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Why Money Matters

As the Sumner County Commission prepares to vote tonight on setting a tax rate that would in part fund a $4000 raise for every teacher in the county, local educator Kyle Craighead explains the importance of taking this step.

My name is Kyle Craighead, and I have lived in Sumner County my entire life except for the four years I attended Lipscomb University. I am a proud graduate of Hendersonville High School and am thankful for the education I received at Lakeside Park, Hawkins, and HHS. I began teaching science at Merrol Hyde Magnet School in 2008, where I also at various points coached basketball, tennis, and served as the athletic director and as a teacher leader. From 2016-2018 I taught biology and served as a teacher leader at Gallatin High School. I am currently in my 2nd year as an assistant principal at White House High school and am in my 12th year overall in education. My wife, brother, and several cousins are educators in Sumner County. Education is a calling, and my family is 100% devoted to doing what is right by our students in Sumner County.

You will likely hear many facts and figures tonight, and I have a few of my own, but I want to first tell a story. This summer in June we were interviewing for an open teaching position, and at the end of the interview we asked the prospective teacher if he had any questions for us. He then asked, “Well I don’t know how to ask this without sounding selfish, but I looked up the pay scale in Sumner County, and it looks like to me that I would take almost a 1200 dollar pay cut if I moved over here. I know that can’t be correct, so can you explain this to me?”

How do you answer that question? Sumner is the 9th wealthiest county in TN out of 95 counties. Robertson is 21st . I’m not talking about Williamson. I’m not talking about Davidson or Rutherford. Robertson is across the street from White House Middle School…literally. White House Heritage is less than 1 mile from White House High School. Let that sink in a minute. This is not a distant competitor.

When finding prospective teachers, we pride ourselves on selling a strong student and faculty culture as well as a supportive community, and it works. Everyone wants to work where they are respected and have growth opportunities. We have accomplished this in Sumner County Schools. But as the Sumner County Community as a whole, how can a brand new teacher looking for a job out of college think that they are supported when Robertson, Davidson, Wilson, Trousdale, and Macon counties all pay first year teachers more? How many teachers overlook Sumner immediately? How many drop out of interview pools when they figure out the pay scale? How many of our top level Sumner County graduates are going to decide to teach in a different county? When you’re talking about a salary of 35,000 dollars, every bit counts.

I want to say this to all parents of Sumner County students: you, like us, want the best education for your child. There are endless studies on the biggest influence on a student’s learning, and every one of them point to the classroom teacher as the most important factor. I am a parent of a future student in our county, and I don’t just merely want good teachers. I expect it. I demand it, just like all of the rest of the parents out there.

In summary, I hope you all see that I am not clamoring for ridiculous teacher pay increases. I’m not even arguing that teachers work way more and are far more devoted that anyone outside of education understands, because although those are very true and valid points, I’m making a simpler point and it is incredibly easy to understand:
Robertson, Trousdale, and Macon have a combined total of 95,000 residents. Sumner has over 160,000. Sumner routinely outperforms those other 3 counties on every measurable piece of student achievement and growth, and that’s because we have amazing teachers.

In terms of wealth, Sumner is 9th, Robertson is 21st, Trousdale is 40th, and Macon is 85th.Based on that evidence, how can Sumner continue to pay the least and expect to have the best teachers in the future?

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

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Regression to the Mean

A guest post from Ken Chilton, who teaches education policy at Tennessee State University

When organizations plan for strategic change, one tenet is to cherry pick some easy wins early in the process to build support for the program and new momentum. School districts across the state of Tennessee are doing exactly that. They are parading the recently released TVAAS data that shows big jumps in value-added achievement.

Good news should be trumpeted, but I’m not sure this is good news. Unfortunately, most people have no idea what TVAAS measures. A score of “5” out of a possible 5 sounds impressive; however, it is an extremely flawed measure of success. While TVAAS purports to measure student growth year over year, the Department of Education advises, “Growth scores should be used alongside achievement scores from TNReady to show the fuller picture of students’ performance.”

