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USDA Cuts Hit TN Farmers, Schools

Still waiting for Gov. Bill Lee to condemn the cuts

A program that both helps schools provide meals to kids and offers a source of income for Tennessee farmers has been cut by the Musk-Trump administration.

With nearly 300,000 food-insecure students and more than $50 million in school lunch debt, Tennessee can hardly afford to lose even a penny of federal funding for school meals. Thanks to Musk’s DOGE agenda, though, the Volunteer State will be out $20 million.

The Guardian reports:

The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) has slashed two programs that provided more than $1bn for schools and food banks to purchase food from local farms and ranchers.

A chart of awards for the two local food programs funded by the USDA tells the story of how much states stand to lose as a result of the cuts.

Tennessee was awarded more than $20 million for these efforts in FY 2025.

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The Trump-Christian Nationalist Alliance

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Speaking Out on Watson’s Immigration Bill

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Bo Watson and Immigrant Education

It seems some of Sen. Bo Watson’s constituents are not too excited about his bill to essentially force Tennessee into a showdown with a Supreme Court decision on educating the children of undocumented immigrants.

Rev. Laura Becker, pastor of Northminster Presbyterian Church, refers to the effect of the bill as “harmful discrimination.”

“Not only am I a parent, a pastor, and a Tennessean, I’m a constituent of Bo Watson – the Senate sponsor of SB 0836 that allows school districts to refuse public school education to students based on their immigration status. I believe that every child is made in the image of God, and this kind of harmful discrimination against beloved children of God is offensive to me as a parent and as a pastor.”

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Speaking Out on TN’s Death Penalty

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TN Lawmakers Seek to Deny Education to Some Kids

Move seeks to set up Supreme Court challenge over educating migrant children

A bill in the Tennessee legislature would allow school districts and charter schools to refuse to educate children who can’t prove their legal status. The move seeks to challenge a Supreme Court decision that requires that public schools provide education to all children, regardless of legal status.

The bills – HB793 and SB836 – would impact as many as 10,000 students, according to an analysis by the Migration Policy Institute.

Currently, as a result of a Supreme Court decision (Plyler v. Doe), public school districts must educate all students, regardless of immigration status. The legislation aims to challenge that ruling and would allow schools to limit the provision of a free public education to only those children who could demonstrate citizenship or permanent legal status.

Cumberland Presbyterian pastor Rev. Joy Warren said of the bill:

“As a Christian pastor I believe that every child is made in the image of God and deserves the opportunity to attend a high quality public school in order to help them reach their full potential. So seeing this legislation that attacks our fundamental American rights and liberties that would take away the opportunity of immigrant children to attend public school is an attack on my values, both as an American and as a Christian. These politicians are scapegoating immigrants, including immigrant children, to divide and distract the American public.”

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Sen. London Lamar Takes on Medical Debt

Rejecting Summer Food Aid for Kids

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Bill Lee vs. Hungry Kids

Moral bankruptcy prevails in Lee Administration

Fiscally irresponsible and unjust.

That’s how the Tennessee Justice Center describes TN Gov. Bill Lee’s plan to reject federal funds to support a summer food program for kids.

Instead, Lee’s administration will create its own program – spending the same amount of state money to feed a lot less kids.

“Instead of serving 700,000 Tennessee children through Summer EBT, TDHS’s program will reach a max of 25,000 children. Despite spending nearly as much as it would take to serve the entire state, the Tennessee program will reach less than 4% of the children that received Summer EBT in 2024.”

Lee found money for a $1.1 billion voucher coupon program to help wealthy families save money on the private schools their kids are already attending – but he can’t find the money to feed hungry kids across all 95 counties this summer.

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Republicans Confused Over Dept. of Ed

They love to rail against but also appreciate the federal dollars flowing to their states

Even as President Trump moves forward with plans to weaken and, ultimately, dismantle the U.S. Department of Education, Republicans appear conflicted.

NPR notes that at a recent hearing, the conversation turned to explaining the key functions of the DoE:

The Department of Education has two main jobs, in addition to managing the federal student loan system: It protects students’ civil rights and sends money to schools that need it most. But, just as the department doesn’t control classrooms, it doesn’t control budgets either.

Schools tend to receive about 10% of their total budget from the federal government. The rest comes from state and local sources. Yes, that 10% makes a huge difference – schools don’t just have tons of money lying around. And, yes, if the Department shuts down, how that money is spent or allocated could change – or, there could be less overall allocation if left to the states or integrated into state funding formulas.

So, Republican lawmakers face a conundrum – join their party’s leader in bashing and trashing the Department OR stand up for the DoE and the funds and protections it brings to schools in their states.

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Trump, Musk, and Testing

Will the oligarchy kill the NAEP?

