More on 2016-17 Testing in Tennessee

From an email sent by Commissioner McQueen to teachers:

Today we finalized our contract with Questar as our primary vendor to develop and administer state assessments this school year. As we move forward with a new assessment vendor, we’re also streamlining our assessments to provide a better testing experience for you and your students. Below are several changes to our assessment structure for the coming year. You can find more detailed information in our updated FAQ (here).

We’ll continue to share more information soon and look forward to sharing assessment blueprints by the end of July

  • •We’ve eliminated Part I. All TCAP tests will be administered in one assessment window at the end of the year. Assessments that require extended written responses, like the writing portion of ELA tests and the writing portion of the U.S. history test, will be completed at the beginning of the testing window to allow the vendor time to expedite the scoring process.
    •We’ve reduced testing time. In grades 3–8, students will have tests that are 200-210 minutes shorter than last year. As an example, for a typical third grader, the 2016-17 TCAP end of year assessments will be shorter by 210 minutes compared to last year. In high school, most individual End of Course assessments have been shortened by 40-120 minutes. For a typical eleventh grader, this would mean the 2016-17 TCAP End of Course assessments will be shorter in total by 225 minutes compared to last year. Please see the complete testing times chart here for further information.
    •We will phase in online tests over multiple years. For the upcoming school year, the state assessments for grades 3–8 will be administered via paper and pencil. However, the department will work closely with Questar to provide an online option for high school math, ELA, and U.S. history exams if both schools and the testing platform demonstrate early proof of successful online administration. Even if schools demonstrate readiness for online administration, districts will still have the option to choose paper and pencil assessments for high school students this year. Biology and chemistry End of Course exams will be administered via paper and pencil.
    •In the coming school year, the state will administer a social studies field test, rather than an operational assessment, for students in grades 3–8. This will take place in the operational testing window near the end of the year. This one-year reprieve provides time to develop an assessment for the 2017-18 school year aligned to the state’s Tennessee-specific social studies standards. However, the operational U.S. history End of Course exam for high school students will continue as planned for the 2016-17 school year.
    •Additionally, some students will participate in ELA and/or U.S. history field tests outside the operational testing window. The ELA field test will include one subpart featuring a writing prompt; the U.S. history field test will also include one subpart featuring a writing prompt. One-third to one-half of students will need to participate in this field test, and the group of students selected to participate will rotate each year.

The goal of TCAP hasn’t changed—we’re providing students the opportunity to demonstrate their critical thinking, problem solving, and writing skills to ensure they’re progressing on the path to success after high school. However, we’re taking a smarter logistical approach with a qualified, proven assessment vendor.

Most importantly, we’re committed to listening to you and partnering with you to create meaningful assessments. Our partnership with teachers is a critical component of our assessment program. We eliminated Part I, moved to a phase-in approach for online testing, and reimagined the writing prompts and scoring timetable largely based on feedback from teachers, and I look forward to continuing these important conversations. We’ll also continue to involve Tennessee educators in many aspects of the assessment process, including item review, bias and sensitivity review, rangefinding, and standard setting. Additionally, beginning this year, we will also work with Tennessee educators to write new test items; the first workshop will be in October—stay tuned for more information.

 

For more on education politics and policy in Tennessee, follow @TNEdReport


 

TN Teachers Part of Award-Winning ESSA Team

Tennessee teachers and Hope Street Group Teacher Fellows Natalie Coleman and Debbie Hickerson were part of a team being recognized for their efforts on development of an ESSA strategy plan.

Here’s more from a press release from Hope Street:

This week, a cross-state coalition of Hope Street Group Teacher Fellows will join 11 other teams in Chicago as finalists of the Learning Forward and the National Commission on Teaching & America’s Future’s Agents for Learning Challenge. The challenge, which called upon educator teams across the country to create plans that detailed innovative uses for federal funding for professional learning and student outcomes under the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), named the Hope Street Group State Teacher Fellow team of Trey Ferguson (NC), Cassie Reding (KY), Carly Baldwin (KY), Natalie Coleman (TN) and Debbie Hickerson (TN) as finalists. The “Game Changers” team from Hope Street Group is the only team with representatives from three different states to receive this honor. Hope Street Group National Teacher Fellows will also be strongly represented: current Fellow Sarah Giddings and former Fellows Debbie Hickerson and Rebecca Wattleworth will also be in attendance to present theirinnovative proposals with their respective teams.

