opportunity to provide feedback, whether in person, with town halls, or whether they're providing risen feedback.

And then you have to hear those during your board meetings, provide feedback. then whether or not we want to have an extended feedback time based on the types of feedback that we received. So it just really just showed just how slow government works for better or for worse, right? Because if you like things as they are, you don't want government to change every minute, right?

However, if you do want to make changes, you do have to be aware that it's not going to happen overnight. And that informs obviously my role that I'm seeking, which is that of superintendant of schools, because realizing that so many of the things that I like to see happen immediately in the school system, just being of being realist and realizing that that's not going to happen as quickly as I'd like for it to happen. However, when you have the

public behind you when you have public outcry and whether or not they're sending letters or emails to their representatives, when you have that type of public behind you on a particular initiative, then things can go a little bit faster.

Sure, so why do you think you'll be able to move the needle quicker in government than anyone has ever done before?

Dr. Nelva Lee: 04:28.878 won't say anyone. I do believe that a lot of my initiatives are common sense initiatives. And as I'm going around the state and sharing my initiatives, everyone's like, yeah, why aren't we already doing that? So I think at this point, the issues that I'm proposing are really leadership issues more than anything else. It's having someone at the helm that's willing to stick their neck out and say, this is a common sense

initiative, let's put this on the table to have it move forward. Now, even with that, I do believe a lot of the initiatives that I propose will take, you know, six months to a year to implement. And that will still be considered pretty fast in government.

Right. I suppose that would be pretty fast, When it comes to legislation, it's about every year for most places, under some exceptions. But operationally, you could do things a little different. I imagine as a superintendent, you can move things quicker. Correct. But you still have to run through all the hurdles and somehow knock them down faster, right?

Right. So I'll give you an example of a few of the initiatives that I have that I believe we can move pretty fast on. So the first one is I'd like to see trade schools for everyone, every graduate to have a trade school certification alongside their high school diploma. And while it's, I believe it's a common sense initiative because that way we will give every student a leg up upon graduation. They'll be able to enter the workforce.

fully prepared, right? Even those that are college bound, they're able to have this certification that's then kind of a built in apprenticeship, if you will, in the industry that they're seeking higher education in. The reason I think that that initiative can go move pretty quickly is because here in the state of Georgia, we already have dual enrollment. So we're already paying for dual enrollment credits, up to 30 credits per student. And so,

Dr. Nelva Lee (06:44.45) just trying to bring that over to the trade schools and most trade schools can serve as college credits as well. And so I believe that's a very simple initiative that just requires a mandate, right? From those that are in leadership to say, okay, we're going to divert these funds and make sure that this is a priority that we're championing. And that is trade schools.

certification.

Evan Meyer: 07:17.878 Okay, all right. You think you're gonna get this, you think you're gonna push this through faster?

I feel that I believe we can for sure. Yes, it makes sense for starters, right? And for those lots of students, right? That are not college bound or would forgo college if they had a way to put food on the table and pay their bills through a certification, some sort of vocational school. As many vocational schools are very high paying jobs, right?

You know, your nutrition, your welders, your plumbers, all of those are six figure income positions. Not to mention the myriad of medical certifications that you can get, paralegals, all of those are very high paying positions. You just don't need to go to college to get those.

Right. You have a daughter. Yes.

I have three children. My youngest is the daughter that we adopted from the foster care system in Puerto Rico.

Evan Meyer: 08:27.914 okay. Yes. And you learned you learned a few a few good lessons from this in terms of the ways that our system needs to improve both from a language standpoint and a health care standpoint. Correct. Jump into that a little bit about how that ties into your your role when you see when you become the superintendent.

So really truly, if you don't mind me, I'm gonna back up just a little bit to my oldest child. So all three, I have three children and they're all very unique. Every parent knows that all our children are very different, right? And my oldest, he was on the spectrum. He was very, he's gifted academically, but socially developmentally, not so much. And so I chose to homeschool him because of that.

