For just over a decade, an organization known as Tennesseans for Student Success has been pushing an ever more aggressive school privatization agenda. By spending big on elections, the group has gained significant influence in education policy debates.
And, well, while TSS has won a lot of fights, the results aren’t so good for Tennessee schools and communities:
In the decade+ that TSS has been seeking to influence Tennessee education policy, the state has seen the creation of a universal school voucher scheme that costs $300 million, including millions of dollars in payments to a private vendor to administer the program.
Tennessee now ranks last in the nation in investment in public education and would need $1.9 billion to catch up to our neighbors in Mississippi.
Thanks in part to the policies advanced by the lawmakers backed by TSS, Tennessee teachers are now making less (6.5% less) in inflation-adjusted dollars than they were when TSS was just starting.
In fact, the state’s investment in schools in real dollars has dropped by 10% over the past two budget cycles – budgets dominated by education policies championed by TSS.
