Representative Mark White says state intervention needed in Memphis-Shelby County Schools following Superintendent firing

Representative Mark White (left) talking to House Speaker Cameron Sexton (center) and Arkansas GovernorSarah Huckabee Sanders (right) (Photo by Sky Arnold

State Representative Mark White, R-Memphis, says he’s working on legislation to provide Tennessee with the ability to intervene in the Memphis-Shelby County School district.

Representative Mark White (Photo by Tennessee General Assembly)

Speaking to the Tennessee Firefly in advance of Tuesday night’s school board decision to fire Superintendent Marie Feagins after less than a year on the job, White says the school district is not functioning the way it should be.

“The challenges are many. With 100 thousand students the figures are right now their proficiency in reading is 23 percent, not acceptable. Math proficiency, 17 percent, not acceptable.  And we’re not moving the needle down there and then when you have issues like right now where the school board now wants to remove the superintendent for whatever reason after 8 months on the job,” said White.  “We’ve gotta have more consistency.” 

White will be chairing the new House Education Committee in this year’s legislative session. He says he could end up filing two pieces of legislation.

One bill would propose state intervention and takeover of the school district.

The other bill would create an advisory board consisting of seven to nine members appointed by the state that would have the authority to intervene in the district and operate separately from existing school board members.

“I’m looking at ways that the state can intervene in some way and say we’ve gotta have better management. We’ve got to bring things up. We have too many school buildings that young people in the building, the deferred maintenance is affecting their education. That’s going on,” said White. “So there are just so many challenges and having been in Memphis for so long, I think it’s time that we from the state level look at ways that we can intervene to put us on the right track.”

Lawmakers return to Nashville next week for a special session on Governor Lee’s plan to allow families to use taxpayer dollars to send their children to private school. White’s legislation would be discussed following the special session.