Maura Black Sullivan (Photo: Courtesy Maura Black Sullivan)
The Memphis Flyer has confirmed that Mayor Paul Young and a veteran public official now serving in Nashville are in continuing conversations about her possible employment here. This would be Maura Black Sullivan, a native Memphian who now holds the position of chief operating officer of Nashville Public Schools.
Sullivan, who previously served as COO for former Memphis Mayor AC Wharton and later for former Chattanooga Mayor Andy Berke, confirmed that conversations with Young are ongoing for the position of his chief administrative officer.
On Tuesday of this week, the city council was prepared to deal with some unfinished business — including a controversial healthcare allowance for council members of two terms’ service or more, and a decision on yet another mayoral appointment — this one of public works director Robert Knecht.
A vote on Knecht, whom Mayor Paul Young submitted for renomination week before last, was deferred after council chairman JB Smiley publicly criticized Knecht for “attitude” issues and asked for the deferral.
Several of Young’s cabinet choices were viewed negatively by Smiley and other council members — notably Police Chief CJ Davis, whose reappointment the council narrowly rejected via a 7-6 vote. (She was later given an interim appointment by Young, pending a later reexamination by the council.)
Another issue with several council members has been unease at the mayor’s inability so far to complete his team with credentialed new appointees in other positions. He has not yet named permanent appointees for the key positions of chief operating officer and chief financial officer, for example.
That circumstance could change soon. Sullivan is frank to say that she has not been in a job search, enjoys her present circumstances in Nashville, and has made no decision to leave them, but acknowledges that a possible return to Memphis would be attractive as well.
Sullivan is the daughter of the late Dave Black, a featured radio broadcaster of many years in Memphis, and the late Kay Pittman Black, who was a well-known journalist and government employee here.
• With Governor Bill Lee’s appointment this week of Mary L. Wagner to the Tennessee Supreme Court, the state’s high court continues with an unmistakably red hue politically.
As a judicial candidate in her two elections as a Circuit Court judge in Shelby County, Wagner campaigned without ideological inflection and enjoyed relatively diverse support, and there was no hint of political bias in her judgments. But her background was that of a Republican activist, and she both was a member of the right-leaning Federalist Society and served a term as chair of the Shelby County Republican Party.
In appointing Wagner, Lee said, “Her understanding and respect for the rule of law and commitment to the conservative principles of judicial restraint make her well-suited for the state’s highest court, and I am proud to appoint her to this position.”
Technically, Wagner is a justice-designate. The justice she was named to succeed, Roger Page,will keep his position for some months.
• District Attorney Steve Mulroy was in a celebratory mood last Monday evening after the Shelby County Commission voted unanimously — except for three abstentions — to pass an ordinance imposing guidelines ensuring that all members of his office, whether their technical employment is by the county or by the state, are paid according to the same pay scale.
As a county official, Mulroy had recently trimmed his own pay according to the lower county rate. He has now restored the voluntary pay cut.
Update: After our print deadline, Mayor Young clarified to the Flyer: “I can confirm that we had early talks with Maura Sullivan about a different position with the Young administration, not the COO/CAO position. We have a strong leader currently acting in the COO role who has my full faith and confidence.”
The mayor’s spokesperson/CCO, Penelope Huston, added: “The role we initially discussed was a high level position on the Mayor’s cabinet. And while talks about that position haven’t continued, we do have an ongoing dialogue with her and many others who we consider allies in the work of creating a stronger Memphis.”
Gov. Bill Lee delivers his State of the State address Monday evening. Credit: State of Tennessee
Gov. Bill Lee renewed his call for private school vouchers for any student across Tennessee on Monday, and he also set aside $144 million in his proposed state budget to pay for the new program for up to 20,000 students in its first year.
For traditional public schools, the Republican governor asked the legislature to raise the annual base pay for teachers from $42,000 to $44,500, in keeping with his pledge last year to get the profession’s minimum salary to $50,000 by the 2027-28 school year. (Raising the base pay has a domino effect and increases the pay of more experienced teachers, too.)
Lee also wants to invest $200 million to grow state parks and natural areas while simultaneously cutting corporate taxes amid a downturn in state revenues. But he maintained that Tennessee has “a very strong economy” to pay for all the changes.
The governor outlined his list of wants Monday evening during his 2024 address before the General Assembly, which will take up Lee’s voucher proposal and the budget in the months ahead.
He opened his remarks by calling Tennessee a “model for economic prosperity” and reminding lawmakers that state revenues are still 40 percent higher than three years ago.
However, after years of being flush with cash, the state faces a $610 million budget shortfall this year, and many lawmakers are leery of approving a universal school voucher program that Lee wants to be available to any K-12 student in 2025-26. Currently, Tennessee offers vouchers to about 3,000 low-income families in three urban counties, but his Education Freedom Scholarship Act would open them up to families in all 95 counties, eventually with no family income restrictions.
“2024 is the year to make school choice a reality for every Tennessee family,” he said, drawing a standing ovation from many legislators — but not everyone in the GOP-controlled legislature — as well as frequent jeers from some spectators in the gallery.
“There are thousands of parents in this state who know their student would thrive in a different setting, but the financial barrier is simply too high,” Lee continued. “It’s time that we change that. It’s time that parents get to decide — and not the government — where their child goes to school and what they learn.”
Lee, a Williamson County businessman who graduated from public schools in Franklin, near Nashville, touted more than $1.8 billion in new investments in public education since he became governor in 2019.
“We can give parents choice and support public schools at the same time,” he said. “You’ll hear me say that over and over again. These two ideas are not in conflict.”
The governor also released his $52.6 billion state government spending plan to begin July 1. The total was down from Tennessee’s $62.5 billion budget for the current fiscal year because of flattening revenues and expiring federal funds appropriated during the pandemic.
He proposed $8 million to hire 114 more school-based behavioral health specialists amid record reports of students experiencing stress, depression, anxiety, and other mental health challenges exacerbated by the pandemic.
Other recurring funding recommendations include $30 million to pay for summer learning programs; $3.2 million to expand access to advanced placement courses for high school students; and $2.5 million to pay for a universal reading screener as part of the state’s literacy initiative, all to offset federal funding that is drying up.
Lee is asking for $15 million in one time funding to help charter schools with facility costs.
The governor also announced that his administration will bring the legislature a bill designed to help parents oversee their child’s social media activity.
“It will require social media companies to get parental consent for minors to create their own accounts in Tennessee,” Lee said.
Such legislation would widen the state’s push against social media giants.
Last fall, Tennessee joined a coalition of states suing Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, which is accused of violating consumer protection laws and deceptively marketing its platforms to adolescents to the detriment of their mental health.
And some Tennessee school districts have joined a growing list of school systems nationwide that are suing major social media companies like TikTok and YouTube over a crisis in student mental health.
But in the wake of last year’s shooting at a private Nashville school — where three children, three staff members, and the shooter died — the governor offered no new initiatives aimed at improving school safety or decreasing gun violence, other than funding to hire 60 more state troopers.
Last year, after the March 27 tragedy, the legislature approved $140 million in grants to place an armed law enforcement officer in every Tennessee public school. But the legislature rebuffed the governor’s call for a law to help keep guns out of the hands of people deemed at risk of hurting themselves or others.