When happy education administrators state “math scores increased from 27.6% proficient or greater to 28.1%” what does this mean? How do we translate a school district’s TVAAS score or essentially meaningless *increase* in scores to your child’s performance? It simply means that on one day your child took a standardized test and was considered above/below a proficiency threshold designated by an education technocrat. It provides little information on your child’s level of achievement and/or the quality of her/his teacher.

Surely, we wouldn’t spend millions of dollars annually and weeks upon weeks on preparation on a test that is meaningless, would we? Sadly, the answer is yes. In statistics, the term “regression to the mean” is used to explain how extremely low and high performers tend to move toward the average over time. If you start with really low scores, it’s easier to show large gains. Achieving a one-year jump in test scores or value-added algorithms at the school or district level does not mean your district or school is performing at a high level.

For example, let’s take two groups of kids and test them on their ability to complete 50 pushups—our chosen benchmark for measuring fitness proficiency. Let’s assume group A completed an average of 65 pushups last year. Group A participants have private trainers and nutritionists who work with them outside normal training hours. This year, Group A completes an average of 66 pushups. The trainers did not achieve much in terms of value-added.

Group B, on the other hand, has had little training. Last year, they averaged 5 pushups per participant. After concerted efforts to improve their performance, they averaged 10 pushups per participant this year. They DOUBLED their output and would likely show high value-added performance. Granted, they are still woefully below the 50-pushup benchmark.

In a nutshell, superintendents across the state are celebrating a nebulous statistic. Critics of value-added tests to measure teacher performance have long argued that state tests—especially multiple-choice ones—are woefully inadequate measures of a teacher’s impact on learning. TVAAS assumes that teacher effects can be isolated from the array of external variables that are widely recognized as factors that affect student performance. So much of learning occurs outside the school, but none of these factors are controlled for in value-added scores.

Here’s the good news: positive things are happening. Celebrate that. However, don’t mislead the public. One year of data does not make a trend—especially when the 2018 data were massively flawed. What matters is performance. Tennessee’s TN Ready test focuses solely on Tennessee standards. As such, parents cannot compare student results to other states that have different standards.

If you want to know how well Tennessee performs relative to other states, focus on the National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP). NAEP is a good test and allows state-to-state comparison of performance using rigorous proficiency standards. It is administered every 2-years to randomly selected 4th, 8th, and 12th graders.

If you analyze NAEP data, Tennessee has not experienced sustained improvements in 4th and 8th grade reading and math tests over the last 3 testing periods. In 2017, 33 percent of Tennessee 4th graders and 31 percent of 8th graders achieved NAEP proficiency in reading. In math, 36 percent of 4th graders and 30 percent of 8th graders achieved NAEP proficiency.

The sad truth remains: most of the factors associated with student performance are related to socio-economic status. Inasmuch as poverty rates, absenteeism, parental involvement, household stability, and economic certainty are outside the control of school administrators and teachers, school performance data will underwhelm. Thus, we celebrate improvements in TVAAS algorithms that are not valid predictors of teacher performance.  

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Fund Us

In the wake of Governor Bill Lee’s voucher legislation that is poised to cost hundreds of millions of dollars and drain resources from public schools, the Fayetteville City School Board passed a resolution calling on the General Assembly to make a commitment to funding teacher salaries.

The Elk Valley Times has more:


The Fayetteville City School Board has adopted a resolution urging legislators to increase public school teachers’ pay by the same amount invested in Education Savings Accounts established through legislation passed by the General Assembly this past session.

The Board is asking school districts across the state to join in the effort. The resolution notes that current BEP funding for schools does not adequately fund teacher pay.


“ … Local school boards recognize that funding for teacher salaries under the Basic Education Program (BEP) under current law is insufficient,” the resolution continues. “ … Districts are funded based on a district-wide student-teacher ratio, rather than the actual number a district is required to employ to meet school-level ratio requirements … The teacher salary used for BEP funding does not represent the actual average teacher salary statewide.