Trey describes their team’s initial incentive to throw their hat in the competition ring:

“My teammates and I felt too many professional learning opportunities were happening to us, not for us, and definitely not with us. Too many systems are being developed from the top down and do not provide adequate resources or accountability to enhance good teaching practices.”

The finalist teams represent a diverse and knowledgeable group, among them 56 teachers, administrators and learning leaders from 12 different states. When asked about their strategic approach, team member Natalie Coleman tapped into the need for collaboration among educators:

“Our proposal focuses on collaboration and learning from excellence, and we have proposed a model of professional learning that makes it possible for teachers to learn from one another through observations, peer feedback and ongoing follow-up sessions.”

Hope Street Group, a national organization that works to ensure every American will have access to tools and options leading to economic opportunity and prosperity, was given the unique opportunity to plan and sponsor the event:

“We were honored to be asked to co-sponsor this event and help plan it,” commented Dr. Tabitha Grossman, the National Director, Education Policy and Partnerships for Hope Street Group. “Giving teachers an opportunity to share their insights and innovative ideas about how educators can learn together and individually is something we hope to do more of in the coming months with the partners who are involved in this event.”

Dr. Stephanie Hirsh, executive director of Learning Forward, weighed in on the call for teachers to lend their leadership–their expertise, experiences, and input–in the distribution of ESSA funding:

“States tell us they are looking for ways to capture stakeholder input, and the creative and bold ideas in the applications show how much these engaged educators have to offer as we enter the implementation phase of ESSA.”

In addition to the proposal presentations, the Chicago event will feature opportunities for the team members to engage to receive coaching to refine their plans and build skills in advocating with policymakers. As evidenced by the insight offered in the proposals, the challenge further demonstrates the need for teacher voice in education policy on the school, district, state and national levels. Educators can provide a firsthand perspective into what is effective and needed by students, themselves and their colleagues. A unique perspective only they can offer.

The presentations from the top 12 finalists will be live-streamed from 1:00pm to 3:30pm (CST) on July 22nd and can be viewed from this URL:http://www.learningforward.org/agentslivestream. If you are not available to watch on July 22, the recorded presentations as well as the teachers’ plans will be available online.

To learn more about Hope Street Group’s Teacher Fellows Program, please visit http://hopestreetgroup.org/impact/education/teacher-fellowships/. For additional information or questions, or to request interviews, please send an email to outreach@hopestreetgroup.org.

About Hope Street Group

Hope Street Group is a national organization that works to ensure every American will have access to tools and options leading to economic opportunity and prosperity.

For more on education politics and policy in Tennessee, follow @TNEdReport

 

MNPS Diversity Report: Rebuild Hillwood High School on Current Site

A new diversity report on the rebuilding of Hillwood High School has been released. Dr. Leonard B Stevens, an expert in school desegregation, reviewed the proposals for the school district and concluded that Hillwood High School should be rebuilt at its current location.

The report describes in detail different information about the proposal followed by a conclusion statement. Below, I will summarize the information in the report and copy and past the conclusion for each section.  

The report says the current site of Hillwood High School has equal driving time for those who live both north and south of the school.

Conclusion: In assessing the current location of Hillwood High School and the alternative sites, the district should seek to locate the school where it is reasonably central to the students it serves so that travel time and travel distance to the school for students and families have both the reality and the appearance of fairness.

When looking at the diversity of the Hillwood, the school is currently a plurality school because of the presence of zone option students, including students from “Black zoned options.” Movement of the school could risk removing these students from the school and would create a smaller and whiter population at the school.

Conclusion: since the Pearl-Cohn students are indispensable to the diversity of Hillwood High School and in light of the district’s commitment to diversity, the district should place significant weight on this factor and avoid a location decision that places the school’s diversity at risk and, in particular, its plurality school status.

