The Metro Nashville Public Schools board took a somber tone for its only March meeting, following Monday’s Covenant School shooting.
“There's a great deal to process here, a tremendous amount of horror and sadness to contend with,” said Director of Schools Adrienne Battle on Tuesday. “Unfortunately, because of so many previous events nationally, we're in a constant state of preparing for this action to come to our doorstep, and we're doing everything we can to keep our own community safe.”
Student board members Abenezer Haile and Alayna Mitchell also spoke about the incident. Mitchell described going into lockdown at Hillsboro High School and seeing first responders pass her school — an experience she describes as “surreal.”
“Barely a mile away from us, the unthinkable happened, and we are forever scarred,” said Mitchell. “This situation is so traumatic for students all across Nashville. My heart aches for those families and the Covenant community as a whole. My sincerest thoughts and prayers are with you. But thoughts and prayers are not enough. And if this is not a wake up call, I do not know what is. Our most vulnerable citizens deserve to learn and they deserve to live. … Keeping children safe is not political. It is the duty of each and every adult in this country. So now more than ever, we need to come together and make change. If you have the power to make change, and instead sit back and remain complicit, do better. Please understand that our city is heartbroken. … I beg all of our community leaders to never let this happen again.”
Haile added: “It's in moments like this when, as students, we feel like the people that we look up to to protect us, people that constantly use our names to get to that powerful seat that they covet so much, when they give up on us — that's when we have to truly look out for each other.”
Battle recognized several student and school achievements at the meeting, from scholarship finalists to sports medalists, students exhibiting kindness and Glencliff Elementary School’s new status as a national magnet school of distinction.
“We had long planned to recognize the brilliance and excellence of our students tonight,” said Battle. “Perhaps now we have even more of a reason to do so. We need to let our students know that we love them and that we are so proud of them.”
The other major conversation of the meeting, and the subject of a related committee meeting beforehand, was next year’s education budget. The details of the budget can be seen in the slideshow below. Battle presented the current operating budget, how much it will cost to continue those operations, and the “aspirational” budget, which serves as a kind of wish list for school board members, the mayor and the Metro Council to consider throughout the process. The aspirational budget includes aspects like employee compensation, the continuation of federally funded initiatives, academic and SEL integration, and operational improvements.
There are several significant fiscal changes that the district is preparing for, including the end of federal COVID-19 relief dollars (which will happen next summer) and forthcoming transition of state funding formulas.
“We've received really limited information [regarding the new funding formula] so far,” said MNPS chief financial officer Chris Henson. “We have received an initial estimate of what that funding might look like, but it's not really helpful because it doesn't include what the state and local match, or split requirements would be. … Until we receive that fiscal capacity index information that can be applied to the [Tennessee Investment in Student Achievement] formula, we're not really going to know what our state funding estimate is going to be for next year. So hopefully we will have that by the end of April.”
The school board will vote on the aspirational budget during its next meeting. From there, Mayor John Cooper will propose a budget to the Metro Council, and once the council approves the mayor’s budget, it will return to the school board for further reconciliation in June.
Related budget community meetings will take place at the following dates and locations:
March 29, Northwest Community Budget Meeting, Whites Creek High School
March 30, Southeast Community Budget Meeting, Cane Ridge Elementary School
April 4, Northeast Community Budget Meeting, DuPont Hadley Middle School
April 10, Southwest Community Budget Meeting, Hillsboro High School
