Tag Archives: Cameron Sexton

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Time to Decide

As Tennessee policymakers grapple with reforming the state’s school funding formula (BEP), the President of the Metro Nashville Education Association (MNEA) says it’s time to decide whether the state is truly committed to funding public education.

NewsChannel5 reports on school funding and comments made by MNEA President Michelle Sheriff:

Metropolitan Nashville Education Association reports Tennessee is 46th in the nation when it comes to funding schools.

The organization’s president Michele Sheriff said for students to be successful the funding needs to be adequate.

“The state needs to decide. You can’t underfund schools and then say schools are failing students. You have to provide the funding for what students need to see the success moving forward,” Sheriff explained.

While Sheriff and other education advocates are calling for more funding, some state leaders are making other suggestions.

Is Sexton Serious?
Windfall?

While House Speaker Cameron Sexton has called for a punishment-based incentive system – taking away money from schools and systems that don’t meet certain unnamed benchmarks – state Senator John Stevens has suggested local systems may get too much money from BEP reform.

“I’m not just going to give the locals a windfall by absorbing the costs that they’re supposed to pay for without them having some skin in the game,” Stevens said. “Because all the schools want to do is hire more people.”

Of course, Stevens fails to mention that Tennessee consistently ranks between 44th-46th nationally in state investment in schools and that the state’s own analysis suggests schools are underfunded by $1.7 billion.

TN School Funding Report Card: 1 D, 2 Fs
calculator and notepad placed over stack of usa dollars
Photo by Karolina Grabowska on Pexels.com

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Sexton’s Appointee to State Textbook Commission Urged Participation in Insurrection

House Speaker Cameron Sexton announced in November his appointment of Laurie Cardoza-Moore to the state Textbook Commission. Not only is Moore’s organization financially shady, she also actively encouraged participation (and participated in) the insurrectionist “rally” in Washington, DC last week.

Here’s more from her various social channels:

To be clear, if nothing happens at her confirmation hearing, this is who Cameron Sexton would have serving on the Textbook Commission.

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No He Didn’t!

Actually, yes, he did! House Speaker Cameron Sexton has appointed the controversial leader of an anti-Muslim advocacy group to the State Textbook Commission.

Cari Wade Gervin has more:

House Speaker Cameron Sexton (R-Crossville) has recently appointed Laurie Cardoza-Moore to the Tennessee State Textbook and Instructional Materials Quality Commission. The appointment, which had been vacant since 2019, runs through June 30, 2022. It is unpaid but does cover travel expenses.

Cardoza-Moore is the head of the Franklin-based nonprofit, Proclaiming Justice to the Nations (PJTN), a Zionist organization that ostensibly fights anti-Semitism. While that might seem like a noble cause, PJTN’s tactics are really in support of a Christian return to Israel. They also happen to take a very anti-Muslim way to get there.

The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) has deemed PJTN a hate group for its work, which include initiatives like “Stop Access Islam.” (This designation led Amazon to delist the group from its Smile program last year.)

State Rep. Gloria Johnson of Knoxville weighed-in via Gervin:

“I don’t think we want to invite conspiracy theorists into leadership positions that require objectivity and discernment. Nor do we want to give hate speech a platform and bullhorn,” says Johnson, who serves on the House Education Committee and is a former public school teacher. “When I think about the thousands of Tennesseans who support public education and want to collaborate to make it better, it boggles the mind we would select someone who has gone on a crusade in the national media to malign public education.”

Read more from Gervin on this appointment.

As Gervin notes, Cardoza-Moore’s appointment has not yet been approved. However, it’s unclear if enough House members will have the courage to challenge their fairly new Speaker. Sexton is generally well-respected and often thought to be a supporter of public schools. He opposed Gov. Bill Lee’s school voucher scheme, for example.

Cardoza-Moore’s appointment to the Textbook Commission comes shortly after Gov. Bill Lee named former Rep. Bill Dunn to an advisory role in the Department of Education.

It seems the state’s leadership has spent the time after the recent election stockpiling key advisors who are openly hostile to the state’s public schools.

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

Your support – $5 or more – makes publishing education news possible.