Delivering on a Promise

Lee moves forward with planned privatization of state’s public schools

Despite mounting evidence suggesting that universal school voucher programs are both expensive and ineffective, Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee seems determined to deliver on a promise from his 2018 campaign. That promise? Privatizing public schools.

NewsChannel5 reports:

Gov. Bill Lee is preparing to announce a plan to dramatically expand Tennessee’s controversial school voucher program, allowing K-12 students to receive taxpayer funding for private school regardless of need, according to talking points obtained by NewsChannel 5 Investigates.

Lee has long been an advocate of using tax dollars to fund unaccountable private schools.

Even though as early as 2016, Bill Lee was extolling the virtues of school voucher schemes and even though he’s a long-time supporter of Betsy DeVos’s pro-voucher Tennessee Federation for Children and even though he has appointed not one, but two voucher vultures to high level posts in his Administration, it is somehow treated as “news” that Bill Lee plans to move forward with a voucher scheme agenda in 2019.

Lee has continued his steady march toward full privatization of schools since 2019. Securing passage of his voucher scheme, advancing legislation that created a charter school commission, inviting Hillsdale to hijack our schools.

He even made a successful push to change the state’s school funding formula to make it more appealing for private schools to accept vouchers.

Now, he’s going for the final blow: A universal school voucher plan.

This plan will be expensive and is not likely to have a positive impact on academic achievement.

In the above article, written in 2017, I noted:

Nearly 15,000 students who never attended public school suddenly receiving vouchers would mean a state cost of $98 million. That’s $98 million in new money. Of course, those funds would either be new money (which is not currently contemplated) or would take from the state’s BEP allocations in the districts where the students receive the vouchers.

Since then, two things have happened.

Lee’s plan envisions 20,000 students AND the guaranteed minimum voucher amount has increased.

The cost now would be $141 million. That doesn’t include any local offset for lost local funding (estimated to be about $8 million in Davidson County alone back in 2017).

If the state absorbs the cost, rather than passing it on to local taxpayers, there would need to be a fund of at least $100 million to cover those costs.

So, at minimum, Lee’s plan creates a voucher school district costing an additional $250 million a year.

All while our state remains in the bottom 10 in school funding.

Oh, and if the state does not create an offset fund, local taxpayers would be footing the bill – which would mean either local property tax increases (as happened in Indiana) OR a decrease in services offered in traditional public schools.

Lee is delivering on his promise, even though it’s expensive and even though data from other states and early data from Tennessee suggests it won’t improve student achievement.

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

A Policy of Privatization

New education commissioner ready to implement agenda that undermines state’s public schools

Gov. Bill Lee’s new Education Commissioner, Lizette Gonzalez Reynolds, has been on the job since July 1st and says her priority will be implementing a raft of policies supported by Gov. Lee and passed by the General Assembly.

Chalkbeat has more:

Three weeks into her job as Tennessee’s education chief, Lizzette Gonzalez Reynolds says her charge from Gov. Bill Lee is to implement existing major policy changes — from how reading is taught to the continued rollout of private school vouchers — not to craft new initiatives.

Privatizing the state’s public schools has long been a goal of Lee’s, and it seems he’s now chosen a chief implementer of that policy.

Of course, privatization also comes in the form of handing public dollars over to unaccountable charter school operators – like Hillsdale College.

Then, there’s the state’s dangerous new school funding formula, TISA:

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

Georgia On Our Mind?

Tennessee lawmakers appear determined to expand vouchers to both Chattanooga and Knoxville this year. In fact, the Senate has already passed legislation expanding the state’s Education Savings Account (ESA) program to Chattanooga at the request of Hamilton County state Senator Todd Gardenhire. Now, the House may add Knox County to the voucher expansion and send the plan back to the Senate.

Meanwhile, Georgia lawmakers recently rejected a voucher plan.

More from The Education Report:

So, it’s encouraging to see Republicans in a Southeastern state say NO to vouchers. Which is what just happened in Georgia.

The legislature there just rejected a voucher expansion plan – with most Democrats and a handful of rural Republicans voting no.

Why would rural lawmakers oppose vouchers? Because local taxpayers don’t want to be stuck with the fiscal impact of supporting TWO school systems.

And that’s exactly what happens when public money supports private schools by way of vouchers – or even charter schools.

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

Privatization Efforts Deferred – But Not Denied

Efforts to privatize Tennessee’s public schools were deferred today in a key House Committee.

The privatization push includes potential expansion of school vouchers into Knoxville and the other would open the doors for charter schools to operate in districts without first being subject to local review.

More from The Education Report:

This bill (HB433), as currently written, would expand the state’s school voucher program (known as Education Savings Accounts, or ESAs) to Chattanooga. Currently, the voucher scheme only applies to students in Memphis and Nashville.

It’s bad enough that some policymakers are ready to expand this privatization program to another Tennessee school district. However, what’s even more alarming is that Education Administration Committee Chair Mark White has filed an amendment to expand the program even further – this time into Knoxville.


As you might recall, I wrote about an amendment to the charter legislation that would:

  1. Create a scheme for allowing charter schools that serve homeschooled students
  2. Allow for the creation of residential/boarding schools that are charter schools

These new charters would also be able to bypass local school boards and apply directly to Bill Lee’s State Charter Commission for approval.

That would mean zero local input and zero local accountability – even though millions of local tax dollars would be spent supporting these charter schools.


It’s important to look at these pieces of legislation for what they are: A clear agenda.

Gov. Lee and his legislative allies want to privatize our public schools.