Remarks about Lee’s universal voucher plan, announced in November, drew quick responses from the leaders of the state’s two largest teacher organizations.
“The concept of universal vouchers would be costly to the state, and we urge the Tennessee General Assembly to move slowly,” said JC Bowman, executive director of the Professional Educators of Tennessee.
“In particular, we have concerns over the lack of income-eligibility requirements and accountability,” he continued. “Our state must avoid any program viewed as a tax subsidy for existing private school families or a tax bailout for struggling private schools.”
Tanya T. Coats, president of the Tennessee Education Association, said Lee’s plan shows that vouchers have never been about helping economically disadvantaged families, as the governor first characterized it in 2019.
“The goal has always been to privatize public education and use public dollars to fund private school education, which goes against our Tennessee values,” Coats said.
Marta Aldrich is a senior correspondent and covers the statehouse for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Contact her at maldrich@chalkbeat.org. Chalkbeat is a nonprofit news site covering educational change in public schools.Sign up for Chalkbeat Tennessee’s free daily newsletter to keep up with statewide education policy and Memphis-Shelby County Schools.
Tennessee Governor Bill Lee enters the House chambers and greets Lt. Gov. Randy McNally for Lee’s sixth State of the State address. (Photo: John Partipilo)
Entering the second year of a second four-year term, Gov. Bill Lee is singing the same chorus he did when he started five years ago: A heavy dose of private-school vouchers is the solution for Tennessee.
In the annual State of the State speech, Lee presented a $52.6 billion spending plan the day after he committed to send Tennessee National Guardsmen to Texas to provide backup to federal personnel on patrol there.
Lee entered office in January 2019 with a plan to offer students public money to attend private schools, as well as to bolster charter schools, which are privately held but officially considered part of public school systems. The state also has boosted K-12 spending by about $3 billion in five years, $1.8 billion from the state level.
After a contentious vote that led to an FBI investigation, in addition to a protracted lawsuit, his education savings account plan took effect two years ago.
As he starts his sixth year in office amid flattening state revenue and a looming business tax break caused by “significant legal risk,” Lee is pushing a $141 million voucher plan for up to 20,000 students to go to private schools, this time without as many requirements to qualify financially. The details for his bill haven’t quite tumbled out completely, but he continued the sales pitch Monday night in the State of the State address.
Less than half of the crowd stood and cheered as Lee introduced his proposal, and people jeered from the balconies, even as the governor said he wants to avoid the “status quo.”
“There are thousands of parents in this state who know their student would thrive in a different setting, but the financial barrier is simply too high,” Lee said during his annual address Monday. “It’s time that we change that. It’s time that parents get to decide — and not the government — where their child goes to school and what they learn … 2024 is the year to make school choice a reality for every Tennessee family.”
In his pitch, the governor also maintains the argument that the state has put an “unprecedented focus” on public schools and he noted Monday the two ideas “are not in conflict.”
The state’s revenues are 46 percent higher than they were four years ago, increasing to $19 billion from about $11 billion. The state is weaning itself off the flow of federal funding that came down during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Yet Lee is pushing for a franchise tax rebate of $1.2 billion and $400 million reductions for the next few years after 80 companies balked at paying the property portion of the state’s franchise tax.
Even though some financial experts have said the state could fight big business efforts to reduce the tax, the Lee Administration and Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti’s office recommended the refunds and reduction because of “significant legal risk.” Officials say no lawsuit is pending.
Democrats criticized the governor’s proposals, saying Tennesseans are being told they should support a “scam” to defund public schools and give large corporations another tax break. No sales tax holiday is scheduled for the coming fiscal year that starts July 1 after the state gave a three-month break from the grocery sales tax last fall.
They point out Lee contends Tennessee is among the nation’s leaders in low taxes and several other financial categories, yet the state is seeing rural hospitals close and money diverted that could go to public schools.
“We ain’t leading nothing when we’re leaving so many people behind.”
Sen. London Lamar (D-Memphis)
“We ain’t leading nothing when we’re leaving so many people behind,” said Senate Minority Caucus Chairman London Lamar of Memphis.
Lamar said the franchise tax break will cost the state $8.3 billion over a decade while the private-school voucher plan will take $800 million in its second year when it could become available to every student. She noted companies will be getting a “fat check” while hourly workers will receive no tax breaks.
Democrats point toward increases in gun violence amid softer gun laws and personal bankruptcies that forced working families to struggle while wealthy business owners receive treatment with kid gloves.
Besides his private-school voucher move, Gov. Lee is proposing legislation to stop the theft of musicians’ voices through AI, calling it the Elvis Act.
He also plans to introduce legislation dealing with the protection of young people from social media. The measure would enable parents to oversee their children’s use of the Internet by requiring new social media accounts.
In addition, Lee said he plans to make hundreds of rule changes and cut permitting regulations to streamline government but gave no details.
Tennessee Lookout is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Tennessee Lookout maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Holly McCall for questions: info@tennesseelookout.com. Follow Tennessee Lookout on Facebook and Twitter.
Tennessee lawmakers are making things harder on the poor and easier on the rich, and those old-timey class frictions are heating up in the rifts.
Republicans blame technical glitches and piles of red tape they created as obstacles to get millions of dollars to help low-income families here. Meanwhile, they cut taxes for the business class last year, plan to cut even more this year, and hope to free up more of everyone’s tax dollars to help everyone — no matter how much money they have — pay for private schools.
Gun violence dominated debate and headlines around the Tennessee General Assembly in 2023. Many vow to keep the issue in front of lawmakers in 2024. But if a school shooting in Nashville during last year’s regular session and an entire special session on gun violence last summer won’t move GOP lawmakers to act, rays of hope on the issue seem faint.
It’s way too early to predict what issue(s) may dominate discussions at the State Capitol in the coming weeks. But money seems an early leader, especially as news came late last year that once-hot state revenues are cooling thanks in large part to those 2023 GOP tax cuts.
Money matters have not seen center stage in Tennessee for awhile. The state’s budget has been pushed up and up in recent years with nary a cut in sight. That’s partly due to the new-ish ability to collect online sales taxes and a major surge in revenues from those business taxes in the past. But that won’t likely be the case this year.
Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee is expected to unveil his new budget for Tennessee on Monday, during the annual State of the State address. Projected revenues — how much money officials think we’ll have to spend in the next year — will likely flatten.
This could present some difficult decisions for lawmakers, especially some on the House side, who may have not yet dealt budget cuts. If cuts come, it will be especially interesting to see where the state’s GOP-dominated purse-string-holders will make them (especially since they made the cuts necessary). This could also likely flatten the state’s ability to fund any new initiatives. (Think of it like this, if you quit a job, you might not have the money to pay for your existing car and you damn sure can’t buy a new one.)
Budgets are more than numbers. Budgets are priorities. For a household, that could mean the difference in saving for college later or going on vacation now. For local governments, that could mean the difference in more police or better parks. With its tax cuts last year, the Tennessee GOP prioritized at least one thing: more long-term money in the bank for the state’s businesses.
Now, as money matters begin to creep into the state spotlight once again, some old, tense questions are rising. Who pays for the government? Who does the government work for? Who wins? Who struggles?
So many of these questions have root in Tennessee’s overarching economic development model. That is, basically, how do we organize our economy? How do we build it?
