The Hamilton County School System ought to have a policy requiring that any professional development or in-service teacher training get recorded on video and posted online for all the public to see.
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If 350 additional employees don’t help raise the Hamilton County School System’s test scores then those new employees will get to keep their jobs, regardless of results, said School Board member Rhonda Thurman. As The Tennessee Star reported, school system officials have proposed adding that many new employees because they believe it is the path to improving their academics. County commissioners may have to raise property taxes to fund these new positions, several of which are administrators and social workers. “We never get rid of a program. All we do is keep adding on to them,” said Thurman, who said these positions are unneeded. “No one ever loses their job or is held accountable. There is all this great and wonderful stuff that is supposed to happen, and the people in charge tell us how these positions will improve everything — and then they don’t (improve everything). No one ever loses a job.” School Board member Kathy Lennon, though, said she’s confident in Superintendent Bryan Johnson’s plan for additional school employees, and she believes it will impact school systems academics in a positive way. School Board member Joe Wingate, meanwhile, said this plan “is just a proposal for how…
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Williamson County and Knox County Schools have been making headlines with their white privilege and “cultural competency” training for teachers, but so far there is no sign that trend has spread to Hamilton County Schools – yet. Williamson County has forced teachers to learn about “white privilege” in required in-service training days, The Tennessee Star has reported in a series of stories. Knox County Schools are spending $170,000 out of their $928,677 in-service budget on cultural competency training for teachers. Hamilton County Board of Education has been working with diversity consultants for the past couple of years to desegregate schools through means that would include busing. They formed committees and workshops to label the district as inequitable for minority students. One diversity group attacked two school board members last year for opposing their plans. Dr. Marsha Drake, the district’s chief equity officer, launched an Equity Task Force in 2018. The Hamilton County Board of Education in May 2018 voted to begin seeking funding to pay for the Howard Group, a consultant agency, to identify “the larger factors that put some students on unequal footing,” the Chattanooga Times Free Press said. The board asked the Howard Group to work with the…
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You may not think such a thing legal in this day and age, but the Hamilton County Public School System offers a Bible History Class. This is courtesy of a Chattanooga-based nonprofit that has put up millions of dollars of its own money to fund it. The group, Bible in the Schools, has donated cash for several years, and their money funds teachers and materials for the class, said Hamilton County School Systems spokesman Tim Hensley, in an emailed statement to The Tennessee Star. A representative from Bible in the Schools was unavailable to talk Thursday. The group has already donated $1.3 million to fund the course for the school year, according to the Chattanooga Times Free Press. According to the paper, enrollment data from 23 participating schools show 4,068 students in grades six through 12 completed the courses during the 2017-18 academic year, a record enrollment. The $1.3 million was the largest philanthropic gift the school system received for the year. With the money the school system hired 20 qualified and certified Bible History teachers, Superintendent Bryan Johnson told the paper. The class is an elective. Bible in the Schools has made this course possible for nearly 10 decades,…
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