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

Legal Challenges to Voucher Scheme Continue

While Gov. Bill Lee’s school voucher scheme started this year in Memphis and Nashville, legal challenges to the plan continue. All of this while some lawmakers are seeking to expand the program to Chattanooga and possibly beyond.

Chalkbeat reports:

Metropolitan Nashville and Shelby County governments, which jointly challenged the 2019 law that applies only to their counties, notified the Tennessee Court of Appeals late last month that they will appeal the latest ruling. Attorneys representing parents and taxpayers in a second lawsuit submitted a separate notice of appeal.

The appeals will extend the 3-year-old legal battle over Gov. Bill Lee’s controversial Education Savings Account program for at least several more months. The program provides taxpayer money for eligible families in Memphis and Nashville to help cover private school tuition for their children. 

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

What’s the Rush?

Gov. Bill Lee has moved quickly to implement his school voucher scheme as courts have cleared the way for it to start this school year.

So far, though, not many families are expressing serious interest.

The Tennessean reports that as of the first day of school in Memphis and Nashville (the only two districts eligible for vouchers), only 30 applications had been submitted for approval.

As of Monday morning, only 30 families had submitted an actual application, according to information from Department of Education spokesperson Brian Blackley. The department received applications from 40 schools, he said, noting that application process has closed.

While Lee has claimed that several thousand families want the vouchers, that has not yet been borne out in the application process.

MORE EDUCATION NEWS

Back to School 2022

Team Kid’s Privatization Payroll

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NPEF Opposes Voucher Program

Amid news that Gov. Bill Lee’s office and Department of Education plan to begin a school voucher program in Memphis and Nashville for this school year (2022-23) following the lifting of an injunction that had been blocking the scheme, the Nashville Public Education Foundation (NPEF) issued a statement expressing opposition to Lee’s move.

Here’s the statement:

Governor Bill Lee announced yesterday that the Tennessee Education Savings Account (ESA) program will enroll students for the upcoming school year in Davidson and Shelby counties.The Nashville Public Education Foundation (NPEF) opposes this decision and the ESA program. While NPEF supports high-quality school options for all students in Nashville, the foundation believes public dollars should stay with public schools. In addition, research suggests conflicting and inconclusive evidence on the effectiveness of voucher programs on academic achievement for students.  NPEF will continue to support Nashville students and Metro Nashville Public Schools to create a public system of education where all students can thrive.
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Voucher Case Gets New Court Hearing

Chalkbeat reports that a case against Gov. Bill Lee’s school voucher scheme will receive another hearing before the Tennessee Supreme Court as that body attempts to assess the constitutionality of the program.

The Tennessee Supreme Court will rehear arguments in the case of educational savings accounts, also known as vouchers. The court’s announcement on Tuesday comes in the wake of the death of Justice Cornelia Clark who was on the bench in June to hear the arguments, but died of cancer in September before the court was able to issue a ruling.

In the brief order, court members said that “in light of the untimely death of Clark, this court has concluded that re-argument will aid the resolution of this appeal.”

At stake in the case is the future of school vouchers in Tennessee. Republican Gov. Bill Lee pushed the educational savings accounts, or school voucher law, in 2019, as a way for students in Nashville and Memphis to use public funds to pay for private education, supplies, and tutoring. The program was to begin with 5,000 students and grow to 15,000 by the fifth year, but the program never got off the ground as multiple courts blocked it.

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

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Vouchers and Taxes

The Associated Press is reporting that after much debate, Tennessee’s school voucher plan (education savings accounts) will be counted as taxable income for some families.


Tennessee’s top education officials say a small number of parents who participate in the state’s latest school voucher imitative might be taxed for participating in the program.


The development on Monday comes after months of debate between policy officials, education advocates and lawmakers over whether the new school vouchers for private education will be considered federally taxable income for parents.

The announcement on taxes comes following a November statement by Education Commissioner Penny Schwinn that vouchers would be subject to taxes:


… Penny Schwinn dropped a bombshell yesterday when she told a legislative committee that the value of a voucher under the state’s new education savings account program would be considered taxable income for the purpose of federal taxes.

Following that announcement, Gov. Bill Lee said he didn’t believe the vouchers would be taxed. Now, it appears that at least for some recipients, accepting an education savings account will also mean accepting an increased tax burden.

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Policy Shift

Tennessee’s next Governor, Bill Lee, is an unabashed voucher supporter.

As the General Assembly prepares to return in January, it will be important for policymakers to focus on what gets results instead of what the new Governor thinks is the cool new thing for Tennessee schools.

Derek Black, who teaches law at the University of South Carolina and focuses on education policy issues, points out some flaws in arguments in favor of “school choice” in a recent column in Salon.

His argument is essentially that a lack of accountability in many choice programs combined with the financial strain they put on traditional K-12 schools has a devastating impact and must be re-examined:

The current debate over school funding must move beyond teacher salaries and whether the books in public schools are tattered. Those conversations ignore the systematic policies that disadvantage public schools. Increasing public school teachers’ salaries alone won’t fix the problem. The public school teaching force has already shrunk. Class sizes have already risen. And the rules that advantage charter and private schools remain firmly in place.

Long-term solutions require a reexamination of these preferences. As a state constitutional matter, the law requires that states make public education their first priority. It is not enough to make education one of several competing priorities. And as a practical matter, states cannot continue to ask public schools to work with whatever is left over and then criticize them for doing a poor job. This cycle creates a circular justification for dismantling public education when states should be repairing it.

Black’s analysis is especially relevant in a state that consistently brings up the rear in investment in education and also continues to lag behind in overall student achievement.

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