The more than yearlong search for a new leader of the state’s largest school district is officially over. Members of the Memphis-Shelby County School Board unanimously picked Detroit Public Schools Chief of Leadership and High School Dr. Marie Feagins to be the district’s next superintendent Friday afternoon.Six board members initially provided the necessary three-fourths majority to approve Feagins, but the remaining three members chose to change their vote to ensure the final tally is unanimous.

Paige Hodge admitted to being a little nervous before speaking to the Tennessee Senate Education Committee Wednesday, but the topic was one the Nashville School of the Arts senior feels passionately about.Hodge serves as a youth assembly leader for the Southern Movement Committee, an organization that fights the school to prison pipeline. She told senators that she and hundreds of fellow students she’s worked with all believe conflict resolution needs to be taught in schools.

Members of the House Education Administration Committee advanced proposed legislation Wednesday to help public charter schools access school buildings that are sitting unused by local districts.The legislation would require local school districts that have public charter schools in them to provide a list of vacant and underutilized buildings on an annual basis. Under the bill, school districts would additionally be required to make those properties available to public charter schools at a fair market value and give charters a first right of refusal for either purchase or lease.

Representative Gino Bulso’s, R-Brentwood, bill that would prohibit pride flags in classrooms advanced from a House Subcommittee Tuesday, but not without vocal opposition from Representative Sam McKenzie, D-Knoxville.That bill would only allow the Tennessee State Flag, the United States Flag, and other flags representing a country or political subdivision to be displayed. Representative McKenzie called the bill dangerous.

Harvard University researcher Tom Kane stood before a captive audience at Washington’s Omni Shoreham hotel last Wednesday, just hours after dropping the report everyone was talking about. Offering the best look yet at students’ recovery from pandemic learning loss, the report showed that students actually made impressive academic gains last school year. But achievement gaps grew wider during the pandemic, and students in some high-poverty districts performed worse than they did before COVID. 

Knox County School Board members are split over Governor Bill Lee’s proposal to let families across the state use taxpayer dollars to attend private school.Governor Lee unveiled the Education Freedom Scholarship Act earlier this year to expand upon the framework of the existing Education Savings Account (ESA) pilot program and offer families a $7,075 scholarship to cover private school tuition and other fees such as uniforms and textbooks.

Springs Empower Academy announced a partnership with the Smyrna Boys & Girls Club to provide a temporary location while the K-5 public charter school’s permanent facility is under construction.The school is currently in the process of building a new school on Enon Springs Road, but construction and financing delays are preventing that facility from being ready in time for students to start in the 2024/2025 school year.

Representative Ed Butler, R-Rickman, is proposing a change to help keep high schoolers enrolled in technical college courses on track after they graduate.Butler presented a bill to the House Higher Education Subcommittee Monday afternoon that would give students taking dual enrollment in high school priority if there’s a waitlist for slots at the Tennessee College of Applied Technology (TCAT) they want to attend after graduation.Representative Butler told the subcommittee that he got the idea for this bill from his daughter.

The Memphis-Shelby County Schools (MSCS) superintendent search is finally drawing to a close, with school board members now planning to select a new leader for the state’s largest school district on February 9.The decision follows a lengthy interview session last week with all three out-of-state finalists.School board members are considering Atlanta Public Schools Chief Academic Officer Yolanda C. Brown, Portland Public Schools Deputy Superintendent of Instruction and School Communities Cheryl Proctor, and Detroit Public Schools Chief of Leadership and High Schools Marie N. Feagins for the long vacant position.

Enrollment in U.S. schools was fairly steady between 2021 and 2022, but the number of K-12 students remained below pre-pandemic levels, according to new federal data released Monday.The release, from the National Center for Education Statistics, shows that with nearly 50 million students, enrollment was still 2% less than 2019 figures. Only Idaho and North Dakota saw enrollment increase about 2% over that time period, while multiple states, including California, Mississippi and New York saw declines of at least 5%.

Victavia Walls says she made the wrong choice in middle school to temporarily leave LEAD Brick Church for her traditionally zoned Metro Nashville school. She's among the nearly half a dozen parents and students who shared their experiences to support LEAD Brick Church's effort to remain open as a public charter school.

A decade ago, it would have been hard to picture Janet Bravo working at a public charter school, much less leading the startup of one.Bravo says back then she had an unflattering vision of public charter schools in her mind, but made the decision to join IDEA public schools in 2014, serving as an academic counselor in one of the network’s underperforming schools in Texas.

Natoria Carpenter says she chose to drive her daughter thirty miles each day to the opposite side of Memphis just to attend Vision Preparatory Charter School.Carpenter was among the crowd of current and former parents who attended Tuesday night’s Memphis-Shelby County School Board meeting to provide support for the public charter school’s request for a new ten-year charter with the district.

The Memphis-Shelby County School Board unanimously voted Tuesday to establish a special council to help guide decisions about public charter schools.The new Charter Partnership Council will provide feedback and make recommendations to the board to ensure continued accountability and access to high-quality public charter schools for the Memphis community.

When the top three candidates for superintendent of Memphis-Shelby County Schools make their final cases to community and board members later this week, they will not only be explaining their leadership and academic successes, but also proving how well they can get to know a new community.The school board’s current attempt at a national search for superintendent has produced three out-of-state finalists, positioning the district to have its first leader from outside Memphis in more than a decade. While new-to-town leaders have helmed Memphis public schools in the past, internal candidates have been favored in the last decade.

Tennessee House members are holding off making the first vote on a controversial bill that would only allow classrooms to display the Tennessee state flag and United States of America flag. The bill would also give parents the ability to sue school districts that violate the prohibition.Representative Gino Bulso, R-Brentwood, agreed to roll voting on the bill in the House K-12 Subcommittee for a week to add an amendment that requires parents to notify the school district before filing suit for a violation.The bill has faced criticism from LBGTQ+ activists because it would effectively ban all pride flags in public schools.

The House K-12 Subcommittee advanced legislation that aims to help public charter schools access vacant and underutilized buildings.If passed the bill would require local school districts that have public charter schools in them to provide a list of vacant and underutilized buildings on an annual basis. Under the bill, school districts would additionally be required to make those properties available to public charter schools at a fair market value and give charters a first right of refusal for either purchase or lease.

Public charter schools across the state are facing a facilities funding crisis that will continue to compound in the coming years. Just half of public charter schools’ facility needs are currently met by state and local funding. The remaining facility expenditures must be covered out-of-pocket by the public charter school, which means fewer teachers, fewer classroom materials, and substandard facilities.By 2028, this funding gap is projected to increase to the point that just 42 percent of charter facility needs are covered by traditional revenue sources.