Tag: Tennessee School Boards Association

Tennessee Public School Students Required to Praise School Board Members for School Board Appreciation Week

Chris Butler

Public school students throughout Tennessee last week celebrated School Board Appreciation Week, where students were encouraged to praise their local school board members. Staff, students, and parents at public schools were asked to adopt a board member. They sent cards and artwork to board members. They were also asked to create school board appreciation posters or ask students to draw posters of them.

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Tennessee School Boards Association Must Provide Records to the Public, Ruling Says

Chris Butler

Members of the taxpayer-funded Tennessee School Boards Association may not like it, but public records laws apply to their organization and they must provide their information to the public.

This, according to a ruling that 20th Judicial District Chancellor Patricia Head Moskal filed this month.

As reported last year, the legal arm of the Beacon Center of Tennessee filed a lawsuit against the TSBA demanding access to the group’s records.

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Bill to Rein in Tennessee School Boards Association May Get New Life

Chris Butler

Wednesday afternoon, members of a Tennessee House Education Committee may revive a bill designed to rein in the Tennessee School Boards Association and its alleged financial abuses, according to a source. More than 90 percent of the TSBA’s $2.2 million revenue in 2016 came from Tennessee taxpayers through dues and no-bid contracts from local school districts. Members of the TSBA, however, won’t abide by the state’s open records laws. They have also shown the public little to no transparency in how they spend money. The most recent information available is three years old. State Rep. Andy Holt, R-Dresden, sponsors the bill, HB 1276. According to the Tennessee General Assembly’s website, the bill would require that local school system personnel post their adopted school budget on the school board’s website before the start of each new school year. That bill failed in an Education Administration Subcommittee last week, according to the General Assembly’s website. But a source told The Tennessee Star Wednesday morning that efforts are afoot to recall that bill today. Exactly 50 percent of the full committee members must agree to recall it. If that happens then committee members will hear the bill again for an up or down…

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Steve Gill Commentary: ‘Pay-to-Play’ Schemes Not Limited to College Admissions When Vendors Can Pay School Board Association for ‘Leads’

Steve Gill

The past several weeks have seen collective outrage at the revelation that some wealthy celebrity parents had paid bribes to gain unmerited admission for their children to elite colleges and universities. Criminal charges, lawsuits, and resignations have already resulted from the scandal.  Few expect that the list of those involved in these sorts of efforts to get unqualified students accepted into the nation’s top schools with bribery and fraud to be limited to those identified so far. Investigations will certainly continue. It is also abundantly clear that “pay to play” schemes are not limited to those photoshopping their unaccomplished child onto the faces of actual athletes in order to gain access to opportunities that might otherwise not be available. Here in Tennessee we see something remarkably similar. But instead of photoshopping the Tennessee School Boards Association actually publishes a price list to sell access to vendors seeking contracts with local school districts. The TSBA “Business Affiliates” program encourages those seeking contracts for the sale of products or services to Tennessee school systems to pay the TSBA in order to gain “credibility with boards or school system personnel who make decisions regarding products.” To make it even more clear, TSBA points…

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JC Bowman Commentary: The Role of a School Board

JC Bowman
Tennessee Star

Local school boards reflect the needs and aspirations of the communities as well as the interests and concerns of professional and nonprofessional employees. We believe non-partisan control is what is best for our communities. This is best ensured when educational policy is made by representatives vested in the community they live, and whose undivided attention and interests are devoted strictly to education of the children in that district. What we stress in a nutshell: Public education is a federal concern, a state responsibility, and a local operation.

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