Republicans here love to tout Tennessee as one of the most “business-friendly” states in the union. But don’t just take their word for it. Yahoo! Finance put the state in its top 10 for business friendliness last year and MSNBC ranked it in the top 3, both using different methodologies.
Tennessee’s economy, like many other Southern states, works on the basic trickle-down theory that lower business taxes will attract more businesses, which will hire more people and create more wealth that will “trickle down” to the lower classes.
Except it doesn’t, according to a new report from the Economic Policy Institute (EPI). The high tide promised by this economic theory does not lift all boats, it said. For a more in-depth look at how this plays out in Tennessee and across the South, see below (Economic Policy Institute Report).
Here, we’ll look at some issues and opinions on money and class that might shape debates as the legislature heads back to Nashville.
The lowest 20 percent of earners in Tennessee spend 12.8 percent of their total annual household income on taxes. (Chart: Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy)
The poor and hungry
Back in 2019, The Beacon Center, a free market think tank in Nashville, discovered the Lee administration quietly sat on a stockpile of $730 million meant to help working poor families in Tennessee. For years, Tennessee got $190 million from the federal government to help these families get on their feet with monthly checks for childcare, transportation, and more.
Instead of finding ways to getting all of the money to needy families, Lee just did not. The initial discovery of the funds in 2019 led some on social media to decry Lee’s money management. Others saw GOP disdain for the poor.
“This is why [I march for universal basic income] today, because of villainous shit-holes like the governor of Tennessee who is hoarding $732 M in TANF [Temporary Assistance for Needy Families] money instead of spending it on reducing poverty,” reads a tweet from the time from Scott Santens, founder of the Income to Support All Foundation.
By 2021, the fund ballooned to nearly $800 million. Thanks to Beacon, a plan is now in place to spend that money down.
However, Lee’s plan puts a hurdle between those needy families and the money. Rather than go directly to families in need, the funds will in large part go to organizations or health departments that will give them temporary aid.
Lee administration officials said it has found a home for $717 million of the TANF reserve. But state Sen. Heidi Campbell (D-Nashville) wants more in the hands of actual needy families. Introduced last week, her bill would increase TANF payments to cover rising inflation costs each year.
Meanwhile, thousands of families in Tennessee have less literal food on the table thanks to Lee administration computer problems. Last summer the Tennessee Department of Human Services (TDHS) updated some computer software. A glitch in the system resulted in a backlog of benefits for 35,000 recipients of the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), sometimes called food stamps.
TDHS Commissioner Clarence Carter said his team hopes to have the backlog cleared by March. He also said he’s not dragging his feet, telling state lawmakers last week that his team has “an almost desperate sense of urgency to get this right.” Tennessee Lookout editor Holly McCall pointed out this “kicker” from their story on the matter: “DHS officials noted that the staff brought in to help are keenly aware of the importance of the work: some department staff rely on food stamps themselves.”
Who pays?
Tennessee has the third-most regressive tax system in the country, according to the seventh annual “Who Pays?” report from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP). Regressive taxes are those paid equally by all, no matter how much money they make. These, of course, hit lower-income taxpayers the hardest.
In Tennessee, this means the lowest 20 percent of earners (those making less than $21,000 each year) spend 12.8 percent of their total annual household income on taxes. The top 1 percent (those making over $661,600 each year) spend just 3.8 percent of their total income on taxes here. The poorest pay more than three times as much as the wealthy.
“States such as Florida, Tennessee, and Texas are often described as ‘low tax’ due to their lack of personal income taxes,” reads the report. “While this characterization holds true for high-income families, these states levy some of the nation’s highest tax rates on the poor.”
State Senator London Lamar (Photo: Dawn Majors | US capitol)
A tale of two tax cuts
State Sen. London Lamar (D-Memphis) can go back to 2011 and rattle off a list of GOP-sponsored policies “that have truly benefited the wealthy and big corporations.” The repeal of the millionaire estate tax. The repeal of the luxury gift tax. A repeal of income tax on stocks and bonds. A reduction of the jet fuel tax. Corporate exemptions to the sales tax. Exemptions for corporate income taxes.
“Our tax policy is incentivizing businesses for keeping people poor,” Lamar said. “I say that because since 2011 and when the Republicans got in office, the main tax reform and benefits have truly benefited the wealthy and big corporations.
“So, the question is, where are the priorities for those citizens who are working the hardest to contribute to our economy?”
Well, the GOP cut taxes for working-class families just last year. Well, kinda sorta. And it wasn’t much. And it wasn’t forever. But …
Remember that odd, three-month cut on the state’s grocery tax last year? It was a $273 million part of the $400 million Tennessee Works Tax Act, “the largest single tax cut in Tennessee history.” It cut the 4 percent tax for everyone from August to October. Then, the tax went straight back onto receipts.
It was a head-scratcher to many and seemed a solution to a problem that didn’t exist (except, y’know, that Tennessee is one of only 13 states that still tax groceries). Why? Where did this cut come from? Even folks on Reddit couldn’t pin the motivation on some coarse design to win votes because there was no upcoming election.
But it was the remaining cuts in the Tax Act that smarted some working-class taxpayers. While they got a one-time deal that put about $100 in their pockets, the state’s business class got a permanent tax cut worth about $127 million that would put thousands of dollars in their bank accounts each and every year.
The Tax Act seemed to prove Lamar’s notion. Meaningful, permanent cuts for those with means; shallow, temporary cuts for everyone else. (Though, legislation has been filed for this year’s session to permanently cut Tennessee’s grocery tax.)
This might all come into sharper focus later, especially if revenues continue to fall. Because it’s lost revenues from those business tax cuts knocking multi-million-dollar holes in the state budget.
So, should lawmakers indeed need to make cuts to programs it offers Tennessee’s taxpayers, it won’t be because the majority of them got a brief respite from grocery taxes.
Chart: Economic Policy Institute
#VoucherScam
Capitol-watchers have said Lee’s controversial plan to expand his school voucher program could be the biggest fight in Nashville this year. Lee eventually wants to expand the program to every student for any kind of school — public, private, charter, or home.
But the program would allow the vouchers, worth about $7,075 per student each year, for all students, with no income requirements. This means wealthy parents — who now pay taxes for public schools and tuition at private schools — could divert funds from the public school system.
The fight over the legislation may prove to be another class battle that could heat up in Nashville this year. For proof, dig around X for #LeesVoucherScam.
“The voucher scam takes tax dollars from our neighborhood public schools to pay for the private school education of the wealthy,” tweeted Teri Mai, a Democratic candidate running for a House seat in Middle Tennessee. “Simply put, the school voucher scam defunds public schools by funneling your tax dollars to private and religious schools.”
Economic Policy Institute Report
Southern politicians tout the region’s “business-friendly” economic development policies, but a new study finds those policies are rooted in racism and have failed most people who live here.
The October study is from Washington, D.C.-based Economic Policy Institute (EPI), a nonpartisan think tank focused on “the needs of low-and-middle-income workers in economic policy discussions.” The study looks at job growth, wages, poverty, and state GDP. The data, EPI said, “show a grim reality.”
The group characterized the Southern economic development model as one with “low wages, low taxes, few regulations on businesses, few labor protections, a weak safety net, and vicious opposition to unions.”