The Trump Administration may end up killing the gold standard of standardized testing – the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP).

Peter Greene reports on the DOGE destruction at the Department of Education, including cutting off the arms that collect and analyze data:

“The U.S. Department of Education has decided not to fund the NAEP 2024-2025 Long-Term Trend Age 17 assessment,” Marcie Hickman, project director of the NAEP Support and Service Center, said in an email to state officials. “All field operations and activities will end today, February 19, 2025.”

What has actually been canceled at this point is the test for 17-year-olds that was supposed to happen in the near future. Nobody seems to really know whether this cancellation will also affect all other future NAEP testing, but since Musk has gutted financing for the Institute of Education Sciences, the data wing of the education department, it sure doesn’t look good.

Will the era of big testing finally come to an end? It’s not clear – because, well, nothing about what’s happening at the federal level is particularly clear right now.

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Team Trump and Charter Fraud

The Privatizer-in-Chief seeks reduced accountability for charter school operators

Charter schools are the gateway drug to full-scale school privatization by way of vouchers.

Charters are so nice and easy, even some misguided Democrats have been known to support them. By contrast, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro is one of a very few prominent Democrats to support school vouchers.

The point: Charter schools ARE school privatization. Courts in Kentucky said so explicitly.

There’s a federal program that funnels money to charter schools, and under President Biden, that program was introduced to some accountability.

No surprise, then, that under Trump, the accountability for charters receiving federal funds is disappearing.

Peter Greene reports:

The federal Charter School Program has been shelling out grants to launch and expand charter schools since 1994. Analysis of the program by the Network for Public Education shows that one out of every four taxpayer dollars handed out by CSP has been wasted on fraud and/or failure. That means of the roughly 4 Billion-with-a-B dollars handed out by the feds, roughly 1 Billion-with-a-B dollars have gone to charters that closed swiftly, or never even opened in the first place.

Seems like something DOGE would be worried about.

But, um, no.

Instead:

Instead, yesterday the Department of Education issued an edict saying that the “unnecessary conditions and overly bureaucratic requests for information” would be stopped and that CPS would start handing out money more easily.

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Here’s How the Voucher Story Goes

It’s not a happy ending

A look at the voucher scheme in Florida offers a preview of where Tennessee is heading – and it’s not good.

An analyst in the state notes:

Peter Greene explores the Florida situation further, digging in with information from a professor from Florida State:

Cottle also wants to point out another factor. Florida used to run a huge budget surplus, but now it’s running a deficit. Cottle and others are trying to raise an alarm about math instruction and the need to improve math instruction, particularly by recruiting and retaining high-quality teachers. But the “still-growing budget for school choice vouchers is surely competing for money with ideas for initiatives to improve student learning, and the voucher budget is winning.”

In Tennessee, we should be alarmed:

Over the course of the next five years, as state funding is gobbled up by a privatization scheme and local taxes increase even as services offered remain the same or decrease, we can look back on this moment as the nail in the coffin of Tennessee public education.

Gov. Bill Lee won – and a generation of Tennessee students will lose as a result.

Gov. Bill Lee promoting school privatization

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Another Look at the 504 Lawsuit

Peter Greene examines a suit with far-reaching implications

I wrote a bit last week about a lawsuit by 17 states (not TN) that could change or end Section 504 protections.

Peter Greene adds more:

The Rehabilitation Act of 1973 was signed into law by President Richard Nixon in September of 1973. Section 504 of that act codified the civil rights of persons with disabilities. “No otherwise qualified individual” can be, simply because of their disability, “denied the benefits of, or subjected to discrimination” in any program or activity that receives federal funds.

That law has turned out to be hugely important in education, offering an even broader definition of students with special needs than the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA).

Green then highlights the threat:

Then, on page 37, as it reached its third of four counts, the lawsuit switches gears, arguing not for an excision of the new language, but the elimination of Section 504 entirely. The suit argues that Section 504 is “coercive, untethered to the federal interest in disability, and unfairly retroactive” and therefor unconstitutional.

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In Kentucky, a Demand for School Funding

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The Impact of the End

When the Dept of Ed dies or is decimated, here’s what could happen

An analysis out of Arizona demonstrates what’s at stake as President Musk and his associate, Trump, move forward with dismantling the federal Department of Education:

Now, Save Our Schools Arizona is offering an analysis of the potential impacts there. Again, as much as $1 billion could be impacted – and, to be clear, even if the final number lost is only a fraction of that amount, it will have real consequences for students and schools in the state.

TN also gets a nice share of cash from the feds. And sure, some of that money may be “block granted” to the states. But taking away a couple hundred million dollars is not a great way to help schools that are already under-resourced.

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TN’s School Funding Failure

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