The Office for Civil Rights, U.S. Department of Education is currently monitoring student assignment matters in the district.

Conclusion: In light of this ongoing review, the district should ensure that its decision on the Hillwood location matter is consistent in all respects with its Diversity Management Plan.

The report goes on to look at the schools in the cluster that meet the district’s diversity plan.

Hillwood High School, H.G. Hill Middle School, and Charlotte Park Elementary School are plurality schools that meet the district’s diversity plan.

Bellevue Middle, Westmeade, Harpeth Valley, and Gower do not meet the district’s diversity plan. Harpeth Valley is the school with the highest population of White students in the cluster, with 76% of student labeled as White.

If the new Hillwood High School is located south of the current location, it would mean moving the school towards a larger White population and away from the Black population in the north.

“The district should be sensitive to the potential for generating perceptions that this school location decision, however unintentionally, would disfavor Black students or students of color who live north of Hillwood High School and thereby could become a basis for racial distrust of the district.”

Conclusion: The district should seek to make a decision that affirmatively contributes to public confidence in the district’s expressed commitment to “preserve, support and further” diversity.

Fewer than half of the high school students zoned for Hillwood attend the school. Almost 450 high school students attend high school outside of the cluster. Why is that?

Conclusion: This is an opportune occasion for the district to review the Hillwood cluster at all grade levels with a view toward the potential to strengthen the attractiveness of the cluster’s schools to families living in the Hillwood cluster-as-extended. The study should explore program offerings, grade organization, and possible development of a Pre-Kindergarten center as strategies to attract cluster students to cluster elementary and middle schools and ultimately to Hillwood High School.

The report ends with the overall recommendation:

Overall Recommendation. The best next step for the district is to rebuild Hillwood High School at its present site.

Here are the four reasons the report lists as why the district should rebuild Hillwood High School on the location:

 

  • First, a premise that locating the school in the Bellevue area would place it closer to a larger share of its students is not supported by the data, which show that the current location serves about equal proportions of students who live north and south of the school.
  • Second, a premise that relocating the school to Bellevue would accommodate population growth in the area is not supported by enrollment projections which foresee modest growth of fewer than 70 students by 2020 at Hillwood High School, leaving the school well within its capacity.
  • Third, an assumption that relocation of the school to the Bellevue area would cause more students in this area to use Hillwood High School is speculative—this issue has not been studied— and, in addition, is undermined by the fact that 447 potential Hillwood High School students are choosing to attend MNPS magnet high schools instead. It seems unlikely that such students in substantial numbers would change their high school plans based on relocation of the cluster comprehensive high school. It is more likely that capturing more cluster students in cluster schools will require changes in the schools that students and families find sufficiently attractive.
  • Fourth, a premise that relocating the school to Bellevue would do no harm to the school’s current diversity status as a plurality school is a high risk assumption that does not place sufficient weight on the significance of the Pearl-Cohn students who attend the school through Zoned Options or open enrollment. Among the factors described in this report leading to the recommendation to rebuild on the current Hillwood High School site, the diversity factor is the most significant.

 

 

For more on education politics and policy in Tennessee, follow @TNEdReport.


 

 

Timing of Amy Frogge’s Town Hall Questioned

Questions have arisen about the timing of an official town hall hosted by Amy Frogge. With early voting already starting, Amy Frogge will host an official MNPS town hall about bringing a new high school to Bellevue.

The discussion of a new high school has been a campaign platform for both Amy Frogge and Thom Druffel, and her support for a new school is listed on a campaign direct mail piece that also invites people out for her town hall.

While allowed under law, Amy Frogge has invited people to this town hall through her campaign email account and through direct mail paid with campaign funds. By holding an official town hall event during early voting, is this event more of a campaign event to help Amy Frogge in the upcoming election?

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It’s similar to what State Senator Steve Dickerson (R-Nashville) is doing by using over $30,000 dollars in state money to send out constituent mail over the past few months. While both Frogge and Dickerson are allowed to use government funds in this way, it does not look good from the outside.