The state of Tennessee basically agrees with this and shouts it in all caps (literally) on its website under the “business climate” section.
“We believe in high expectations, low debt, and a pro-business regulatory environment,” reads the page from the Tennessee Department of Economic and Community Development. “Tennessee is proud to be a right-to-work state [also noting Tennessee’s low union participation] with no personal income tax. Our state and local tax burdens are among the lowest in the country, and our state budget operates with a healthy surplus, rather than a deficit.”
The EPI study said this does not work for everyone.
“While this economic model has garnered vast amounts of riches for the wealthiest people across the region, it is leaving most Southerners with low wages, underfunded public services, a weak safety net in times of economic downturns, deep racial divisions, and high rates of poverty,” said report author Chandra Childers, a senior policy and economic analyst for EPI’s Economic Analysis and Research Network.
Here are a few key takeaways from the report:
• Job growth across the South has failed to keep up with population growth. The share of prime-age workers (ages 25–54) who have a job is lower than the national average in most Southern states.
• Workers in Southern states tend to have lower earnings. Median earnings in nine Southern states are among the lowest in the nation, even after adjusting for lower cost of living in the South.
• Poverty rates are above the national average in most Southern states. Louisiana and Mississippi have the highest poverty rates in the nation, with nearly one in five residents living in poverty.
• Child poverty is highest in the South compared to any other region. At 20.9 percent, child poverty rates in the South are 3.7 percentage points higher than the region with the next-highest child poverty rate — the Midwest (17.2 percent).
• Southern states are among the lowest-GDP states. Nine of the 15 states with the lowest per-worker GDP are in the South.
The racist remnant of the Southern economic development model, according to EPI, is that business owners in the South continue to rely on “large pools of cheap labor,” particularly Black and brown people. The study points back to slavery in the South when Black people were not paid at all and then to Pullman porters who were “forced to rely on tips” after slavery ended. Now, incarcerated individuals can be required to work with no pay at all, the study said.
“The racist roots of this model have been obscured and have been replaced by a more acceptable ‘pro-business’ narrative,” reads the study. “The pro-business narrative suggests that low wages, low taxes, anti-union policies, a weak safety net, and limited regulation on businesses creates a rising tide that ‘lifts all boats.’”
Tennessee policies fit into this model, the study said, as the state has no minimum wage, no income tax, a high sales-tax burden for all residents, no expanded Medicaid program, a low per-worker GDP, and more.
Poverty is higher in Tennessee than in other parts of the country. This is especially true for people of color and particularly women of color, according to the data. The highest rates of poverty across the South are experienced by Black women. One in five lives in poverty, but it’s not due to an unwillingness to work, the study says. Black women have a higher employment-to-population (EPOP) ratio than women from any other racial or ethnic group in the South.
“One reason Black women’s poverty rates remain high in the South — despite a relatively high EPOP — is that they are disproportionately employed in jobs consistent with the occupations they were largely limited to during and after the end of slavery: care work, cleaning, and food production, including agricultural and animal slaughter work,” reads the study. “Because this work is largely done by Black, brown, and immigrant workers, consistent with the Southern economic development model, these jobs pay very low wages.”
Wages are lower in Tennessee than in other parts of the country, and again it’s especially true for people of color and particularly women of color, according to the report.
“On average, Black women in the South are paid $35,884 at the median and Hispanic women just $30,984, compared with $58,008 for white men,” reads the report.
If the Tennessee economic model is working like politicians claim, where does the money go? The study says it goes to the wealthiest Tennesseans. The top 20 percent richest Tennesseans share more than half (51 percent) of the state’s total income. The top 5 percent share 23 percent of the state’s aggregate income. The bottom 20 percent share just 3.4 percent.
“Many Southerners may believe their politician’s arguments that the Southern economic development model will deliver good, well-paying jobs,” reads the report. “However, the data presented here show clearly and emphatically that this model has failed those living in Southern states.”
State Capitol (Credit: Tennessee State Government)
Five years after a bruising legislative battle opened the door to private school vouchers in parts of Tennessee, lawmakers are preparing to take up a controversial bill to create a similar program statewide.
Gov. Bill Lee’s universal voucher proposal, which eventually would make all K-12 students eligible to use public funding to attend a private or home school, is expected to dominate debate after the 113th General Assembly reconvenes on Tuesday.
But other issues affecting students and educators are sure to emerge in a state where education reform has been front and center since 2010, when Tennessee won $500 million in the federal Race to the Top competition to jumpstart changes.
With the GOP supermajority setting the agenda again this year, here’s a look at some big issues to watch as the opening gavel falls.
School vouchers: Lee’s expansion plan renews long-running debate
In November, the governor said he’ll introduce a new Education Freedom Scholarship Act to offer $7,075 in taxpayer money for each of up to 20,000 students statewide next school year to attend a private or home school, with eligibility restrictions for half of them. In 2025, eligibility would open up to all students, regardless of their family’s income.
The proposal would mark a massive expansion of Tennessee’s voucher program, which is now limited to three urban counties and still under-enrolled. But more than a month after Lee’s announcement, few details have been released.
“I have yet to understand where the financing is coming from,” said Sen. Page Walley, a Republican whose district includes eight rural counties in West Tennessee.
“If we jump to statewide vouchers, I don’t see how we fund it without robbing Peter to pay Paul,” he added.
Other big questions:
Would students accepting the new voucher scholarships have to take the same state tests as public school students in order to measure outcomes?
Would private schools accepting vouchers have to be state-approved or accredited, and would their teachers have to be licensed as public school educators are?
Would the state place stipulations on tuition costs at participating private schools, so they don’t raise their rates as many did in Arizona after the rollout of a universal voucher program?
Speaking with reporters last week, Lee promised accountability measures but declined to give specifics. He expects Republican leaders to file the bill on his behalf in the next few weeks, after his administration gets more feedback from lawmakers and stakeholders.
“Getting that input’s important for us to finalize the language that we think is the most agreeable to the most folks,” he said.
Rep. John Ray Clemmons of Nashville, who chairs the House Democratic caucus, called that approach “backwards.”
“They’re trying to craft something to get enough votes, instead of looking at the data and research on whether vouchers are good public policy,” Clemmons said.
Meanwhile, the pro-voucher Beacon Center released a poll last week finding broad support from Tennesseans for expanding such programs statewide. However, the group did not use the word “voucher,” which tends to poll worse, in its question to Tennesseans.
School safety: Renewed discussion, but no gun laws (it’s an election year)
Tennesseans were unnerved when an armed intruder shot and killed three children and three adults at a private Christian school in Nashville on March 27, in the middle of last year’s legislative session. And the growing impact of gun violence on kids across the state is undeniable.
But Republican lawmakers’ response last year was to further harden schools rather than entertain any proposals to restrict gun access — not even for people who are deemed at risk of hurting themselves or others, as the Nashville shooter had been.
Some of them have organized news conferences and rallies at the Capitol this week for students, educators, and others to voice their concerns. Meanwhile, a group of parents from The Covenant School in Nashville, where the tragedy took place, say they’ll continue to advocate for changes to “ensure responsible firearm ownership, safe schools, and accessible adequate mental health care for all individuals across Tennessee.”
