Durham Public Schools will make May 1 an optional teacher workday, canceling classes after more than 600 teachers, about a quarter of DPS educators, requested the day off. The district said operating schools with that many staff absent would be unsafe.

After-school programs are canceled. High school athletic events will continue. Students will not need to make up the day.

The DPS Board of Education voted April 20 to approve the change. At least four other districts made similar moves: Chapel Hill-Carrboro Schools and Guilford County each shifted to an optional teacher workday, Chatham County's board voted April 13 to make it an annual leave day, and Wake County had already scheduled a teacher workday for traditional-calendar schools before the protest was announced.

The teachers are heading to the "Kids Over Corporations" rally at Halifax Mall in Raleigh, running 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. The North Carolina Association of Educators organized the event to push for increased public school funding, accountability for voucher spending, and an end to policies it says prioritize tax cuts over students.

The rally follows the North Carolina Supreme Court's decision to throw out the Leandro school-funding lawsuit. A 2021 agreement would have directed more than $5 billion toward special education, teacher pay, counselors, and school nurses. None of that money was ever paid out.

"This is our line in the sand," NCAE President Tamika Walker Kelly said. "We will not back down in demanding qualified educators in every classroom and safe, well-resourced schools for every student."

Not all districts complied. New Hanover County, with a Republican school board majority, rejected making May 1 a workday. Lauren Horsch, a spokesperson for Senate leader Phil Berger, criticized the closures. "At a time when teachers should be preparing their students for critical exams, they're instead keeping kids out of their classrooms," she said.

NCAE organized similar mass protests in 2018 and 2019. The 2019 event drew thousands of teachers through downtown Raleigh on May 1 of that year.