Lawmakers Move Revised Plan for State Oversight into Memphis Schools

The Memphis-Shelby County Schools logo. (Photo Courtesy Memphis-Shelby County Schools)

A conference committee featuring members of the House and Senate voted along party lines on Monday to advance a revised version of the Senate’s plan to provide state oversight into Memphis-Shelby County Schools (MSCS).

The move was a reversal of an earlier announcement to use the House’s plan for state intervention.

What the Bill Does

This compromise version of the Senate’s plan establishes an oversight board that serves for four years for any school district that meets four or more of these six requirements:

·       50 percent or more of students were deemed not proficient in the Latest Tennessee Comprehensive Assessment Program (TCAP) results for English language arts and math.

·       25 percent or more of students were assigned to a school that received a D or F letter grade in the most recent school year.

·       25 percent or more students were considered chronically absent in the most recent school year.

·       At least one school in the district is designated as Priority or has maintained a Priority designation for each of the five prior years.

·       The Tennessee State Comptroller’s office completes an audit that finds waste, fraud, or other legal issues.

·       If the district’s school board has employed more than two directors of schools on an interim basis during the prior four years.

The board will conduct a comprehensive needs assessment that includes teacher numbers and qualifications, class sizes, textbooks and materials, and parental involvement. It will then create a transformation plan based on the assessment, which will be reviewed each year.

The oversight board may also exercise any of its powers before the assessment is complete, including denying or directing actions by the local school board or the director of schools and firing any district employee, including the director of schools.

The oversight board will then submit an annual progress report to the governor and other top State lawmakers.

Democrats Oppose the Move

Representative Parkinson, D-Memphis, and Senator Raumesh Akbari, D-Memphis, were the only committee members to give any significant pushback to the proposal.

Akbari proposed an amendment that would provide school districts meeting improvement criteria an exit plan option before the four years of oversight are complete. That proposal failed.

She also pointed out that 80 percent of state districts have students who have proficiency failures, and 50 percent of districts have failing schools.

“It really highlights that this legislation was written very surgically so that it only applied to Memphis and Shelby County Schools,” Akbari said. “There are other school districts. 80 percent of school districts have 50 percent proficiency or less. That's something we need to pay attention to.”

Senate bill sponsor Brent Taylor, R-Memphis, disagreed, saying there were easier ways to target MSCS with the bill if that was what was wanted.

“We could have (made the bill) population-based,” Taylor said. “We could have had it only apply to charter counties.”

House Education Committee Chair Representative Mark White, R-Memphis, also made the case that the legislation is necessary, not just to turn around MSCS, but also to turn around other school districts.

“Personally, being education chair for 12 years, I'm very concerned about accountability across (the) state,” White said. “We can't say, ‘Well, because everybody else is maybe deficient, we don't need to do this on this particular deficiency.’ This is a process we've been working on for two years, and this is what's before us now, and I think it's a good move that we can get in and address deficiencies that have been going on in this district, Memphis, for 60 years.”

Oversight Board Makeup

The oversight board will consist of nine members, including five appointed by the governor, two by the Speaker of the House, and the final two by the Senate. If the district still meets four of the six previously mentioned criteria following the four-year term, nine new members will be appointed for another two years.

The committee also passed an amendment allowing one member appointed by the Speaker of the House to live outside of the district if they live in Tennessee. Representative White introduced the amendment, saying it was needed to ensure the board is made up of the most qualified people possible.

Akbari vehemently opposed the amendment before it passed along party lines.

“I think that it is highly inappropriate to have someone outside of the (district) for (anything), as this legislation has been positioned as something that should apply to all (districts),” Akbari said. “And so, to have this one particular board member that could be appointed from outside of that (district), to me, it seems like it's being written for a specific person.”

Next Steps

The compromise version of the legislation must still be approved by both chambers. Those votes are expected this week, before the anticipated end of the legislative session.