Bellevue residents who have been to many of these high school proposal events in the past were never contacted about this event, even though they have left their contact information at each event they attended.

The invite states that the Mayor’s Office, Metro Schools, Metro Parks, Metro Planning, and MTA will be in attendance at the event.

Metro Nashville Public Schools will have representatives from the Student Assignment & Planning Department and the Construction Department at the town hall. MTA will be sending sending staffers to the event.

When reached, the Mayor’s Office stated they were invited a few weeks ago by Councilmember Sheri Weiner, but that they do not believe anyone will be available for the event. The Metro Planning department will also not be at the event after a special meeting was called for the Planning Commission.

From the outside, this looks shady.

Update: 7/20: Metro Parks will not be attending the event. 

For more on education politics and policy in Tennessee, follow @TNEdReport.


 

Mary Holden Welcomes Dr. Joseph

Former teacher and current education blogger Mary Holden recently posted her remarks welcoming Dr. Shawn Joseph to MNPS. Here they are:

Good evening, members of the school board and Dr. Joseph.

My name is Mary Holden, and I am an MNPS parent and former teacher. Dr. Joseph, I want to welcome you to MNPS. I’m glad you’re here and happy to see the direction you’re taking so far, which seems to be that of someone who listens and learns from those around you.

Recently, I spoke to the school board about what I would like to see in a new director of schools. One thing I mentioned was that we need a champion for our schools. Many great things are happening here. However, the inequity that exists in our neediest schools is unacceptable. They need extra resources, funding, and support in order to make them equitable. I support the community schools model. What we don’t need is more charter schools. I have heard you talk about equity, and I am pleased to hear that this seems to be a priority.

Another thing I mentioned was the need to truly listen and respect the teachers in this district. When I worked in MNPS, I noticed the culture of fear right away. It’s a real thing. Teachers feel intimidated to speak up for fear of retaliation. I hope you are able to dismantle that culture of fear quickly, and I believe your approach so far has been effective.

There is an important issue I want to speak about. Over the last year, the human resources department apparently enacted a policy wherein any teacher who is going to be non-renewed will also automatically be made ineligible for rehire. This means if a principal feels a teacher is not a good fit, instead of simply non-renewing that teacher and letting them go back into the pool of eligible teachers, that teacher is basically fired and not allowed to apply ever again in this district.

I know of an experienced kindergarten EL teacher fired under this policy for low test scores – in kindergarten! A first year middle school English teacher told to teach math instead and then fired under this policy for low test scores. Teachers who speak out and ask questions and suddenly that principal doesn’t like them, so they’re fired under this policy. The careers of these dedicated teachers are now over and done with in MNPS. This policy is harmful to teachers and students. I have three requests for you: 1) that you get rid of this current “policy”; 2) consider a new written policy where more than one person must sign off on teachers who are specifically recommended to be ineligible for rehire, and 3) please consider reviewing the files of those teachers from this year whose careers are, for the moment, effectively ruined. We have lost good teachers because of this, and yet there are tons of open positions. It’s not right, but you can make it better.

Another concern I have is your 47-member transition team. I understand the need for a transition team. But 47 is an awfully high number, especially when I don’t see teachers and parents well represented. There are charter folks, TFA, business people, and complete outsiders, but not a lot of actual MNPS stakeholders. It’s disappointing.

Overall, I am excited for your work to begin here in MNPS, and I sincerely wish you the best. Thank you.”

For more on education politics and policy in Tennessee, follow @TNEdReport


 

 

What’s Amy Frogge All About?

She takes a moment to talk about her race on Facebook.  Here’s her post:

This article outlines what’s really going on in this year’s school board races: Well-funded special interests pushing unabated charter school growth and vouchers are trying to take down school board incumbents who won’t comply with their agenda to privatize schools. Why are they so interested in public education? There is much money to be made on the backs of our children.