They include several measures to let certain citizens or school employees carry handguns in schools, and a bill to require all public and private schools to create alarm policies that differentiate emergencies for fire, weather, or an active shooter.
A new bill, from Republican Sen. Mark Pody of Lebanon and Rep. Susan Lynn of Mount Juliet, would let schools purchase lanyards equipped with emergency alert buttons for school staff to wear around their necks.
But don’t expect the legislature to look seriously at bills to restrict gun access in an election year, according to several key Republicans.
“I do not believe there’s an appetite or pathway to success for any legislation that might be introduced that is going to infringe on constitutional rights of law-abiding citizens,” said Senate Majority Leader Jack Johnson, of Franklin.
With the latest State of the Child report ranking Tennessee near the bottom nationally for access to mental health resources, Johnson sees more room for discussion on that topic.
“I think a big conversation in the coming session will be how we strengthen our mental health safety net,” Johnson said, “as well as general access to mental health treatment in Tennessee.”
Third-grade reading law: Lawmakers may revisit retention provision — again
Now under the same law, the state may have to retain thousands of fourth graders who test poorly this spring.
“I think we have to look into it,” said Rep. Mark White of Memphis, who chairs a House education committee. “We’ve probably got a lot of fourth graders who have already done summer school and tutoring but still won’t pass that test. It’s never a bad thing to have off-ramps and waivers.”
He added: “I want us to continue looking closer at Kindergarten, first, and second grades so we’re not waiting until the third and fourth grades to address these challenges.”
But Sen. Jon Lundberg, who chairs his chamber’s education panel, is less inclined to make more changes in the 2021 law.
“We’ve set the standard for proficiency and for showing adequate growth, and I don’t want to move those,” he said.
Federal education funding: Talk about rejecting it looks like just talk, for now
House Speaker Cameron Sexton, a Republican from Crossville, surprised many in his own party last year when he floated the idea of Tennessee rejecting more than a billion dollars in federal funding for students, which he said could be offset with state tax revenues.
Legislative leaders polled by Chalkbeat last week said they haven’t heard of any legislation coming out of the hearings.
“It doesn’t hurt to know where our funding is coming from and how it’s being spent,” said White, the House’s education leader, said of the task force’s discussions, “but I don’t see that conversation going anywhere in the short term.”
Teacher shortages: Vacancies could lead to creative thinking
With Sexton declaring that Tennessee has enough state revenues to cover more than $1 billion in federal funding, plenty of public school advocates asked why the state wouldn’t use that excess instead to accelerate the governor’s plan to raise the minimum salary for teachers to $50,000 by 2027. (This year, the base is $42,000.)
Districts struggled to fill nearly 4,000 vacancies statewide last school year, especially in the middle grades, English as a second language, world languages, and special education, according to one report. And shortages of school bus drivers are a nationwide problem.
Lee told reporters that, while state revenues have flattened in recent months, Tennessee’s economy remains strong.
“We should probably look at our investments in public school funding and investments in teacher pay every year,” he said when asked about the prospect of accelerating pay increases.
Currently, the state covers less than half of health insurance premiums for its teachers, while state employees get 100 percent of their premiums covered. Moving teachers to the state employee plan could be a boost to both teachers and the local districts that employ them.
Professional Educators of Tennessee (PET) has also called on the legislature to develop policies to address child care access and affordability for teachers, more than 80 percent of whom are female.
“If you want to keep good teachers,” said PET executive director JC Bowman, “ease their burdens so they can focus on their work in school to educate and nurture our future generation.”
To follow this year’s legislative business, visit the General Assembly’s website for calendars, committees, legislation, and livestreams.
Marta Aldrich is a senior correspondent and covers the statehouse for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Contact her at maldrich@chalkbeat.org.
Chalkbeat is a nonprofit news site covering educational change in public schools.
Nashville and Shelby County governments have pulled out of their more than 3-year-old legal dispute with the state over a 2019 private school voucher law.
The paperwork to withdraw their latest appeal was filed quietly on Aug. 25 with the Tennessee Court of Appeals, according to court documents.
The pullout by Tennessee’s two largest counties is the latest setback for efforts to overturn the controversial education savings account law, the signature legislation of Gov. Bill Lee’s first year in office.
The law, which allows the state to give taxpayer money to eligible families to pay toward the cost of private school tuition, was declared unconstitutional by a Nashville judge in 2020 because, at the time, it affected students only in Nashville and Memphis, where local officials have consistently opposed vouchers. But after several appeals, the Tennessee Supreme Court ruled in favor of the state in 2022 and resurrected the law, allowing the program to launch last year in the two counties. This fall, the state rolled out the program in Hamilton County after lawmakers voted earlier this year for expansion.
On Friday, Nashville Law Director Wally Dietz declined to comment about the decision to pull out of the suit, as did E. Lee Whitwell, chief litigation attorney for Shelby County government.
But Dietz, whose office has been leading the charge on the Nashville-Shelby lawsuit, noted that the legal challenge remains alive through a second lawsuit filed in 2020 by the Education Law Center and the Southern Poverty Law Center on behalf of 11 public school parents and community members in Memphis and Nashville. Their appeal is pending before the state’s appellate court.
The state Supreme Court’s ruling in May 2022 rejected Metro Nashville and Shelby County’s argument that the voucher law violated a “home rule” provision in the Tennessee Constitution. The latest court battle has been over whether plaintiffs in both lawsuits have legal standing to pursue the case based on other legal claims, such as a constitutional clause that requires the state to maintain a system of “free public schools,” with no mention of private schools.
In a split vote in late 2022, a three-judge panel of Davidson County Chancery Court dismissed those claims. Soon after, attorneys behind both lawsuits appealed that ruling to the Tennessee Court of Appeals.
Chris Wood, a Nashville lawyer helping to litigate the remaining lawsuit, said the pullout by Metro Nashville and Shelby County has no bearing on his case filed jointly with the Education Law Center, the Southern Poverty Law Center, and the ACLU.
“We’re still here,” Wood said Friday. “Our case has always been our case. And while it’s good to have other folks working with you, this really doesn’t have an impact on what we’re doing.”
A spokesperson for the Tennessee attorney general’s office did not immediately respond when asked Friday about the development.
Currently, Tennessee’s education savings account program has fewer than 2,000 students enrolled in 75 state-approved private schools in the three counties where it operates, significantly below this year’s 5,000-seat cap.
Rep. Mark White, a Memphis Republican who chairs a House Education Committee, has said he expects to file legislation next year to take the program statewide.
Marta Aldrich is a senior correspondent and covers the statehouse for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Contact her at maldrich@chalkbeat.org.Chalkbeat is a nonprofit news site covering educational change in public schools.
State Capitol (Credit: Tennessee State Government)
The days of skyrocketing tax revenues are likely over, multiple budget experts told Tennessee’s panel in charge of predicting revenue growth.
The financial experts predict the state and national economy will grow, but at a slower pace over the next two years. This, combined with the state’s business tax cuts enacted earlier this year, will slow the state’s revenue, making them harder to predict.
For the past five years, Tennessee’s revenue has grown from $17.4 billion to $24.7 billion. This has allowed the state to spend more money on projects and keep up with the growing wages for employees.
