It’s A Sellers Market for Teachers
Two years ago a friend of mine decided to move schools. Once he had it down to his two final choices, he realized he was in an abnormal position for a teacher. Both schools wanted him so much that he...
View ArticleAnnouncing the Official SCS Lawsuit
Its official – Shelby County Schools will sue the state of Tennessee over its funding formula. According to a press release today just before noon, Shelby County Schools “will file a lawsuit against...
View ArticleFighting the Summer Brain Drain
This is an updated version of a post originally seen on the Huffington Post on July 23rd, 2015. Growing up, I experienced one of public education’s intractable problems between June and September —...
View ArticleWhat Is Omni Prep Thinking?
This past spring saw a glimmer of hope for charter school accountability in Tennessee and Memphis. For the first time state law would require several under performing charters to be closed down due to...
View ArticleFederal vs State Control
This summer, both the House and the Senate voted on separate bills to reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) in an attempt to provide a much needed update to the bill. The Senate...
View ArticleLocal Schools Nominated for SCORE Prize
This past week SCORE announced its nominees for the annual SCORE prize, given to schools who are, in SCORE’s words, “rising to the challenge of preparing each student for success in the next grade and...
View ArticleIn Defense of JC Bowman
By Jennifer Martin For a few months now, Chris Brooks, the Tennessee Education Association representative for District 6, has been closely following Professional Educators of Tennessee president J.C....
View ArticleASD Takeover Target Data
This past week the Achievement School District informed six Shelby County Schools that they have a charter operator interested in taking them over for the 2016 school year. As always, I think it is...
View ArticleShelby Debate Saved for This Year
This past June, the Shelby Debate Society was hit with some startling news – our non-profit board had decided to cease league operations. This was a shock to all the coaches and students who have...
View ArticleThe Future of BluffCityEd and Tennessee Education
Two years ago I started Bluff City Education with a vision – a place for teachers to come and share their stories and their perspectives on education policy in Tennessee and engage in a critical but...
View ArticleVote Down Vouchers (Again)
This will be the third year in a row that I’ve re-published this piece in my opposition to vouchers. It’s as true now as when I wrote it in 2014, but includes a few updates to reflect new realities.Let...
View ArticleVoucher Proposal Doesn’t Add Up
Earlier today I returned to the blogging scene with a piece about why vouchers don’t make sense. There’s one argument that I left out however – not enough private schools would use them to make them...
View ArticleIf Dunn Really Wants to Help Memphis…
If you haven’t heard, Tennessee’s state-wide voucher program is likely dead after its sponsor, representative Dunn (R-Knoxville) failed to garner enough votes for it to pass the assembly. When reading...
View ArticleGetting Teacher Evaluation Right
Today Governor Haslam announced something that we’ve been calling for since 2014 – officially removing test scores from the 2015-2016 school year from teacher evaluation scores. Back in 2014, we...
View ArticleMemphis Lift Goes to Nashville
Memphis Lift, a parent advocacy organization based in Memphis Tennessee, just finished their 2nd big trip to Nashville for this school year. On Wednesday, the group of between 100 and 200 parents stood...
View ArticleAnalyzing the ASD’s Approach
In the early years of the Achievement School District (ASD), administrators held community meeting in school slated for takeover and confronted the community with their schools poor data. They were...
View ArticleNot On Anyone’s Side? Memphis Lift in Their Own Words
Last week, NPR Nashville ran a story about Memphis Lift parents traveling to Nashville to fight a bill that would have allowed parents of schools set to be taken over by the ASD avoid takeover. The...
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