Diversity Goal Removed

The board met for their August Work Session last Thursday.

Josh Brown and Dan Cash were absent. And Drason Beasley joined remotely. Since both the Chair and Vice Chair were absent, Jay Galbreath presided.

Agenda
Live Stream - 1:10:43

And they met for their regular voting meeting Monday night.

Dan Cash, Melissa Wyatt, and Drason Beasley were absent.

Both of these meetings were much shorter than usual. This was mostly due to a lack of agenda items that required much discussion. But also, the board had recently had their strategic planning session recently, so they were eager to be expedient.

There were a few items that caught my attention, coming from the public comments at the voting meeting.

The removal of a personnel goal regarding diversity
A recent death threat toward a student
Removing cell phones from schools.

Diversity Personnel Goal

In the Policy Meeting this month, council recommended the removal of policy 5.100, which would effectively remove diversity as a personnel goal for our district. Specifically, the policy used to say that the board should "set goals for educator diversity that take into consideration the diversity of the student population."

Before this year, TN state law mandated that each school district have a policy to this effect (49-1-302(g)). With the new "Dismantle DEI" bill, this has been completely reversed to prohibit such a policy. See the last paragraph on this link.

I spoke to the board, asking them to continue to broaden the applicant pool for our educators as wide as possible so that we can have the best chance of hiring the best educators. Diversity amongst our applicants will lead to diversity in our educators. Citing a 2018 TN Deparment of Education Report, I emphasized that diversity improves student outcomes.

WKRN reached out and ran a story, highlighting our concerns. You can watch it here.

Death Threat

One parent spoke about a traumatizing incident. His daughter, among other students, received death threats from another student. The alleged perpetrator was given In School Suspension and was still able to interact with the victims. This parent was very dissatisfied with how the situation was handled and promised to return next month with a plan for how this can be better dealt with in the future.

Removing Cell Phones

Another citizen spoke about a desire for our cell phone ban to go further, advocating for a "bell to bell" restriction.

This prompted Jason Golden to talk about how the existing ban has been going. He said that it has gone more smoothly than they anticipated, but warned that they may be in a "honeymoon period."

New School Year Starting Strong

Enrollment

Mr. Golden cited many numbers, indicating a strong start to our new school year. Enrollment is higher than expected. We expected a 0.4% decrease and it has only been a 0.2% decrease. Each cohort has higher enrollment than last year. Though there are about 1300 fewer kindergardeners this year than seniors who graducated last year, which leads to the overall decrease.

Teacher Bonuses

The teachers across the district received their bonuses that were issued from the state of Tenneesee in conjunction with the voucher bill.

Retention in 3rd and 4th Grade

Fewer than five 3rd and 4th graders were retained this past year. And for those who were retained, the decision was made based on conversations with the families and school admin. This is a continuation of what our schools have been doing for years.

Mature Reading Lists

Parents can now proactively opt their children out of having access to materials that are deemed "mature." Thirteen percent of parents district-wide have chosen this option. Here are the numbers by grade band:

Elementary: 18%

Middle: 13%

High: 7%