The revenue projections made by the state funding board are crucial as programs boosted by federal coronavirus relief funds expire, leaving the state with the option of whether to cut them or fund them from its own revenue. The projections will also factor into whether the state can afford to fund any new programs or whether it can cut taxes.
If the panel goes with a negative growth rate, the state would have to cut its current spending, dip into its reserve funds, or increase revenue with new taxes.
The funding panel heard presentations from economic experts at East Tennessee State University, the state Department of Revenue, the Federal Reserve, the Tennessee General Assembly’s Fiscal Review Committee and the University of Tennessee.
The various officials detailed Tennessee’s economic outlook, giving out projections for future tax revenue over the next two years. The funding board will use these predictions as it sets the revenue projections for state officials to use when developing next year’s budget.
Tennessee’s budget hearings start Tuesday, and the governor will submit his proposed budget to state lawmakers before his State of the State address in late January or early February of 2024.
Several of the experts pointed out that part of the reason Tennessee’s revenue isn’t growing as fast is because of a significant business tax cut already leading to a slowdown in franchise and excise tax collections. From July 1 to Sept. 30, 2023, these taxes missed projections by around $61.4 million.
Most of the state’s revenue gain over the past five years has been driven by the ability to collect taxes on internet sales and an enormous growth in franchise and excise tax collections. Budget data shows that nearly two-thirds of the increase in state revenues came from these two areas.
He predicted tax revenue would grow by less than 1 percent in each of the next two years. Officials from the revenue department made a similar prediction, estimating virtually no revenue growth over the next two years.
Representatives with the Tennessee General Assembly’s Fiscal Review Committee and those from East Tennessee State University were more optimistic, predicting positive growth. Fiscal review officials projected 1.1 percent revenue growth next year and 3.4 percent the year after, while ETSU economists went with 4.8 percent and 4.2 percent.
Over the past few years, the state’s funding panel has used expert predictions to set revenue growth below their estimates, creating a surplus in revenue.
During this period, state officials used the surplus to increase its funding for schools by $1 billion, give $884 million in incentives to Ford and contribute $850 million towards professional sports stadiums in Nashville and Memphis.
The state funding board — whose members are Finance and Administration Commissioner Jim Bryson, Secretary of State Tre Hargett, state treasurer David Lillard and Tennessee Comptroller Jason Mumpower — will meet again on November 29th to finalize the projected growth rate.
Tennessee Lookout is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Tennessee Lookout maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Holly McCall for questions: info@tennesseelookout.com. Follow Tennessee Lookout on Facebook and Twitter.
Tennessee Education Commissioner Lizzette Reynolds has unveiled a new calculation for giving A-F letter grades to the state’s 1,700 public schools. The overhaul is her first major initiative since coming to the job in July under Gov. Bill Lee’s administration. Photo courtesy of Tennessee Department of Education
After months of asking Tennesseans how the state should judge its public schools when giving them their first A-F letter grades, Education Commissioner Lizzette Reynolds mostly ignored the feedback.
In her first major initiative since taking the helm of the state education department in July, Reynolds chose a school grading system that elevates the importance of proficiency — whether students are meeting certain academic standards on state tests — over the progress that schools make toward meeting those standards over the course of a year.
It’s also significantly different from what Tennesseans have asked state officials for since Reynolds announced in August that an overhaul in the state’s grading system was coming. The overwhelming feedback at 10 town halls, meetings with stakeholders, and in nearly 300 public comments was for keeping the calculation focused on growth, as it has been the last five years.
Reynolds’ plan is similar to the model backed by ExcelinEd, the education advocacy group founded by former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and where Reynolds previously served as policy director.
It will still include improvement as a factor, as required by a 2016 Tennessee law, but achievement will get more weight than under the original formula — and there won’t be a way for schools to meet the achievement criteria by meeting certain improvement goals, according to a presentation to the state Board of Education.
“This version is recalibrating that balance point and is going to say more about where the kids are in those schools right now,” said David Laird, assistant commissioner of assessment and accountability in the education department. “It is less of a referendum on maybe what the school’s impact has been, but it’s more clearly articulating their challenges right now.”
The department also announced that the grades will be released in mid-December, a month later than previously planned. State officials say they need more time to verify data going into the grades.
This is the first time the state will issue its letter grades since the 2016 law requiring them took effect. Previous attempts were called off because of testing glitches and the pandemic.
There are several other changes to the calculation.
The formula will factor in test scores for science and social studies, although not as much as for math and English language arts, which were the focus of the original model.
Gone is data related to chronic absenteeism. A new factor will be how well schools are helping their lowest-performing quartile of students to improve. For high schools, college and career readiness will be included, based on measures such as ACT scores, post-secondary credits, or industry credentials.
The debate about growth vs. proficiency was the biggest concern for school leaders who have been waiting and planning for grades for five years.
Focusing on proficiency likely will mean fewer A’s and generally worse grades than expected for many schools, especially those serving students from lower-income families in rural and urban communities.
Beyond the stigma of getting a D or an F, officials representing those schools eventually may face hearings before the state Board of Education or audits of their spending and academic programming.
Several board members worried that teachers could flee schools graded D or F, exacerbating the challenges faced by schools in high-poverty areas, where students face extra challenges before they even walk into a classroom.
“It’s a struggle for me to think about saying everyone should pull themselves up by their bootstraps, when some folks have a closet full of boots, and some have none,” said Darrell Cobbins, who represents Memphis on the board.
Many education advocates worried the state could return to an era when schools with many affluent students coasted to the top ratings, while doing little to show they were helping students improve. Meanwhile, schools in high-poverty areas will have little chance to earn an A or B, they told Chalkbeat.
“Measuring only absolute proficiency for 50% of a school’s grade will most certainly disadvantage our highest-poverty schools,” said Erin O’Hara Block, a school board member for Metropolitan Nashville Public Schools, who served on the working group giving input to the state.
“I’m not sure what this system is supposed to motivate for schools, nor how it will truly inform parents on differences in what various schools can offer to their children,” she said.
Reynolds said the letter grades are a tool to provide families and school communities with information they can use to make decisions, not necessarily to incentivize schools to improve.
“We want to tell the truth about whether or not our kids are actually achieving,” she said.
But Gini Pupo-Walker, director of the Education Trust in Tennessee, is hopeful the grades will somehow be tied to extra resources to help struggling schools.
“We look forward to learning more about how the state plans to support schools that receive D’s and F’s,” she said, “and ensure schools are paying attention to the success of all students.”
Marta Aldrich is a senior correspondent and covers the statehouse for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Contact her at maldrich@chalkbeat.org.
Chalkbeat is a nonprofit news site covering educational change in public schools.
A 2016 Tennessee law required the state to assign each public school a letter grade, A to F, based mostly on student test results. The intent was to give parents and communities an easy way to assess the quality of education at each school.
Nothing about it has been simple, though. Since the law took effect, the state hasn’t issued any grades, mostly because of testing glitches and the pandemic.
And now there’s a new complication: As the state prepares to finally issue its first grades in November, the education department and its new leader are revamping the grading formula. The changes likely will mean fewer A’s and generally worse grades than expected for many schools, especially those serving students from lower-income families in rural and urban communities.
The rollout will be a jolt to many Tennessee public school leaders, who have been waiting and planning for these grades for five years, thinking they understood what the criteria would be. And beyond the stigma, the grades could have real consequences: Officials representing schools that get D’s or F’s eventually may face hearings or audits of their spending and academic programming.
