During its quarterly meeting Thursday and Friday, the Tennessee Public Charter School Commission approved three new-start charter school applications that were previously denied by the Metro Nashville Public Schools board. The commission upheld the MNPS board’s denial of one other school.
Such is the annual process for charter schools attempting to set up in school districts across the state. First they apply to the local school board. If they’re denied, they can submit amended applications. If they’re denied again, they can appeal the school board’s decision to the state charter commission, which has final authority.
At a tense meeting, the board also refrained from passing a ‘family life policy’
Among those approved by the commission this week is LEAD Southeast Elementary, a K-5 school that will open in Southeast Nashville. LEAD has five other schools currently operating in the city, including a middle and high school located in the Southeast Nashville area. Initially, LEAD brought two new elementary charter school applications to the MNPS board and the charter commission, but withdrew its application for LEAD Cameron Elementary earlier in October.
The charter commission also green-lit applications for Encompass Community Schools and Nurses Middle College Nashville. The former is a K-8 community-school-based model slated for the Whites Creek and Pearl-Cohn clusters. The latter is a grade 9-12 school that would focus on preparing high school students to enter health care.
In a release, president and CEO of Tennesseans for Student Success Lana Skelo called the approval of Encompass Community Schools “a win for families in North Nashville who simply want a different kind of public education for their children than existing zoned schools are providing."
An application for the Nashville School of Excellence was denied by the commission, though some of its members expressed interest in potentially approving another application down the line once the charter school can more thoroughly establish certain application elements. Each of the charter commission’s Nashville-related votes aligned with the recommendations of its executive director Tess Stovall.
The commission also approved Wooddale Middle School in Shelby County and denied Novus SMART Academy in Rutherford County.
In a message to the Scene, the Metro Nashville Public Schools board's District 2 representative Rachael Anne Elrod calls the new charters “unnecessary, lesser options than the surrounding public schools that they’ll inevitably hurt.”
Elrod points to MNPS’ academic gains amid a history of underfunding from the state as a demonstration of Metro schools’ strengths. She also says the district will now have to pay for schools the board voted against twice.
“This is a strategic dismantling of public schools and Metro Nashville’s budget,” says Elrod. “We’re becoming upside-down with too many seats and an unsustainable cost per pupil to cover the fixed costs charter schools force onto public school districts. It is beyond a ‘school board issue.’ Taxpayers, county commissioners, city councils and mayors across the state should be alarmed about this gross overreach and demand better. “
