Soulsville Charter School senior Elisha Muhammad says a high school internship set her on a new path to advocate for those trying to overcome systemic barriers.

Tennessee’s black male students statistically lag other demographics in enrolling, persisting, and completing post-secondary education. The State Collaborative on Reforming Education (SCORE) held a panel Wednesday to discuss how to reverse that as part of its SCORE Institute informational series on preparing students for Tennessee careers.“This SCORE Institute, and many of you have been here through kind of the series of SCORE Institutes, but this one in particular is focused on Black male success. And that’s not to say that there’s not room for improvement in serving all students well, but the data for Black males in particular is alarming,” said SCORE Vice President of Strategy Mary Cypress Metz.

In 2021, Lewis County Schools’ career and technical education (CTE) department utilized a $124 thousand state grant to give its rural Middle Tennessee students a head start on getting the skills they need for a job after high school.The district spent the money to create a mock hospital and purchase healthcare training simulators to replicate clinical scenarios for students. That grant additionally helped purchase equipment enabling students to produce live-streamed school events and construction equipment to help them create a school-based enterprise that produces various products.“The district expects the purchases to promote student experiences with various industries and move them faster and further in dual enrollment and postsecondary programs and eventually to high-demand, high-wage jobs,” wrote Tennessee Comptroller Research Analysts Kim Potts and Allison Pams.