“It almost seems like we’re trying to change rules after the game’s already been played,” said Brian Curry, a school board member in Germantown, during an August town hall in Memphis to discuss potential changes with state officials.
At the crux of the state’s late change is a long-running debate over proficiency vs. growth — whether students should be judged based more on whether they meet certain academic standards, or on how much progress they make toward those standards. Where the state lands in that debate is especially important for schools where students face extra challenges even before they walk into a classroom.
But many public school leaders believe there’s a larger political motive behind the sudden drive by Gov. Bill Lee’s administration to change the rules: advancing his school choice agenda.
Under a 2019 voucher law pushed by Lee, Tennessee now provides taxpayer money to help some families send their children to private schools. But the program has fewer than 2,000 students enrolled in the three counties where it operates, significantly below this year’s 5,000-seat cap. Lee wants to expand enrollment and eventually take the option statewide.
“Think about it,” he continued. “If you have an A or B school in your community, that may not motivate parents to want to pull their kids out of public schools to use a voucher.”
Several other district leaders brought up the same concern to state officials at town halls hosted by the department in August and September to get public feedback about revising the grading formula. But state officials flatly deny there’s a connection between the voucher law and changes to the grading formula.
The grading law “was passed to promote transparency, and families should be able to know and to understand how their students’ schools are performing,” a department spokesman said in a statement to Chalkbeat.
Education Commissioner Lizzette Reynolds said the goal of the new formula is to generate grades that signify meaningful differences in school performance in a way that make sense to Tennesseans, whether they reflect proficiency, growth, or other criteria that are ultimately chosen.
“Whether you are a student, parent, teacher, policymaker, or an interested community member, school letter grades will empower all Tennesseans with the information they need to support K-12 public education and our local schools,” she said.
State law requires that Tennessee’s model for grading schools take into account student performance and improvement, as demonstrated on annual state tests, and it allows inclusion of other reliable indicators of student achievement. The statute directed the education department to come up with a formula to turn those results into a single letter grade for each school, to be published online on the State Report Card.
When developing the calculation under former Republican Gov. Bill Haslam’s administration, the department stressed achievement and growth in math and English language arts. And it created two pathways for schools to demonstrate achievement.
One way was based on what the state calls “pure achievement,” meaning that a certain percentage of a school’s students demonstrated a required level of proficiency, skill, or knowledge. By this metric, a school that started the school year with a high proficiency rate was likely to receive an A even if it had not improved student learning during the school year.
The other way rewarded schools that met certain goals to move their students toward proficiency from one year to the next. The idea was that all schools, especially those serving low-income students or that have historically performed poorly, should have an opportunity to get an A as long as they make strong progress toward the state’s achievement goals.
So even the achievement part of the grading formula could be fulfilled with strong growth. In this way, Tennessee was an early adopter of a growth-heavy model when developing its accountability system.
“All means all!” became the mantra of then-Education Commissioner Candice McQueen as she worked with education stakeholders for nearly a year to design a system to incentivize improvement for allstudents — whether they are considered low, average, or high achievers — as well as for all schools, regardless of their demographic makeup.
Tennessee had modest success with that approach, even though the actual letter grades were never issued. Before the pandemic hit in 2020, students were showing incremental growth in math and reading based on some of the nation’s highest proficiency standards.
But state lawmakers have become increasingly impatient with the pace of improvement, especially in reading. About a third of the state’s students meet grade-level standards on the English language arts test, which requires students to demonstrate the ability to read closely.
“At the end of the day, I want to know: Can you add, subtract, multiply, and divide, and can you read, regardless of how much you have grown from one year to the other?” said Rep. Mark Cochran, an Englewood Republican, during one legislative hearing about the state’s emphasis on growth.
Meanwhile, the legislature has sought to provide more options for families dissatisfied with the performance of traditional public schools by introducing private school vouchers and allowing charter schools to open statewide.
Now as Tennessee revamps its school grading system, Lee’s administration is poised to shift weight in the equation from growth to pure achievement. Reynolds wants the state to do that by eliminating the growth pathway for demonstrating achievement. Growth would still be a component of the overall grade, as dictated by state law, but a much smaller part.
“I want to be very clear that when we’re talking about academic achievement, we’re talking about academic achievement,” Reynolds, the new education commissioner, said at an Oct. 12 meeting of education stakeholders.
Reynolds, who was sworn in to her post in July, launched the reevaluation of the grading system about a month later as her first major initiative. She invited Tennesseans to weigh in on how the state should measure a school’s academic success. At the time, state officials said all options were on the table.
At town halls, meetings with stakeholders, and in nearly 300 public comments from Tennesseans, state officials heard a common theme: Keep some kind of growth option as part of the achievement calculation. Measuring student performance with a single letter grade requires nuance, many educators said, and the growth-based model allows that.
A formula that’s weighted too heavily toward pure achievement, they warned, would produce grades that essentially mirror the economic profiles of the schools — with high-income communities getting the A’s and B’s — and families wouldn’t be able to use the grades to differentiate the performance of one high-poverty school from another.
“Given the strong correlation between achievement and poverty, I think it’s really difficult to talk about just achievement in isolation. We really need to balance this with growth,” said Madeline Price, policy director for the State Collaborative on Reforming Education, at an Oct. 5 meeting of the stakeholders group.
“All schools, especially low-income and traditionally low performing schools, should have a very real opportunity to receive an A” if they significantly improve student performance, the leaders of Tennessee’s school superintendent organization wrote in a letter to Reynolds.
Meaghan Turnbow, who coordinates programs for English language learners in fast-growing Rutherford County Schools, south of Nashville, noted pitfalls in a model that emphasizes proficiency over growth.
“We have students come to our district from all over the world with various education levels and English levels,” she wrote in a public comment. “Year to year they grow, but it may be several years before they are considered meeting or exceeding expectations.”
But soon after asking for public feedback, Tennessee’s new education chief signaled that she wanted to narrow the way the state judges student performance.
During an Aug. 29 town hall in Chattanooga, Reynolds acknowledged that the education department, before scuttling plans to issue grades in the fall of 2022 under former Education Commissioner Penny Schwinn, had run the numbers but didn’t like what it saw. For instance, she said, a school with 80 percent of its students reading on grade level might have received a B, but so might a school that had only 15 percent of students reading on grade level, while also demonstrating high growth.
“Is having a campus that has only 15 percent reading proficiency really a B school, if those kids cannot read?” Reynolds asked.
“We should celebrate growth,” she continued. “We should also celebrate achievement, because at the end of the day, kids can grow. But if they never get on grade level, they don’t have much of a future, particularly when it comes to reading and math.”
The A-F grading system, as required by the state, was billed as a simple, common-sense tool to help parents understand how their child’s school is doing and compare schools.
But changes the department is making could add a new layer of complexity for school communities.
When Tennessee developed its accountability plan in 2017, it opted for a single system to satisfy both the state law and a 2015 federal accountability law called the Every Student Succeeds Act, or ESSA. That way, “we’re not sending different messages to parents and the general public,” said Winstead, the Maryville schools director who served on the state task force that developed the plan.