At great personal cost, I have stood up against this effort for four years now. I’ve dealt with all sorts of lies and attempts to malign my character, because I’ve been a strong, effective voice against this agenda, which has nothing to do with educating children. Although it has taken a toll on my family, I am running again because it’s vitally important to prevent special interests from gaining control over the future of Nashville’s schools, and Dr. Joseph’s arrival on the scene marks a pivotal time of hope for our children, who deserve much more.

Remember that nasty push poll maligning me with false allegations? Stand for Children (which endorsed my opponent) paid $80,000 for polling this quarter alone. Stand for Children is also sending out numerous attack mailers on me. My personal favorite was their latest claiming that I don’t listen to parents, which is pretty comical given that I’m a public school parent myself who talks with other parents (and teachers) on a daily basis! Please don’t pay attention to these silly lies.

Here is what I’ve fought for (often successfully) over the last four years:
-evidence-based school policies
-less standardized testing
-whole child education that provides each child with a rich, broad curriculum that includes art, music, recess, and physical activity
-wraparound services for children in need
-high-quality pre-k
-individualized instruction and services for all students, including advanced and gifted learners, as well as those with special needs
(and much more!).

Over the last four years, I’ve watched the conversation about education (both locally and on a national level) turn toward this direction, and I’m proud that I’ve been even a small part of helping to change the conversation.

Regardless of what happens in this election, I will continue to use my voice to stand up for the best interests of our children. My involvement in this ongoing battle over our schools has absolutely nothing to do with politics and everything to do with standing up for what is right. I am grateful for the opportunity to make a positive impact on Nashville’s children and will continue to speak up as long as I can make a difference.
Please be informed and go vote!

Here’s more on the article she references from the Nashville Scene and the spending in her race and others.

For more on education politics and policy in Tennessee, follow @TNEdReport


 

Testing Time Reduced for 2016-17

The Tennessee Department of Education announced yesterday it is reducing the amount of time students will spend testing in the upcoming school year. The release comes shortly after the announcement of a new testing vendor.

Here’s the full release:

Tennessee Education Commissioner Candice McQueen announced significant changes to state assessments today that respond to feedback from educators, parents, and students—including eliminating Part I in all subjects, restructuring the test to better fit within the school day and year, and reducing overall testing time. The changes come as the department finalizes its contract with Questar, the primary vendor for the 2016-17 Tennessee Comprehensive Assessment Program (TCAP).

“We have learned a tremendous amount from our testing experience this past year, and we want to make the right adjustments to create a positive, balanced culture around testing in Tennessee’s classrooms,” McQueen said. “These adjustments will give educators a greater ability to maximize rich, well-rounded instruction for all our students. We are still working toward the same goal of providing aligned, rigorous assessments to measure what our students know and can do, but now we have a smarter logistical approach and a strong partnership with Questar to achieve this goal.”

Overall, testing time has been reduced by nearly a third. The exact reductions vary by grade. In grades 3-8, students will have tests that are a total of 200-210 minutes shorter. As an example, for a typical third grader, the 2016-17 TCAP assessments will be shorter by three and a half hours compared to last year. In high school, most individual End of Course assessments have been shortened by 40-120 minutes. For a typical eleventh grader, this would mean the 2016-17 TCAP End of Course assessments will be shorter in total by 225 minutes—or three hours and 45 minutes—compared to last year.

One assessment window at the end of the school year

TCAP has been the state’s testing program since 1988, and it includes state assessments in math, English language arts, social studies, and science. As the state has transitioned to higher academic standards in math and English language arts over the past several years, those tests have become better aligned to what educators are teaching. The assessments now include rigorous questions that measure students’ writing, critical thinking, and problem solving skills.

The 2016-17 TCAP will be given in one assessment window at the end of the school year, and the tests for the four subjects have been divided into shorter subparts. This change is in response to feedback from district and school administrators, who expressed some difficulty with fitting the longer sections into the regular school day. The new timing is outlined on the department’s website. These reductions and adjustments reflect Commissioner McQueen’s desire to reduce testing and streamline administration while still providing students with ample opportunity to do their best work. The specific changes to each subject area are included in the department’s fact sheet.