And for me, that was the right choice for him to homeschool him, at least to fifth grade, because by then he started to learn how to be development socially and much more mature developmentally. And so was I was able to do that. And I was blessed that I was able to work from home. I had started my my vocational school at the time that I was running from home. And so was able to do that for him. Then fast forward.

to my daughter who we adopted from the foster care system from Puerto Rico. So she came to us not only with a language barrier, because she understood no English when she came to the US, but she also was an IEP student. So she had an individual education plan because of a learning disability. And so those two things together made it very difficult for her to really thrive in the public school system. So we ended up taking her out after

a few months in the public school system and put her in a Montessori school. And so if you know anything about Montessori, they're very, you know, hands on, they really promote children being children in the classroom and she thrived under that system. And so one of the things, one of the initiatives that I have is to make more public Montessori, similar to Minnesota and even South Carolina, they have public schools that are Montessori.

Dr. Nelva Lee: 10:45.118 based systems rather than your traditional, you know, learning environment where the students are expected to sit at a desk for six hours at a time, right? So I like to see more of those. I would also like to see parents to have more school choice because I was able to benefit from being able to provide the learning environment for my children that best suited their abilities or what they required at the time.

And so I'd like to be able to give that ability to every parent. So for example, in Florida, they have True School Choice, where they provide $8,000 vouchers to every parent to be able to provide to their child so that their child can attend any school environment, whether it's private school, charter school, home school, Montessori, you name it. That is what I would like to provide to the...

parents here in Georgia for them to have true school choice and be able to fully be engaged in their child's education.

Sure, that sounds what everyone should have everywhere. Exactly. It's a great goal. Yeah, so what do you foresee as some of the hurdles that you're going to have to overcome in trying to make that a reality? Let's say you're now the superintendent.

So I would say anytime the school system, whether it's teachers, student, teachers unions, principals, other superintendents, whenever they hear the word school choice or vouchers, they get very, very afraid because they believe that it's taking money out of the school system. And they believe that it's then affecting those students that are left behind. The way I look at it, again, Florida, the money, the way that they set up their budget, money follows the student.

Dr. Nelva Lee: 12:40.974 So it's a true school choice state. Here's the institution. And therefore, if you do take a child out of that institution, it does affect them because they're losing funding in that way. And so I believe that the best way to do it is where the money is following the student, have true school choice, totally revamp our budgetary system in the city of Georgia. Make it simpler, frankly, because the QBE system that we have

is very complicated, very antiquated, and it lends itself to, unfortunately, compromises, fraud, and things to that nature. And so I would like to propose that we completely revamp that. So I expect pushback from the teachers unions, I expect pushback from principals, but until we change the budget system. Once we change that and we make it where the majority of our

funding is going to the schools and the teachers and the students right now in Georgia. 50 % of our funding is going to management. That's shouldn't be.

Well, if you look at government like a nonprofit, a sense, like if you were to say like what percentage of overhead is going to administrative costs versus the homeless crisis in California.

they would fail, right?

Evan Meyer: 14:06.968 I'm not sure that nonprofit. Yeah, I mean, and every department's a little different in how they manage budgets and stuff and like, but, but if you even 50 % seems like a lot, like these things need to go to directly to the, to support and yeah. Do you think, do you think, in the education system, AI is going to be helpful or hurtful towards your goals and towards the education of students overall?

a situation.

Dr. Nelva Lee (14:36.59) You know, I am a big believer in technology. I really do. I believe that whenever we are afraid of technology, it comes back to bite us later. Right? So just embrace it, but figure out how to use AI as a tool, not to replace teachers, because you never replace a good teacher, right? Not to replace real engagement with students. But it could be used as an amazing tool. I mean, I use AI right now.

in my businesses. It's an amazing tool. And as I mentioned earlier, you mentioned earlier that I currently have an interpreting agency. Well, we have been fighting, the interpreting agency has been fighting AI forever. But you know what? Stop fighting AI. So it doesn't raise it, right? So what I've done in my business is we have AI, you start off with AI, and then once you realize that you need a human interpreter, you just click a button and it transfers you.

transfers you straight to the human interpreter. So just embrace the technology and you'll realize that you can coexist. So I would like to figure out ways to use AI as a tool for our students to learn better and faster. Definitely more like a homework coach, if nothing else, or even within the classroom, once the teacher has taught a lesson for the students to then practice with AI, but never to replace a teacher.

