KNOXVILLE, Tennessee — School leaders across East Tennessee voiced concerns about individual public schools receiving letter grades in a town hall meeting at Central High School in September.
Teachers, like Joe Crabtree who teaches seventh grade in Johnson City, said he questioned what would happen after schools got a failing grade.
"To tell a school that they are an 'F' is going to undeniably damage the morale of teachers working their hearts out to try to make a difference in those schools," Crabtree said.
The Director of Schools in Anderson County also said that giving letter grades is a way for the state to push Governor Bill Lee's proposed universal voucher program.
"Maybe nobody else will say it, but I know what it's about," Dr. Tim Parrott said. "It's about making public education look bad. We got to have vouchers in this state. The governor wants it, the legislators want it, everybody else wants it. And we got to figure out a way, to me, to make public education look bad. The problem is, we're not bad."
The Education Freedom Scholarship Act would start by providing a total of 20,000 scholarships to Tennessee students during the 2024-2025 school year. The first 10,000 scholarships would be for students whose families were at or below 300% of the federal poverty line, who have a disability or who are eligible for the state's new ESA program.
The other 10,000 scholarships would be available to a universal pool of students eligible to attend public schools.
The following school year and beyond, Tennessee students would be universally eligible to get scholarships so they could attend schools other than public schools, as long as funds are available for scholarships. They could be used for faith-based schools, private schools and charter schools. Tennessee would join nine other states that have similar programs.
Critics expressed concerns that private schools would get public funds despite not having to follow the same standards as public schools under the program.
The state also gave people a chance to provide comments on the letter grade. There were 171 responses.