ESSA doesn’t require A-F grades, but it directs the state to use its own criteria to identify schools that are academically in the bottom 5 percent, plus other schools showing low performance or significant disparities across groups of students who are Black, Hispanic, economically disadvantaged, or English learners, or have learning disabilities. Such schools become eligible for additional federal funding.
Because of the link between the two laws, the schools that would earn the lowest grades under Tennessee’s current formula are the same ones that would get federal support to help them improve. And educators would work with a common set of goals, priorities, and incentives.
Under Reynolds, the Tennessee education department appears ready to decouple the state’s A-F system from its federal compliance plan. The change would result in Tennessee having two accountability systems, potentially producing conflicting assessments of how a school is doing.
For example, if the new state formula places less emphasis on certain student groups than the federal system does, a school that has big racial or economic disparities in student performance could still earn high grades from Tennessee based on overall proficiency rates. Meanwhile, a school with low proficiency rates would get a D or an F, even though it may serve certain groups of students better than an A or B school.
Mary Batiwalla, former assistant commissioner of assessment and accountability in Tennessee, says what’s going on here has parallels in Texas, where Reynolds used to be chief deputy commissioner. Officials there changed their grading criteria this year to apply to schools retroactively. However, after some school districts sued that state over the changes, Texas delayed the release of its grades.
Texas lawmakers are also in the midst of a special session on vouchers to debate whether students should be able to use public dollars to attend private schools. Batiwalla worries that officials in both states are hijacking the grading systems for political aims, not to incentivize school communities to improve.
“If you want to do vouchers, do vouchers,” said Batiwalla, an outspoken critic of Reynolds’ efforts. “Don’t take away this policy tool that has the potential to drive improvement from the rest of the public schools.”
Other tweaks are likely when Tennessee releases its new equation in the days or weeks ahead, just before giving schools their first set of grades.
The department has heard calls to include social studies and science scores in the calculation, as well as data related to third-grade reading, participation in tutoring programs, and postsecondary indicators like dual enrollment and career and technical education offerings, just to name a few. There’s also a growing consensus around ditching student absenteeism data, which is a factor in the current equation.
But most educators have their eye on the growth vs. proficiency debate. They worry that greater emphasis on proficiency will motivate schools to focus on improving “bubble kids” — those scoring just under proficiency — instead of working to improve students at all levels of achievement.
“You’re incentivizing bad choices that serve just a few kids instead of all kids,” Winstead said.
Winstead’s suburban school system should be fine. Maryville City Schools, near Knoxville, is one of the state’s highest-achieving districts and stands to benefit if Tennessee’s revamped grading formula puts more weight on proficiency. But Winstead philosophically disagrees with the approach that the state appears to be taking.
“This is going to demoralize a lot of school communities,” he said, “teachers, kids, and parents — folks who have done incredible things to move kids forward.”
Marta Aldrich is a senior correspondent and covers the statehouse for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Contact her at maldrich@chalkbeat.org. Laura Testino covers Memphis-Shelby County Schools. Reach Laura at LTestino@chalkbeat.org.
Chalkbeat is a nonprofit news site covering educational change in public schools.
State Capitol (Credit: Tennessee State Government)
State lawmakers will likely end up passing only three bills (of the more than nearly 200 filed) as the Tennessee General Assembly’s special session seems set to wrap on Thursday.
The substance of the special session on public safety continued to collapse Wednesday morning as Senate Republicans tabled 21 bills in about a minute. This came after similarly cutting 52 bills on Tuesday, setting the total number of Senate bills that could be voted on to three.
Those bills all came from Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee. One provides free gun locks to Tennessee residents, mandates a safety course on safe gun storage, and exempts gun safes and safety devices from sales taxes. Another sets into law Lee’s executive order from April that tightens up background checks for the sale of firearms in the state. The last requires the Tennessee Bureau of Intelligence to file an annual report on human trafficking.
One final bill just sets aside the money from state coffers to pay for the legislative costs of the special session. That cost? It’s $58,000 per day, or $232,000 for the four-day run. State leaders said Wednesday they could not detail ancillary costs of the session, such as paying for the increased security around the Capitol by the Tennessee Highway Patrol.
House leaders were 30 minutes into a meeting of the State Government Committee Wednesday morning when a Senate leader effectively made moot discussions on bills that would continue the rest of the day on the House side.
Moments after the Senate Education Committee was gaveled in at 8:30 a.m., Sen. Jon Lundberg (R-Bristol) moved to table the 21 bills — from Republicans and Democrats — on the committee’s agenda. With no other information about the move at all, the committee adjourned. The Senate GOP supermajority, it seemed, had finished its work and was ready to head home.
House Republicans weren’t happy.
“Congratulations @tnsenategop on receiving the 2023 Ostrich Egg!” read a post on X (formerly Twitter) from the Tennessee House Republicans Tuesday afternoon. “It must be egghausting sending so many bills to [the general subcommittee, meaning no action taken during committee] instead of doing the work people sent us here to do.”
Credit: Tennessee House Republicans via X [This post has since been deleted.]
And a great many weren’t happy with that posting. Rep. Jeremy Faison, the apparent author of the post, apologized to members Wednesday morning. The post was deleted.
“Members, I have offended you with my actions yesterday and I want to offer you my sincerest apologies,” he wrote to fellow GOP members. “My only intention was to provide some levity while we are dealing with some very serious matters. It was not funny at all.”
Even Sen. Paul Bailey [the lawmaker who wanted to hang those set for executions here “from a tree”] wrote “You should be apologizing to the moms that were unjustly removed!”
To some, the Senate’s move to table so many bills seemed orchestrated, a continuation of Tuesday’s playbook.
“Now the House GOP is trying to blame Senate GOP for how this special session is playing out?” posted Rep. John Ray Clemmons [D-Nashville]. “Do they honestly think Tennesseans fail to realize that this whole taxpayer funded charade of nothingness and harm was jointly (albeit clumsily) scripted from start to finish?”
Tuesday’s Senate floor session had Lt. Gov. Randy McNally curiously chiding one Senator that “if you don’t follow the script, then we have to follow the rules.”
But the House plowed on with committees Wednesday, even though many of their bills would never make to the floor nor immediately into law.
Public sentiment got an early-morning win after a Davidson County judge ruled against GOP rules that banned the public from holding signs during meetings. Protest signs and applause from audiences members had the House Civil Justice Committee chairman Rep. Lowell Russel [R-Vonore] to use state troopers to clear the entire room, including mothers of Covenant School children.
That committee met again Wednesday morning, this time with another Representative — Rep. Andrew Farmer [R-Sevierville] chairing the meeting while Russell sat quietly to the side. Applause, boos, and jeers from the sign-holding crowd came easily. Farmer adroitly managed to get the legislative work done while tempering the crowd without raising their ire.
However, Farmer did ask for troopers help after lawmakers approved a measure that would allow certain people (with enhanced gun permits) to carry guns on schools as a way to help secure them against possible mass shooters. The crowd erupted, shouting “their blood is on your hands!, “cowards,” “you can’t un-kill our kids!” and “shame on you.” Farmer recessed the meeting until order was restored, though he never asked troopers to clear the room.
Senate leaders have tentatively set floor sessions for 9 a.m. and 2 p.m. Thursday. It is expected the session will wrap during one those.