Sure. part of it could be, I mean, it's hard, right? Every time there's a huge industry expansion, or in this case, explosion, Some people don't have work. Like it's just, there's just like when the steam engine came out, a lot of people were out of jobs, and then new jobs got created. these people say this one's different, and this one, you know, and I'm just, and maybe that's true, but

You know, is that just part of the reality?

Dr. Nelva Lee: 16:39.758 New jobs aren't going to be created. You still need AI to, you still need humans to manage the AI. You still need units to develop the systems to be able to make everything work. mean, new systems, new jobs will always be created by technology. We just have to adapt, right? We need to learn how to pivot quickly.

until the robots do all the work and we are all just on universal income and there's no more anything for anybody. What are we going to do with our days and our time and our life? my God.

Well, this is again a plug for health care because an AI will never be able to replace a nurse, a doctor, you know, the human touch. People discount it, but it's so healing, right? So you'll never be able to. Same with teachers. A good teacher can never be replaced. You know, that human empathy and compassion. So that is that is this is a plug for all the jobs that an AI could never could never

Take over.

Okay, okay. Well, we'll revisit this in 20 years. It's it's starting to replace legal counsel and psych psychology. In a lot of ways. I've used it a lot for Doc, you know, not to replace a doctor, but I have used it to learn to know what to write. think that's very helpful. Okay. Well, to be educated. So when you go talk to a doctor, you can actually not be like, what you know, correct. And

Dr. Nelva Lee: 17:53.004 Go?

Evan Meyer: 18:17.592 So I found it to be very useful in that AI doesn't prescribe medication, yada yada. You've had an interesting, with your daughter in learning English, and you have some experience around that and some of the hurdles there and some of the things that you dealt with through that and how you overcame some of that, if I recall correctly, but also how that translates.

to some of the health outcomes that you saw directly with her.

Anyone that's limited English proficient can relate to this, right? Anytime you have a patient that does not speak English proficiently, you're going to have issues if you don't have a qualified medical interpreter in the room. And so that's really at the crux of my business. And I sought first hand with my daughter, right? So you have to have...

qualified medical interpreter in the room. And it can't be a family member, honestly, even if they are medically trained, even if they are fully bilingual, you really can't have a family member because the emotions involved as well as the confidentiality. And so I definitely recommend every healthcare provider to have a qualified medical interpreter in the room whenever you have a patient. You have proficiency enough to order

at restaurant, you know, to drive, to do a lot of day-to-day activity. But when it comes to medical and legal, the jargon alone, very few English people understand driving, let alone you add on top of that the layer of language barriers.

Evan Meyer (20:13.31) Sure. Yeah. And so on the side of health outcomes, one of the things that I've seen happen many times, even with myself, is like prescriptions going wrong. And that doesn't even, there's not even a translation problem there from a language standpoint. But like, you know, is there

But that's my most direct experience with it, where it's like, okay, how did you not translate from a doctor to a pharmacist and you got the you got a prescription? How can anyone get a prescription wrong in

Medical errors, right, just by themselves are the number one cause of death. One of the leading causes of death, medical errors, nosocomial infections. And so you have to be your own advocate whenever you're dealing with the healthcare system. You do. You have to fight whenever a doctor gives you a...

diagnosis, especially if they're prescribing a surgery or some sort of medication that you don't agree with, always get a second opinion. Especially if you're getting medications that, know, always look at, you know, double check, double check on the medication. Make sure that that is in fact the best course of action for you. So you mentioned, you know, educating yourself, you know.

know, WebMD has been around forever, right? I definitely recommend that. know, educate yourself because you are your number one advocate. Doctors see many, many patients. Sometimes they get it right, sometimes they don't. So don't go into a doctor's office and get white clothes, you know, white coat, you know, syndrome where you just believe and you just nod whenever the doctor tells you to do something. Don't do that.

Evan Meyer: 22:16.184 Mike Coke Syndrome WCS.

Well, many people do, you know, when whatever the doctor says, I have to do this because the doctor said to do it. And I'm going, my gosh, you have you have some agency here. You know, it's your body at the end of the day.

Yeah, it's wild. Is there a way to fix this prescription writing problem? Is it just not entered into a computer immediately? And then when you get there, they tell you that it's like the wrong, oh, that's not the generic version. How do we fix that?

