Tag: Bethany Bowman

Music Spotlight: Stephanie Owens Talks Family, Faith, and Country Music

Bethany Bowman

Nashville, TN — Stephanie Owens grew up in a musical family. Her dad was a high school choral director and her mom was a classical organist. She knew from a young age that performing was what she born to do. “I had an old turkey-baster for a microphone and ran around the couch for my stage,” she said. When Stephanie was 19 years old  and attending Liberty University in Lynchburg, she gained experience in front of the camera and in the studio. She made her film debut when she was chosen to play the starring role of Faith Garrett in Finding Faith the movie, co-starring Erik Estrada. The movie was released nationally in 2014 on Netflix and at Wal-Mart and other retailers. The movie soundtrack includes Stephanie singing a featured song and a lullaby which she composed for the film. (Read more here.) Even though she is a talented actress, she always knew she wanted to pursue the singing route more because “you can be more you as opposed to being a character.” Because there is definitely a spiritual element to her songs, I wondered why she chose to pursue country music as opposed to Christian music. Stephanie stated that she…

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Tennessee Educator Survey Reveals Teacher Frustration With Testing, Flood of New Initiatives

Wendy Wilson
Tennessee Star

  Tennessee teachers surveyed this past spring reported frustration with statewide standardized exams, while administrators surveyed showed more confidence in them. A majority of teachers disagreed with the statement, “Overall, information received from statewide standardized exams is worth the investment of time and effort.” Sixty-five percent disagreed, while only 35 percent agreed. For administrators, it was nearly the reverse. Thirty-eight percent disagreed, while 62 percent agreed with the statement. More than 38,000 educators completed the extensive annual Tennessee Educator Survey created by the Tennessee Department of Education and Vanderbilt University’s Tennessee Education Research Alliance. That number represents 56 percent of the state’s teachers and 60 percent of administrators. Other findings included teachers’ frustration with what they view as insufficient instructional and planning time. A big drain on their time, according to survey results, is a program called Response to Intervention (RTI²) designed to help struggling students. According to a summary of the findings, teachers are burdened with administering screenings, using progress monitoring tools and meeting with other teachers and administrators, as well as fitting intervention periods into their schedules. Teachers, especially those new to the classroom, also expressed concerns about the amount of time needed to address student behavior. The survey results also raised…

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Teacher Shortage Worries Tennessee Department of Education

Wendy Wilson

Tennessee is scrambling to come up with ways to find and keep quality teachers in the classroom. The state Department of Education released a report last week that details the problem and outlines proposed solutions that focus especially on strengthening ties with teacher education programs in the state’s postsecondary schools. “More than 65,000 teachers show up each day to work in Tennessee’s public schools. At the current rate, half of these teachers will leave or retire in the next decade,” the report says. Bethany Bowman, director of professional learning for Professional Educators of Tennessee (ProEd), calls the situation “a complete mess.” “The Department of Education is too optimistic,” she told The Tennessee Star. “They’re always talking about highly effective teachers and I’m thinking, you’re lucky to get teachers period.” Bowman noted that just days before the start of the new school year last summer, Metro Nashville Public Schools was still short 400 teachers. The district employs around 6,000 teachers. As if simply finding good teachers weren’t enough, the state also wants to focus on making teaching staffs more diverse. The report said that only 14 percent of new teacher candidates graduating from Tennessee’s teacher education programs self-identified as not white in…

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