While vouchers certainly impact school funding, it’s also worth noting here that Governor Lee made a significant investment in charter schools this year as well, doubling funds for charter facilities while offering teachers only a 2.5% increase in BEP salary funds.

Estimates indicate that funding the BEP salary component — funds given to districts for teacher pay — at an amount approaching the actual cost of hiring a teacher would mean spending in the range of $300-$500 million.

It’s not clear if Governor Lee or anyone in the legislature has a desire to actually improve teacher pay at a level that will make a real difference. Or, if anyone there even plans on undoing Governor Haslam’s mistake of freezing BEP 2.0.

It will be interesting to see how lawmakers respond if additional districts join Fayetteville in pushing for adequate pay for teachers. Will the same lawmakers who were so focused on ensuring vouchers didn’t “hurt” their districts also support providing their districts with the needed funds to compensate teachers?

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

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Got a teacher struggle story? Share: andy@tnedreport.com

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Don’t let your babies grow up to be teachers

A new report from PDK International, a professional association for teachers, indicates that most parents and teachers don’t want their kids to become teachers.

Here’s more:


“We ask parents whether they want their children to become teachers and when we started asking that question in 1969 there was good support from parents for having their children enter the teaching profession,” she tells CNBC Make It. “But when we asked the same question in 2018, for the first time, a majority of parents said they did not want their children to become teachers.”


“This year, when we asked teachers whether they wanted their own children to follow them into the profession, a majority of them said they did not,” says Richardson. “We do see a shift over time. As the teaching profession has become a lot more difficult, we’ve seen a lot less interest in the part of both the public and on the part of teachers in encouraging others to follow them into the profession.”

This report comes amid a growing national teacher shortage that has impacted Tennessee. In fact, Tennessee leads the nation in the number of inexperienced teachers in classrooms. This should come as no surprise to policymakers. As early as 2009, studies have noted Tennessee’s challenges with attracting and retaining teachers. Specifically, the Appalachia Regional Comprehensive Center noted:


Since 2009, Tennessee has identified shortages in the overall numbers of K-12 teachers needed for public schools as well as teachers for specific subjects. There is a critical need in the state for STEM teachers, as well as shortages in high school English, social studies, world languages, Pre-K through high school special education, and English as a second language.

It’s also worth noting here that Tennessee lags behind the rest of the country when it comes to the rate of teacher pay raises:


Average teacher salaries in the United States improved by about 4% from the Haslam Promise until this year. Average teacher salaries in Tennessee improved by just under 2% over the same time period. So, since Bill Haslam promised teachers we’d be the fastest improving in teacher pay, we’ve actually been improving at a rate that’s half the national average. No, we’re not the slowest improving state in teacher pay, but we’re also not even improving at the average rate.

This seems like the perfect time to mention the Teacher Struggle. If you’ve got a Tennessee Teacher Struggle story to share, email me: andy@tnedreport.com

Teachers are leaving. Students aren’t entering teacher education programs to replace them. Parents are telling their kids NOT to become teachers. It’s almost like there’s a full flown crisis and all lawmakers want to do is pour more gas on the fire.

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The Struggle is Real

As Sumner County considers providing teachers with a $4000 pay raise for the 2020-21 academic year, teachers there have taken to Facebook to explain the struggles they face under current salary conditions. Here are some excerpts from a few of those stories:

I teach full time, sponsor an extracurricular that requires multiple hours outside of the regular school day, and I work another job two nights a week and on occasional weekends. Wow this is just eye opening that people believe teachers have the nicest of everything. My apartment was flooded this week, and I’m potentially looking at having to move back in with parents until I can afford to get a house. That comment has me completely baffled.