It depends on what system your doctor's office is using.

By way, I'm asking you this now as when you were on the community health board, not the superintendent.

Dr. Nelva Lee: 23:05.454 Got it. Well, it depends on what system your doctor is using. So some doctor's systems speak much easier with the pharmacist and some still. So it really is a case by case basis with your particular doctor, unfortunately. So some doctors can prescribe something and it enters and they don't have to transcribe it at the pharmacy, right? Whereas others, they do have to do that. So it depends on the...

on whether or not their systems are speaking with.

But if there were so many medical errors, you'd think that writing anything to a pharmacist at this point would be no more handwriting, right? You think we would eliminate the handwriting error problem or?

Evan Meyer (23:50.71) I mean.

Well, like the clinic, the primary care physicians that I use, they don't write anything down, right? They literally just type it in and it goes electronically to the pharmacist. There's another doctor that I use for, you know, for a different, you know, not necessarily my primary care. And he's still writing things down on the little prescription notes though. So then it has to be transcribed by his nurse.

right, to the pharmacist and there's another error that can occur at the pharmacy side. So there's too many opportunities for errors.

Yeah, well, let this be the call to all of these folks that like that stuff just has to stop. We don't have to have that problem. It's not a necessary problem.

Exactly. But it depends on whether or not your doctor wants to upgrade co-system that speaks directly to the pharmacist.

Evan Meyer: 24:50.786 Yeah, maybe it should be a community health policy in the state of Georgia.

Nationwide,

Nationwide, you know, we're having the conversation now and you're in Georgia, correct? Okay, cool. And so it's interesting. You've got all this wonderful experience. You are you did run for state Senate position District 17. You didn't become a state senator, but that was your first time. Correct.

Yes, they not only but learned a lot about campaigning, going about a lot of other things, going for audits. So definitely it's helping those lessons were learned and everybody in this race for sure. And I think you look at my challenger. mean, so you don't have to be nasty in politics. So we spend the day to communicate on a very good basis.

Evan Meyer (25:54.52) Great, I love to hear that. It's such an important part of running and one of the evils that happens now in political campaigning. It's terrible and I've seen some of it firsthand and you have to make everyone your enemy in order to win. So I am happy to hear that. You are part of the Black Republican Georgia...

Evan Meyer: 26:27.384 Council, the Georgia Black Republican Council.

Day one.

Dr. Nelva Lee: 26:34.115 See.

The GBRC, the GBRC. Okay, good. So you're a member of that council. Why do you think it's important that that membership is important? And just to kind of frame it a little bit, being black and Republican is not the first thing you think about in, we'll call it American politics. We'll call it, it's a sub, right? It's a nuance.

And it's a very important nuance and I was hoping we could learn a little bit more about what that means and why you're part of this.

It's funny because every time we have our meetings, we'll have one or two new people and they'll always say the same thing. I didn't know there was a of people like me. Right. So it's nice. So if nothing else, it's a nice it's nice to know that you're not alone. Right. So we meet often every other month or quarterly. But it's just nice to know that there are other like minded individuals. And most of us are really

you know, they're because of our values. We're values-based, you know, Republicans. You know, for me, it's my faith. Others, might be, you know, fiscal, you know, monetary type of reasons. But for the most part, we're all, you know, values-based Republicans. And so it's just nice to be in a group of people that are like-minded and you're not seen as an outlier in that group.

Dr. Nelva Lee: 28:07.544 For that reason alone, that's one of the reasons to have it. And then we can also join forces and speak as a block in some issues. And we have been able to provide our unique stance on different issues to the governor or to legislatures. So for instance, back in a few years ago when we had the issue with

where they were calling one of Governor Kemp's laws racist, right? We were able to weigh in on that from the back of public counsel side.

Right, right. Was it or was it not racist?

It was not. No, but I mean, it was not racist. I mean, it's just easy. That's just an easy thing to throw out there whenever people don't like laws. So we were able to weigh in on that. And so I think it's helpful in that case, being able to provide a voice from the Black Republicans from time to

Yeah, you remember what that can I ask what that law was that you were?

