Metro Nashville Public Schools (MNPS) has made significant progress in recent efforts to address teacher vacancies in the district, according to a back-to-school update given by Director Adrienne Battle at Tuesday’s regular board meeting.

Last month school board members in Nashville and Rutherford County voted down six proposed new public charter schools.Next month supporters from all of them will make their case to the Tennessee Public Charter School Commission for why the decision was the wrong one.

Rutherford Collegiate Prep opened its doors for the first time to students last Wednesday while American Classical Academy Rutherford and Springs Empower Academy are both opening today.

The Rutherford County school board unanimously voted to approve revisions to district policy regarding the removal of books with sexual or inappropriate themes from school libraries to align with a new state law that went into effect this year.

Tom Stinnett

Today voters across the state will decide the primary races for 16 State Senate seats along with all 99 State House seats. Very few of these seats are expected to be highly competitive in the November general election, so tonight’s primaries will have a big impact on the General Assembly that returns to Nashville next year.

The education philanthropic organization Scarlett Family Foundation recently launched a new tool designed to allow parents and other education stakeholders to find information and data on schools in Nashville all in one place.

Rep. Scott Cepicky calls Governor Lee’s voucher bill “terrible” despite receiving his endorsement in next month’s primary.

The Sumner County Board of Education discussed potential ways to approach the 2024-25 fiscal year budget at Tuesday’s regular meeting after the Sumner County Budget Committee rejected their budget for a second time on Monday.

Members of the Rutherford County School Board voted 4 to 3 Wednesday night to reject what would’ve been the county’s fourth public charter school. Financial concerns ended up playing a bigger role in the close decision against Novus SMART Academy (K-8) than academics.

Next month Rutherford County will see three new public charter schools open and a fourth could see approval before the first class bell rings.

Representative Scott Cepicky, R-Culleoka, has won three elections for House district 64 by comfortable margins, but this week’s campaign filings show he’s facing a strong challenge in the August GOP primary.

Representative Scott Cepicky, R-Culleoka, went on The Michael Patrick Leahy Show recently to discuss the failed effort he led last session to reduce the amount of state tests Tennessee students are required to take along with the number of evaluations their teachers see. Cepicky said the changes he championed were similar to changes Wisconsin lawmakers made when they implemented a school voucher program.

The Metro Nashville Public Schools (MNPS) Board of Education celebrated gains made across grade levels and subjects in this year’s Tennessee Comprehensive Assessment Program (TCAP) tests at Tuesday’s board meeting.

Ray Jeter says the construction company he manages in Maury County operates with one key motto for its staff. Build people, move dirt.Jeter says he’d apply a similar approach to building up Tennessee’s education system if elected to House District 64 this year.

Vanderbilt University and Oak Ridge National Laboratory have announced a new partnership focusing on artificial intelligence research to develop technologies for national security, as U.S. universities continue to invest more in machine learning research and education programming.

Last Thursday Republican State House District 65 candidate Brian Beathard took to his Facebook page to attack what may be Governor Bill Lee’s biggest education accomplishment.In 2022 lawmakers passed the Governor’s Tennessee Investment in Student Achievement (TISA) that invested a billion dollars into K-12 education and fundamentally changed the formula the state uses to fund schools.  Beathard told his supporters that TISA is reducing the amount of money schools in Williamson County are receiving.

The education and parent advocacy organization Nashville PROPEL has released a white paper detailing what local parents think about “Nashville’s hidden literary crisis,” as well as how that crisis affects students of color.According to a news release emailed to Tennessee Firefly, less than 30 percent of students in the Metro Nashville Public Schools district are reading on grade level despite nearly 80 percent of parents believing their children are at or above grade level, a finding consistent with national trends.

Metro Nashville Public Schools' alternative learning centers, or ALCs, will provide students with support "every step of the way" under redesign plans unveiled by district leaders at Tuesday’s school board meeting. 

On May 8 floodwaters rushed into Sumner County, damaging property, and forcing emergency crews to execute dozens of water rescues.The storm also washed up new criticism for a far right-wing political organization that’s gained power in the county in recent years, and is challenging to take its politics to a bigger role in state government this year. That group is the Sumner County Constitutional Republicans.