I’ve been teaching for 18 years. I have had a second job for 16 of those 18. As a single woman, I have had a roommate for the last 10 years because I can not afford to live on my own. I have lost a home in foreclosure in the last 10 years. I will be paying for my student loans well after retirement age (I have a bachelors and a masters). I still live paycheck to paycheck with no savings to speak of. I drive a car that is 12.5 years old and was not purchased new. Would I choose to be a teacher again if I knew these circumstances? Yes. God has called me to this profession. But it only seems fair that people who work tirelessly to make a difference in the lives of children should be treated as the professionals that they are and compensated as such. Oh yeah, and before I was a teacher, I was a missionary. I had to raise 100% of my support. When I left the mission field and began teaching, I took a shocking pay cut. .


It’s not only a struggle financially, it is a struggle mentally, physically, and emotionally on myself and my family. The fact that I am at school hours before school begins, ends, and on weekends is crazy. The fact that my kids don’t understand why mommy spends so much time away from them when school is “over”. The struggle comes when I am constantly looking and comparing my bank account to when the next payday is and wondering what else I can find in the pantry to feed my family until payday comes around. The struggle is when it’s 5pm on a Monday, and I need to leave the classroom, and get all of the kids and take them home to eat, but I still have so much work that needs to be done in order to give my students the best.


If many teachers are having to work other jobs, you should know they can not and will not be able to give their best to their students. I was tired before the day began and I couldn’t grade timely enough because of my other responsibilities. (Fun fact – it’s in our contracts to not work other jobs that could get in the way of our performance)
4) It should not be okay that we justify paying teachers poorly because most teachers are female and have husbands that could support the family. That is a stereotype that isn’t always true nor should it be acceptable. Teaching isn’t a hobby. We are professionals with high levels of education. I literally panicked if I had to buy clothing. And I didn’t buy more than maybe a shirt at a time from Target.
5) The financial strain and lack of support for teachers is what makes great teachers quit. I LOVEEEEEE the relationships I build with my students. That’s why I teach. But sometimes, you can be too overwhelmed to remember that.

There’s more — a lot more. And it’s not just in Sumner County, where starting pay for teachers is about $4000 less than in peer districts and lags behind throughout a teacher’s career.

Tennessee is a state that pays teachers poorly and experiences a high teacher wage gap.

Since it’s back to school time, it’s a great time to share your “teacher struggle story.”

What struggles do you face as a Tennessee teacher? Do you work a second or a third job to make ends meet? Tell your story: andy@tnedreport.com

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

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Don’t Call it a Comeback

At the end of June, Pearson signed a two-year, $40 million contract to takeover the failed TNReady test. This is the third vendor in the five year history of the new, supposedly better test.

This is a role Pearson has played before. When the first TNReady vendor, Measurement, Inc. failed to deliver, Pearson came to the rescue. The effort earned the testing giant $18.5 million.

Here’s the problem: Pearson seems to have a habit of failing to keep student data secure. Two recent stories out of Illinois and Nevada raise questions about the ability of Pearson to protect student information.

From the Kane County Chronicle in Illinois:


Both school districts have notified parents that they recently learned from Pearson Clinical Assessment that the company experienced a data security incident related to their AIMSweb 1.0 product by an unauthorized third party. The districts used AIMSweb 1.0 to track student academic progress and are among 13,000 Pearson clients impacted by this incident.

And from the Nevada Review Journal:


More than 650,000 Nevada students had personal information exposed in a data breach announced this week by the state’s two largest school districts, prompting internet safety advocates to urge parental caution with products children use online.


The breach involved Pearson Clinical Assessment’s software program known as Aimsweb 1.0, which is used for screening and assessment.

This is not exactly a reassuring restart of Tennessee’s relationship with Pearson.

Maybe, though, they can effectively administer an online test without problems?

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

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$4000

That’s the raise teachers in Sumner County could see in 2020 if a proposal being advanced by Director of Schools Del Phillips secures funding from the Sumner County Commission.