In addition, the 2016-17 social studies test in grades 3-8 will be a field test. Field tests are not reportable and do not factor into students’ grades or educators’ evaluations, and they will provide the department with information to develop an assessment for the 2017-18 school year. There will also be a separate field test for the English and U.S. history writing prompts. One-third to one-half of students will participate in the field test each year on a rotating basis. Based on educator feedback, the department is administering these writing field tests at a separate time to address concerns about students’ stamina to complete two writing prompts during the main testing window.

Tennessee teachers already have significant input in the test development process as they review and approve every TCAP question, including those that will be on the 2016-17 assessment. Starting this fall, Tennessee teachers will also be engaged in developing and writing questions for future TCAP administrations.

Contract finalized with new vendor

As part of today’s announcements, Commissioner McQueen shared that the department has fully executed a two-year contract with Questar, a national leader in large-scale assessments, to administer the 2016-17 TCAP. Questar has experience developing a statewide test on a similar expedited timeframe as well as with administering it at a scale even larger than Tennessee’s.

Last week, the department announced it intended to award the contract to Questar. As part of that announcement, Commissioner McQueen also announced that the department would phase in online testing over the next three years, with a paper option always available for the youngest students. In the 2016-17 school year, all testing in grades 3-8 will be done on paper. High schools will have the option to test online if they and Questar show early readiness for online administration, but districts can choose paper for their high school students if they prefer.

As part of its contract with Questar, the department has made a number of improvements to testing timelines, including working with the vendor to expedite the overall scoring process so the assessment can be administered in one window and ultimately, results can be delivered to schools and families more quickly.

Resources for schools, educators, and families

Following the execution of the contract, the department immediately began to finalize resources to familiarize students, parents, and teachers with the 2016-17 TCAP.

The assessments are designed so that the best test preparation is strong teaching and learning every day. Questions on the 2016-17 test will be similar to those students saw last year. To help students become familiar with the test format in advance, this fall students and teachers will have access to sample test questions. Practice tests will also be available in EdTools, an online platform for educators and district leaders, in August.

The department is also finalizing test blueprints, which map out exactly what standards will be covered on the test, and expects to release these by the end of July. In addition, the department is also working on guides for families and educators, which will be shared with district leaders and on the department website within the month.

To help address questions about today’s announcements and next year’s test, the department has prepared a Q&A document that can be accessed here and will be updated as more details become available.

 

For more on education politics and policy in Tennessee, follow @TNEdReport


 

MNPS School Board Race Spending

Amanda Haggard has an interesting piece out about the MNPS School Board race and the key players.

She covers groups like Project Renaissance/Nashville RISE and Stand for Children.  And she notes their top targets: Will Pinkston and Amy Frogge (they are less aggressively against Jill Speering).

It turns out, the same donors and backers supporting Renaissance/RISE are also spending to unseat Pinkston and Frogge.

Frogge penned a pieced not long ago about why school board race spending is skyrocketing.

Here’s Haggard on the spending this year:

And then, of course, there’s the money. So far, Druffel has outraised Frogge by $10,000, bringing in almost $37,000 — $20,000 of which came from donors in District 8. Pinkston has secured a little under $70,000, along with endorsements from Mayor Megan Barry and former Gov. Phil Bredesen, for whom Pinkston was a top aide.

Miller has brought in around $90,000, with the largest contributions coming from charter school backers like DeLoache and Trump supporter and English-only backer Lee Beaman. Stand for Children’s O’Donnell says checks are on the way from his organization and mailers have already been sent out in support of its endorsed slate. Additionally, Beacon Center board members other than Beaman have donated the maximum amount in multiple races.

It’s worth noting that Beaman and the Beacon Center are supporters of school vouchers. Likewise, as was noted in an earlier piece on Nashville RISE, the umbrella group Education Cities is backed in part by voucher advocates:

And here’s something interesting about all that: The funders of Education Cities include The Broad Foundation, the Walton Foundation, and The Gates Foundation — the Big Three in corporate education reform.

