Members of the Metro Nashville Public Schools (MNPS) Board of Education opened the district up for a lawsuit last month when they decided to rezone students away from attending LEAD Cameron Middle School.¶
The public charter school is unique in that it essentially operates like a normal zoned school that elementary students attending Fall-Hamilton, Glenview, and John B. Whitsitt in the district’s Glencliff cluster feed into when they advance to middle school. The arrangement is different from most other charter schools in Nashville that have open enrollment policies. Charter schools are free public schools operated by an independent contract or “charter” with an authorizing agency like a school district or the state.¶
The district’s plan moves Margaret Allen Middle School from the Antioch Cluster into the Glencliff Cluster, and feeds elementary students from Fall-Hamilton, Glenview, Napier, and John B. Whitsitt elementaries into that school instead of LEAD Cameron. The plan would additionally classify LEAD Cameron as an optional charter school, forcing families who want to attend it to apply.¶
LEAD Public Schools is now challenging the rezoning plan as a violation of its charter and the charter operator’s lawsuit took direct aim at what the change will mean for students.¶
“The rezoning plan removes the highest performing middle school in the cluster, LEAD Cameron, as the automatic zoned option for the mostly minority and low-income families in the Glencliff cluster, leaving them with a zoned school which has had significantly less academic success,” said LEAD Public Schools in its lawsuit.
