The Sumner County Board of Education voted to move $15.5 million out of reserves to fund the first wave of stadium renovations, rebuilds, and facility updates in the district.The need for renovations arose following the collapse of Beech High School’s bleachers last month. A portion of the visitors’ bleachers at Beech High School’s Shackle Island Stadium collapsed overnight following days of heavy wind and rain.

The most controversial issue at Monday’s Williamson County School Board meeting wasn’t even on the agenda.Nearly three dozen parents and students came to the meeting to express their opinions on whether pride flags should be allowed in district classrooms.The issue has gained attention across the country in recent years and the Williamson Herald reported the local Moms for Liberty chapter encouraged parents come to Monday’s meeting and urge the school board to adopt a policy that only allow the state and American flags in public schools.

Six Tennessee schools have been recognized as National Blue Ribbon Schools for their academic performance or their work to close achievement gaps between student groups

Shelbyville parents and educators gave the Tennessee Department of Education (TDOE) a lot to consider as it fine tunes the new system to provide an A through F grade to each public school.TDOE plans to unveil the School Letter Grades to the public in November and the department has spent the last few weeks hosting public events across the state to gather input.Thursday night’s meeting in Shelbyville provided a number of concerns from both parents and school leaders who don’t want the school grading system to devalue student growth in favor of student achievement.Bedford County Superintendent Tammy Garrett was among them, saying increasing the importance of student achievement on School Letter Grades won’t help with the teacher shortage poorer counties like hers are facing.

Rutherford County School Board members voted Shelia Bratton to be the new board chair Tuesday evening, replacing former chair Tammy Sharp.Sharp withdrew from serving another one-year term due to a medical diagnosis that she wishes to focus her full attention on.“I just wanted to thank everyone for the emails, the texts, and the phone calls in support of my well-being and my new diagnosis. I even had some people here tonight. Thank you, thank you everyone, and it was an honor for me to serve the last year and aside Dr. Sullivan and we’re gonna keep going. We’re gonna go from here,” said Sharp.

Accountability was the main focus for Cookeville parents, educators, and administrators during a Tuesday night discussion about how schools should be graded for serving students.The public meeting is the latest in a series of forums hosted by the Tennessee Department of Education (TDOE) to gather state input on how to improve the new School Letter Grades evaluation tool. The tool will provide an A through F letter grade for each public school when it launches in November.Grading schools based on student academic growth has been a common topic discussed in prior meetings, but this time, multiple speakers stressed the importance of School Letter Grades providing a measurement for student achievement and career/college readiness.

Rutherford County is home to two of the top readers in the state.Smyrna’s Stewart’s Creek High School Senior Taylor Aslup and Murfreesboro’s Oakland Middle School sixth-grader Gibson Weber were among four winners of the annual Tristar Reads contest.

Parents and educators in Dickson kicked off a series of town hall events across the state Tuesday night designed to help the state grade its public schools.The Tennessee Department of Education (TDOE) is hosting a total ten forums throughout August and September to fine tune the long awaited A-F School Letter Grades. When it launches in November, the new accountability resource will provide the public with a clear understanding of where schools fall on a grading scale in comparison to other schools.“What we wanna hear from you about is how do we measure a school’s academic progress. We’re thinking about developing a letter grade system for schools that’s really intended to provide parents and families with clear, understandable information that’s comparable across the state,” said a TDOE representative in the hearing.

Parents and educators in Dickson kicked off a series of town hall events across the state Tuesday night designed to help the state grade its public schools.The Tennessee Department of Education (TDOE) is hosting a total ten forums throughout August and September to fine tune the long awaited A-F School Letter Grades. When it launches in November, the new accountability resource will provide the public with a clear understanding of where schools fall on a grading scale in comparison to other schools.“What we wanna hear from you about is how do we measure a school’s academic progress. We’re thinking about developing a letter grade system for schools that’s really intended to provide parents and families with clear, understandable information that’s comparable across the state,” said a TDOE representative in the hearing.

Members of the Maury County Public Schools Board of Education narrowly voted down a much talked about application by American Classical Education (ACE) to open the county’s first public charter school.

The halls of Cheatham County’s middle and high schools will look a bit different when students return August 7.  Students will no longer be carrying backpacks to class.

The approval process for proposed new public charter schools is about to begin its second round for school districts across the state.Four school boards will be voting on amended applications this month from nine public charter schools that were all denied in the spring.

Special needs students in Rutherford County may get to live out their dreams of becoming superheroes in the near future.At Thursday’s Rutherford County School Board meeting, The Every Kid Is A Hero Foundation presented board members with a proposal to give special needs students in the district a chance to become heroes in a comic.“What we have done, we’ve become a foundation called The Every Kid Is A Hero Foundation,” said foundation representative Lee Colvin. “Within this county’s school system, what we’re trying to do is we’re trying to come in and we’re trying to work with the special needs high school programs.”

The Tennessee Department of Education (TDOE) announced current Jackson County Schools Superintendent Kristy Brown will take over as the department’s new Chief Academic Officer on July 15.

Members of the Williamson County Schools Board of Education voted 8 to 2 to keep five challenged books on the shelves Monday night.Those books include Speak, Perks of Being a Wallflower, The Field Guide to the North American Teenager, Where the Crawdads Sing, and Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. The books contain a common theme of the main characters being outcasts based on their own personal experiences and earlier this year, a district committee recommended against removing them from Williamson County School libraries.“A book that, in my opinion, makes a teenager kind of dive into and recognize that everybody is different and people at based upon their own personal experiences is a valuable piece of literature that’s a whole lot deeper than just the subtext or the specific sexual content, or bullying content, or drug content that’s being called out here,” said board member Eliot Mitchell.

State Senator Bill Powers (R-Clarksville) took an unconventional path to politics and the Tennessee General Assembly where he's the Vice-Chairperson of the Senate Education Committee.The sixth generation Montgomery County resident served as former U.S. Senator Howard Baker’s page as a teenager in the 70s but didn’t run for office himself until four decades later.  Baker served two terms as a Clarksville City Councilman before succeeding former State Senator and current Congressman Mark Greene in what is now Senate District 22.

A Tennessee school district has joined a growing list of school systems across the nation that are suing major social media companies like TikTok and YouTube over a crisis in student mental health.

Williamson County Schools Board of Education voted to give parents two notifications when there’s a request to remove a book from a school library.Last April, the board passed the first reading of a library materials policy that notifies parents after the board votes on  a challenged book.At last week’s meeting, board member Sheila Cleveland proposed updating the proposed policy to provide parents with an earlier notification.  Under Cleveland’s proposal, the district would provide parents an initial notification when the review committee makes its recommendation on challenged books.

School districts across the state should learn this week what students could be held back under the state’s new Third-Grade Retention Law.The Tennessee Department of Education expects to be able to send that information to districts by May 19. Districts will then check to see if any of those students meet exemptions to the new law and then inform parents.

American Classical Education (ACE) will open at least one public charter school in Tennessee, but the group’s controversial history remains a roadblock in several communities.This week five school boards voted on applications for ACE to open public charter schools with a classical education focus.  The organization received approval from Rutherford County Schools and came close with board members in Maury County Public Schools, but the group still faced opposition in Madison, Robertson, and Montgomery Counties.