Sign up for Chalkbeat Tennessee’s free newsletter to keep up with statewide education policy and Memphis-Shelby County Schools.
The last two schools in Tennessee’s failed Achievement School District will return to local control next year after the Tennessee Public School Charter Commission upheld a Memphis-Shelby County school board decision to deny their applications to become district charter schools.
Now, Memphis-Shelby County leaders will have to decide whether to continue operating Kirby Middle School and Hillcrest High School as standard public schools or shutter the locations that serve more than 800 students when the district absorbs the schools in June 2026.
The district will make the decisions as discussions about other school closures continue in a plan to address longstanding facilities issues in the coming months. Though commission members indicated last week the district plans to keep Kirby open, the district said this week it has not made a decision.
“We are still in the preliminary stages following the charter commission’s decision,” a district spokesperson told Chalkbeat Tennessee this week. “Over the coming weeks, the district will begin gathering data and engaging the communities to determine our next steps for both locations. As always, our focus will remain on doing what’s best for students as we prepare to make a final decision.”
In July, the Memphis school board denied charter applications from IOTA Community Schools, the charter group currently running the two schools, ahead of the upcoming sunset of the ASD program. IOTA appealed to the state commission this fall, but on Oct. 17 commission members cited inconsistent enrollment and low academic performance when discussing their decision to uphold the district’s ruling.
IOTA will continue to manage former ASD school Wooddale Middle in Memphis as a charter school after the commission overturned a MSCS denial last year.
Tess Stovall, the commission’s executive director, noted both Kirby and Hillcrest scored the lowest possible score on Tennessee’s school scoring system for the past three years. Hillcrest also has a significantly lower graduate rate than the district and state average, and Stovall is concerned about an overreliance on virtual instructors at the school.
Stovall acknowledged that the majority of Hillcrest students came to the school already several grade levels behind, but she said charter agreements must end at some point if there are no academic gains.
“This is particularly challenging work; these are challenging recommendations because we know this is a school that is in operation. There are staff, there are students, there are families impacted by this decision,” Stovall said. “We know the staff of IOTA community schools, as with many other operators, have dedicated the last decade trying to turn around some of the most difficult school circumstances in Memphis.”
Commissioner Terence Patterson, who is also CEO of the Memphis Education Fund, called the ASD schools’ decision “really, really difficult. Patterson said he couldn’t overlook the “trend of underperformance” at Kirby, despite his concerns that existing Memphis schools in the neighborhood would not necessarily be a better option or are at capacity.
Tennessee took over Kirby and Hillcrest a decade ago due to low academic performance, assigning the schools to a charter operator that later became IOTA Community Schools. The goal of the Achievement School District was to improve academic performance through a turnaround plan that would allow schools to exit the ASD plan. But the two never met that goal.
At its peak, the ASD portfolio oversaw 33 schools, many of which were turned over to charter operators. The program cost taxpayers more than $1 billion and netted few results. The ASD saw high teacher turnover and did not lead to long-term improvements for students, research showed, while the takeover of schools in mostly low-income and communities of color sparked community backlash. MSCS in recent years has transitioned several schools back into the district.
“I’m incredibly troubled that we went through the legislature’s initiative to set up the ASD to try to address low-performing schools,” said Commission Chair Chris Richards, who represents west Tennessee. “We’ve been 10 years into this, and we continue to have this low-performing school. I can’t warrant a situation where I can support another 10 years.”
The Tennessee General Assembly this year passed legislation to sunset the existing ASD program, though it replaced it with a different intervention plan for low-performing schools that will start by the beginning of the next school year. The new plan will have escalating interventions for targeted schools and initially allow local districts to implement their own turnaround plan or work with an expert before moving toward a state takeover.
Bri Hatch contributed to this story.
Melissa Brown is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Tennessee. Contact Melissa at mbrown@chalkbeat.org.
