School choice
The lawsuit challenges a new Tennessee law that establishes an oversight board to take control away from the locally elected school board.
Though Tennessee law bans religious charter schools, state officials have left the Knox County Board of Education on its own to defend the policy. The legal battle signals major changes may be on the horizon for Tennessee’s charter landscape.
SCORE CEO David Mansouri will be the only takeover board member who isn’t a Shelby County resident.
The South Memphis alternative school will relocate to Norris Achievement Academy for at least one year. District leaders faced community backlash over the school’s impending closure.
Parents and staff at Ida B. Wells Academy say MSCS made a last-minute choice to transfer classes to another building next year. But the details remain unclear as the school year comes to a close.
Data about the new voucher recipients for the upcoming school year could fuel ongoing debates about who should benefit most from private school choice.
Tennessee’s supermajority wants to seize the city’s congressional seat amid a looming schools takeover.
Students in Tennessee’s Education Savings Account program will no longer have to take state standardized tests, but the program is not expanding.
Voucher-friendly Tennessee Republicans are pushing a last-minute amendment that would drop all enrollment caps on the state’s original voucher program.
A slim majority of Tennessee Republicans passed legislation to expand the program and rewrite part of the law maintaining public school funding.
A slim majority of Tennessee House Republicans approved a plan to expand the state’s voucher program to 35,000 seats next year which might also require public schools to begin collecting student Social Security numbers.
House Republicans dropped the immigrant tracking provision of the expansion bill, which is poised for final votes within days.
This would combine two of the most controversial issues public schools have faced in recent years.
Some Republicans say private schools participating in the Education Savings Account program deserve more flexibility in what assessment they use.
Some Republicans want to roll back a mandate related to Tennessee’s Education Savings Account program.
The MSCS school board voted last week to shutter five schools by the end of this year. That leaves over 1,200 students to find a new place to go next fall, with the district extending its priority transfer deadline to accommodate last-minute changes.
The case between a fledgling Christian charter school and the Knox County Board of Education could bring a fresh challenge to the religious charter issue that deadlocked the U.S. Supreme Court in 2025.
Over 1,200 Memphis students will attend a new school in August as part of the first round of a long-term district closure plan.
The school board will vote next Tuesday on whether to close five schools at the end of this year. But parents say they’ve come to rely on Wells teachers and services.
In his final year in office, Gov. Bill Lee is pushing for an aggressive expansion of the state’s new voucher program. Teacher pay bumps are also on the horizon.