According to Phillips, in a presentation made to the Sumner County School Board last night, the cost of the plan is an estimated $8.8 million. Phillips says he’s been working with the School Board in recent years to boost pay for classified employees and noted that all classified employees in Sumner County Schools now earn a minimum of $10 an hour.

The pay increase is necessary, Phillips argued, because similar systems are already paying teachers more than Sumner. Williamson, Wilson, Robertson, and Rutherford counties were used as reference points.

Here’s how Sumner County pay compares with these systems currently:

First year teacher with a bachelor’s degree

Sumner $36,100

Williamson $40,150

Wilson $40,000

Robertson $39,156

Rutherford $41,144

So, Sumner County has the lowest starting pay among peer districts — and it’s not even close.

Let’s look at veteran teachers.

Teachers with 15 years of experience and a master’s degree

Sumner $49,983

Williamson $57,463

Wilson $51,000

Robertson $51,204

Rutherford $59,842

Here again, Sumner County lags behind peer systems. Veteran teachers with advanced degrees make less in Sumner than in comparable middle Tennessee systems.

The new proposal would boost every step by $4000, ensuring no teacher started in Sumner at less than $40,100. Veteran teachers with advanced degrees would see mid-career salaries in the mid-50s, and those with 20 years or more would see pay in the $60,000+ range.

All of this would bring Sumner County in line with similar districts. Sumner already has one of the best benefit packages in middle Tennessee.

Phillips plans to ask the Sumner County Commission for a funding commitment for this plan at the August 19th meeting.

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No Approved Alternatives

The Tennessee Department of Education doesn’t give a damn about teachers. At all. Not one. And, apparently, they are also willing to ignore legislators. You know, the people tasked with both making laws and funding budgets. That’s the clear message from the attitude demonstrated by the TNDOE around the issue of Pre-K/Kindergarten Portfolios.

Here’s the deal: On May 10th, Public Chapter 376 became law — it’s legislation designed to create alternatives to the current portfolio disaster. The law states that districts may use the current (failed) portfolio model or “an alternative academic growth indicator approved by the state board of education.”

So, teachers will finally get relief from the fiasco that has been K portfolios.

IF the state has an approved alternative. Which they don’t.

Here’s the text of an email from Jaime Grimsley, Senior Director of Educator Effectiveness at the TNDOE (total bs job title):


The department is working with the State Board of Education to recommend alternative growth options to portfolio in early grades.  At this time, there are no approved alternatives to implement and all districts should move forward with implementing portfolios for the 2019-20 school year. Our goal is to have approved alternatives ready for use in the 2020-21 school year. 

Translation: We didn’t do what teachers asked and what legislators mandated. We don’t want to and you can’t make us.

Here’s more on how the TNDOE has failed educators and students in the portfolio process:


Kindergarten teachers I talked to estimate the evidence collection process takes up a minimum of five instructional days. This means students aren’t actively engaged in the learning process during the evidence collection days. As in the scenario with Eric, it requires the full attention of the teacher (and if possible, an assistant) in order to collect the evidence. This doesn’t include the tagging of evidence or the uploading to an often unreliable online platform known as Educopia. Some districts report hiring subs on evidence collection days so teachers can document the evidence from their students.

Eric’s story is just one more example of a Department of Education that claims victory when the evidence suggests much improvement is needed. It’s a Department hellbent on pursuing supposedly lofty goals no matter the consequences to students or their teachers.
Lost instructional time due to portfolio evidence collection? No problem!
Days of stress and chaos because TNReady doesn’t work? Outstanding!
Teachers faced with confusing, invalid evaluations? Excellent!
Eric and his teachers and Tennessee’s schools and communities deserve better.

So, teachers and students will have to wait ONE MORE YEAR until the DOE actually provides an alternative model. That means your Kindergarten student will be losing instructional time and that teachers across the state will be forced to jump through meaningless hoops in order to meet a ridiculous mandate.

