In SCORE’s report, Excellence For All: How Tennessee Can Lift Our Students To Best In The Nation, one of the five key priorities is supporting every student to become a strong reader and writer. Leading Innovation for Tennessee Education (LIFT), a group of dedicated district, school, and classroom leaders from across Tennessee, has been working to improve…
The ACT is one of the most important college-ready indicators that we use for our students in Lenoir City. In Tennessee, we have the tremendous opportunity to provide a free retake to all public high school seniors who took the ACT for the first time as a junior. In 2017, nearly 52,000 students took advantage…
If I had asked my second-grade class three years ago to write a paragraph about a text we were studying that included an introductory sentence, at least four details, irregular nouns and verbs, and vocabulary like “colossal” and “enchanted,” I would have seen a lot of blank stares—especially in September. But this year when I…
Education ranks among the most important issues for Tennesseans who are likely to vote in the November election for governor, according to a statewide poll. The State Collaborative on Reforming Education (SCORE), a nonpartisan education policy and advocacy nonprofit that focuses on improving student achievement, today released the results of the survey of 600 likely…
The 21st century workforce is rapidly changing, and Tennessee students deserve a bright future with the opportunity to obtain a high-quality job that leads to economic prosperity. In the last decade, Tennessee K-12 education policy has been guided by one primary goal: Every student must graduate ready for postsecondary education, entry into the workforce, or…
August is my favorite time of the year because it means that across the state, Tennessee students are heading back to school. As a former teacher, the first few weeks were always exciting because it was a new opportunity to learn about students and their families as well as build strong classroom culture. Anyone who…
Over my first twelve years of schooling I managed to attend five separate schools in Raleigh, North Carolina. I had the unique opportunity to attend many different types of schools with many different educators, but one in particular made a significant impact on my life. Dr. Wesley Kirkpatrick (Dr. K)—the dean of studies, college-placement expert,…
Inspired by my students, I founded the Future Educator Leader Academy (FELA). FELA is a teacher-nominated leadership academy for students who are recognized as great potential educators. The goal is to expose a diverse group of students to the tremendous difference they can make with a career in education.
Dear Friends, Tennessee has long believed that an annual statewide assessment is central to student achievement growth. When Tennessee aligned annual assessment with our high academic standards, we saw unprecedented growth in student achievement. Recently, we have been discouraged by calls to pause or stop Tennessee’s annual assessment. Although there have been significant challenges, now…
The work of Tennessee’s educators is vital. Teachers are the single most important in-school factor for raising student achievement, and school leaders are the next. For this reason, Tennessee educator voices are valuable to state-level leaders and policymakers for greater understanding of what occurs daily in diverse schools and classrooms. For the last eight years,…
Throughout the summer, SCORE conducted focus groups with principals across the state to hear honest, on-the-ground perspectives of what school leaders are seeing and experiencing in their schools. Hearing from educators in schools is critical work for SCORE so that we can incorporate these voices into our annual report and ensure that the needs of…
Tennessee is home to 18 leader preparation programs and they collectively help prepare about 500 candidates each year. The work these programs do to ensure that our school leaders are ready for the complexity of being a principal is critical. Here, we profile two programs, Lipscomb University and University of Tennessee-Knoxville, and their leaders about…
Dear Friends, “Great leaders create great school culture where students want to come to learn. One of the opportunities for growth for Tennessee education is to ensure that we have the correct leadership aligned to every school to make sure we have success in every school.” – Dexter Murphy, Upper School Dean, Emerald Academy Public…
With the start of school in Tennessee only a few weeks away, many students are excited to meet their teachers for the new school year. Teachers are so important to students’ experiences and success in the classroom, but there are additional educators in the building who are also critical to setting a positive culture of…
When Tennessee began setting higher expectations in the classroom, student-focused advocates knew it was important to have an aligned annual measure of progress. The release of the 2017-18 TNReady scores is a good time to recall how statewide assessment data helped Tennessee students make some of the biggest student achievement gains in the nation over…
As part of our research on school leadership this year, SCORE has partnered with the Wallace Foundation to learn about national practices that can better support the leader pipeline. The work that the Wallace Foundation is leading with states and districts across the country could help inform Tennessee’s own policies to better prepare and support…
In the past decade, the role of the principal has changed from that of a building manager to an instructional leader who sets the tone and vision of the school. Principals are now expected to recruit, hire, and support strong teachers as well as deeply engage with families and communities. Even while the role of…
As I arrived to begin my first year as a ninth-grade English teacher, my principal spent an hour of his busy schedule bringing me on a campus tour. At the end of the tour, we stopped in front of the auditorium in the 60-year-old campus and he told me simply, “If you have any questions,…
“No Latin – we cannot find a certified teacher…” “No AP – there is not a large enough enrollment…” “No art class – you are missing a history credit…” Are you tired of saying no? With today’s technology, the Niswonger Foundation has been able to work with large and small school systems throughout Tennessee to help…
A student who is a strong reader and writer has the foundational building blocks to excel not only in school but also in postsecondary studies and jobs. Research has shown that literacy is vital for students’ lifelong success. For instance, low literacy levels often prevent high school students from mastering and completing other subjects. In…