Perhaps more interesting is the group of partners, including the pro-voucher Fordham Institute.

Early voting begins tomorrow. Stand for Children says it is sending mailers and more money is coming to defeat Pinkston and Frogge (and ostensibly Speering). This in spite of some rather odd reasoning around Stand’s endorsements.

What does all this mean? The next few weeks will likely see the MNPS School Board races turn a bit ugly, as those who want a new agenda spend aggressively to defeat the very incumbents who have brought about mayoral collaboration and the arrival of a much-heralded new Director of Schools.

For more on education politics and policy in Tennessee, follow @TNEdReport


 

 

 

 

TC Weber, Amy Frogge, and The Tennessean

TC Weber is up with a post today on the Tennessean’s recent endorsements in Nashville’s School Board races.

He provides a thorough rundown of each endorsement, but I want to focus on his comments regarding Amy Frogge and the Tennessean’s decision to not only endorse her opponent but also chastise her for her social media and other behavior.

Here’s what TC had to say:

This brings us to District 9, quite possibly the most egregious of all the endorsements. The Tennessean chose to endorse challenger Thom Druffel over incumbent Amy Frogge. In doing so, they didn’t only endorse Druffel, but utilized this opportunity to take Frogge out to the proverbial woodshed in a manner that runs counter to their call for greater civility among board members and honestly, came off as a personal attack. They wrote, “A passionate parent and attorney, Frogge also has served as a disruptive force unwilling to step outside her box and has shown a pattern of being responsive and respectful only when constituents agree with her. Whether it involves social media behavior like writing acerbic posts and deleting comments that are critical of her, this behavior is not conducive to productive community engagement.”

Hmmm… let’s take a look at some of those posts and you be the judge. There was a piece Frogge wrote on excessive testing that was picked up by the Washington Post, another from The Tennessean about the importance of teacher voice in the national discussion on education, and one that Diane Ravitch picked up on her blog where Frogge discusses discipline issues in a local charter school. The tone throughout these posts is direct, factual, and research-based. The one on discipline caused the most uproar, but tell me, how is that different from the what Secretary of Education John King has been recently saying about discipline practices in charter schools? I guess when the Secretary of Education says it, it’s thought provoking, but coming out of the mouth of an intelligent and vocal woman, it’s being a disruptive force. (emphasis added)

Here, TC nails it. In the same endorsement piece where the Tennessean endorses Will Pinkston in spite of what they claim is his bad behavior on social media, they call out Frogge for being disruptive and endorse her “nice” opponent.

What else did the Tennessean find disruptive? The fact that Frogge advocated to have a woman included among the finalists for MNPS Director of Schools. They claim her push for this inclusion could have derailed the entire process. First of all, there’s little evidence that simply adding a candidate for consideration, even fairly late in the process, would have taken the whole search off track. Second, let’s look at the MNPS directors of the past — all men.

Frogge should be commended for raising the issue. And likewise, when her colleagues pushed to move on without adding a candidate, Frogge didn’t throw a fit or leave the game, she kept on going. She stayed engaged. And she was part of the team that helped bring Shawn Joseph to Nashville. The same Shawn Joseph the Tennessean is excited about having here.

Amy Frogge is a fierce advocate for her schools and constituents and a strong presence on social media. She raises issues that are sometimes uncomfortable but that need to be addressed. As TC intimates, the Tennessean appears to be applying a double standard.

Fortunately, Frogge overcame a significant tidal wave of spending and negativity when she was first elected in 2012 and she’s well-equipped to weather the storm this time.

For more on education politics and policy in Tennessee, follow @TNEdReport


 

Curlee to Resign

The Tennessean reports that controversial Williamson County School Board member Susan Curlee will resign:

“While it has been an honor to serve our community, I will be resigning from the Williamson County School Board effective August 1 for family & personal reasons,” Curlee, using her personal account, wrote in a post to The Westhaven/West Franklin Conservative Alliance Facebook group.

More on Williamson County Schools:

Just South of Nashville

What’s Going on in Williamson County?

For more on education politics and policy in Tennessee, follow @TNEdReport