Does the TNDOE care? Nope. Not at all.

Will legislators hold them to account? They haven’t yet, and there’s no sign the current crop of lawmakers or the Governor will do one damn thing to make the TNDOE responsive to the needs of those in classrooms.




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Making Failure Great Again

Governor Bill Lee has made no secret of his desire to expand charter schools across Tennessee. From doubling the funding available for charter school facilities to creating a “Super Charter Authorizer” that will override local school boards, Lee has made clear his disdain for public schools. A report from the Network for Public Education offers insight into why this strategy is destined to fail.

The report examines funds distributed by the US Department of Education’s Charter Schools Program and finds an alarmingly high 40% failure rate. Tennessee, always a national leader in the wrong categories, exceeds the national average with a 49% failure rate. Here’s more from the report specific to Tennessee:


Tennessee which has a 49 percent grantee failure rate, gave 38 grants of $10,000 each to schools that not only did not have a NCES number, they also did not have a listed name. Where did that $380,000 go? Apparently, the Department of Education has no idea.

Here’s more on the “success” of charters in Tennessee:

One hundred and twenty-one grants were given to open or expand charter schools in Tennessee from the federal charter schools program between 2006-2014. At this time, at least 59 (49%) of those charter schools are now closed or never opened at all. Fourty-three of the 59 grant recipients never opened at all.


Of the 43 that never opened, 38 did not even have a name. Only a grant amount was listed.

How much was spent on failed charter schools?

In total, $7,374,025.00 were awarded to Tennessee charter schools during those years that either never opened or shut down

This is the future Bill Lee wants for Tennessee — schools that never open or shut down just a few weeks into the year. Cash giveaways to private entities with little to no track record of positive impact. Taxpayer dollars wasted in the name of “choice” and the “free market.”

Bill Lee and his team of privatizers surely know these facts. They also don’t care. Steady, reliable service to the DeVos agenda of using public money to support private schools is all that matters.

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Bill Lee’s $200 Million Dream

During the voucher debate this past legislative session, I wrote about Governor Bill Lee’s Arizona Dream. I noted that Lee seemed determined to turn Tennessee into the same type of fraud-riddled education mess that decimated school funding in the Grand Canyon State.

Now, of course, the FBI is investigating Tennessee’s voucher vote. But instead of caution, Bill Lee is hitting the gas pedal and trying to move vouchers into our state even faster.

Let’s take a look at how that’s gone in Arizona:


Last year, nearly $200 million which otherwise would have been in the state’s coffers, money which could have been used to boost our shamefully low education budget, is paying for children to go to private schools.


Private school tuition tax credits, the state’s first voucher program, began in 1999. Back then, before vouchers, 44,050 students attended Arizona’s private schools, about 5 percent of the student population.

How did private school enrollment look in 2015, the most recent year I can find data for? In 2015, the number had risen to 46,250, which is an addition of 2,200 students over 17 years of taxpayer-funded vouchers — about 130 new students a year. That doesn’t sound like the kind growth you should expect given the investment we’re making.



Here’s a math problem for you. If Arizona had 2,200 more private school students in 2015 than in 1999, and in 2015, we spent $150 million on vouchers. How much were taxpayers pitching in for each new student? You’ll probably need to grab a calculator to figure it out, so let me give you the answer. It comes to $68,200 per new student.

$68,000 PER STUDENT.

That’s the cost to advance a voucher agenda that all the evidence indicates will fail the children it is designed to help.

That’s Bill Lee’s Arizona Dream. That’s the scheme he’s trying to foist (quickly) on Tennesseans.

Don’t let anyone tell you Bill Lee is a fiscal conservative who cares about protecting taxpayer dollars.

Here’s what his agenda makes clear: Bill Lee wants to take YOUR tax dollars and spend them on private entities regardless of outcome. Just because.

That’s bad policy. It’s fiscally irresponsible. It tells you all you need to know about Bill Lee.

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

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