Dr. Nelva Lee: 29:16.824 So then when they were expanding the voting, certain laws around voting and requiring licenses to be presented when you go to the booth. And so we had a lot of Democrats state that it was a racist law because it was unduly targeting black people. And yeah, it was.

I see. I see. think there was, do you know the show Curb Your Enthusiasm?

I have watched it, yes, for time to time.

Have you watched the one when he goes to Georgia and ends up being a hero for, there was something with the water bottle and you couldn't like give water to people online. Anyway, it's, mean, curb, but that was Georgia voting poll.

Yes, yes.

Dr. Nelva Lee (30:11.63) Georgia boarding folks, yes. It's nice to make it to the show.

Hahaha

Evan Meyer (30:21.39) Yeah. Yeah, it's interesting. I'm always encouraged when I see that groups of people come out against the status quo of what would be normally understood. If the messaging is like, Black people are all Democrats and they're all

And then you're like, well, what does that mean? And to even be a Democrat? And what does that mean to even be a Republican? And I think those terms just get, they get mixed up. I'm not sure people even understand. They generally, from my experience, will look at a Republican as whatever the current understanding of the good or bad Republicans are in the federal.

And I always tell people, I'm first and foremost a woman of faith. I don't identify as a black Republican. That's not the first thing I identify as. I'm a woman of faith and it just so happens that the Republican party is just much more amenable to my values. Does it mean that I agree with everything within the Republican party?

Sure, of course, of course. Some of your values that you align with the GBRMC.

So I am GBRC, GBRC.

Evan Meyer: 31:42.926 GBRC, GBRC, okay.

For starters, am pro-life. I'm the vice chair of the Presidency Resource Center, which is a pro-life organization where we try to stem abortions, right? So that's one reason. The other is that I'm very much faith-based individual. And so I promote laws that are going to provide for our faith to be...

at the very least not be maligned, all right? And so, like I believe, for example, my school choice stance, promoting the ability for homeschool mothers to be able to get some of the jobs. I think that's a faith-based initiative in some sense. So, I believe I'm values first, and it just so happens that the Republican Party just...

allows for my values to be, be a negative.

Sure, yeah, and those are big ones, right? And wherever people stand on these issues, think one of the issues that I see is that they think that the people who think differently than them are not coming from a good set of values. you don't have to be pro-life, or you can be pro-life, but you have to...

Evan Meyer: 33:14.228 at least hear why, what that reasoning is and say, okay, well, that makes sense. And I respect that choice, you know, for you. It doesn't have to be for me, but I respect it for you. That's the beauty of people.

And the beauty of living in America where we have the legal choices, right?

Yeah, exactly. The luxury.

luxury of having choice and having an opinion.

Yeah, and more power to you, you know, more power to people to do that. Don't hurt other people. And that's really the number one thing. So this was a wonderful conversation. I really enjoyed chatting with you. Is there anything that you want to tell the people of Georgia?

Dr. Nelva Lee: 34:09.742 Well, for starters, the reason why I'm running is because we are declining in our rankings nationwide. So Georgia is 38th out of 50. Okay. That's not good. And that's a decline under the current superintendent's watch. Okay. So he's been in office 11 going on 12 years and we are declining. going backwards. 70 % of our fourth graders are not proficient in reading. That's a decline under Richard Woods.

And 76 % of our math, of our eighth graders are not proficient in math. That's a decline under Rachel Wood. So I always tell Georgians, Misa, stop going backwards and stop going backwood. Okay? So I believe that we need to move forward with new ideas, with new energy. All right? And I believe that I offer that not only was I homeschool mom, then only do I have experience in academia, but because of the fact that I also had a

vocational school and that's one of the main initiatives I'd be able to move that needle forward for the state of Georgia. So please visit my website drnobilly.com. I've got my speech platform speech on there, other podcasts interviews, my book so you can learn a lot more about my platform and what Dr. Nelbilly is all about.

Yep. Awesome. Really great connecting with you and I wish you all the best. Thank you. In your journey on this and hopefully a victory. And thanks for all the good work you do in making people safer, healthier, smarter.

Yes, thank you so much for having me on, Evan. I really appreciate it.

Evan Meyer: 35:49.292 It was a pleasure.

This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity while preserving the authentic flow of conversation.