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Hamblen County Schools welcomed teachers and staff back on Friday morning to begin the 2023/2024 school year.

They gathered in East High School’s Auditorium early Friday morning to receive a welcome from Superintendent Arnold Bunch who began by thanking the school board for their service and dedication to the Hamblen County School system.

“Without the board’s great support, we wouldn’t have added the positions and the many other things that we have done this year, we wouldn’t have the investment in capital. They are strong supporters of education here in Hamblen County and doing a great job in serving and we appreciate their great support,” Bunch said.

Bunch continued by thanking the teachers for their willingness to serve the students of Hamblen County.

“Thank you for your willingness to serve as an educator, it’s a critical role but you’re doing a phenomenal job. You’re not always appreciated or understood by a lot of the community, but you make a significant difference in the future of this community and in these kids’ lives, so thank you for your sacrifice in what you’re doing to help us move forward in creating a better learning environment and educate our students better so they’re prepared to go out and face the world.”

“This is about the kids, it’s not about us and not about you. I work for each and every one of you but we all work for the students. It’s all about the kids and preparing them for the future,” he said.

Bunch then delved into the subject of standardized testing results and how Hamblen County Students have been performing overall the past year.

“Some of you may have seen articles where I explain what we’ve done in TCAP, but when I say what we’ve done, what I really mean is what you’ve done. When you look at all 31 areas, 21 of them we improved in from last year. Some of the jumps are very significant: 3rd grade 34.9 and 40.9 on the ELA. All 3rd through 8th in science 31.8 to 44% You can look at all these areas, and what I am telling the public when I go out and talk is that we can close the learning gap created by Covid. I am just talking about that, but you all are proving that what I’m talking about can be done,” he said.

Bunch continued by encouraging teachers to work together and collaborate on learning strategies.

“We are seeing a continuous steady growth path. You all are doing a great job in a lot of these areas, we have got to continue to stay the course, we have got to continue to collaborate and pick those areas where someone is doing really well and propagate those out through the rest of the district. Don’t be afraid to take somebody’s good lesson learned so we all get better. That’s what we’re really after. Some new teachers find a way to get to the kids today that some of our more seasoned teachers may not have capitalized on before. Some of our more seasoned teachers have scar tissue from doing this for a lot of years and they can teach some of the ones right out of college, so we have to work together to continue to improve and I think that’s what you want as well.”

Bunch then included information on state averages and how they correlate with Hamblen County students in various demographics.

“If you’ve listened to some of the news reports and some of the things I’ve talked about, when you break it down into all the categories 50% were above the state average, unfortunately 50% of the categories were not above the state average. There’s no reason we as a district shouldn’t be at or above the state average in everything.”

“When you break out our results for our demographic areas, the economically disadvantaged, African American, Hispanic, students with learning disabilities or students with special needs, other than one or two areas we improved across the board. Some of our areas in every area we are above the state average in a lot of years. I know that’s been a focus area and I know there’s one area where we don’t have the results that I had hoped we would see and that’s English language learners. But in that area, thanks to the support of the board we’ve added 8 additional positions this year to bring in and address that area where we knew we probably weren’t up to speed on and we’re trying to make a difference in this area, so for this, thank you. I’m just talking about it but you guys are making it reality. You all are the ones doing the hard work on this, you all are where the rubber meets the road trying to reach these kids,” he said.

Bunch then elaborated on the changes in teacher evaluation strategies for the upcoming school year called Project Coach which encourages continuous communication and feedback between administrator and teacher.

“So you will see a shift in teacher evaluations, now there will be many observations with continuous feedback. So if there’s a bad day on the day they schedule an eval, then you don’t have to worry about that. Unannounced variety of different times, continuous rapid feedback from the evaluator, this is all about communication. The goal is continuous improvement and not a one-time gotcha that we’re out there doing. Each one adds up. Jefferson County does this, this is a move so that we are more in the classrooms and we are working with the administrators, so if you have issues, please bring them up to them. This is a shift from what we were doing before and I want you, those that are going to bear the impact, to hear it straight from me. This is not an attempt at a gotcha, this is an attempt at frequent feedback so that we are continually improving and it has to be a two part guide with the administrators and the teachers.”

Then Bunch addressed the issue of safety within the schools.

“Last year when I talked to you, I talked about doors. I talked about don’t prop them open, and according to Jeff we fixed four to five times more doors this year than we’ve fixed in a year. With what happened in Nashville last year safety is even more of an emphasis item in this state than it has ever been.”

“The board approved a significant amount of money going into a program that would have had us providing school security officers and us running all of that out of central office. I would much prefer as a district that we are in the education business and not in the security business. So after meetings with both mayors and local law enforcement, the county is picking up the SRO responsibilities for all of our schools. they have already applied for and acquired the grant money that the governor has promised, they have gotten over a million dollars to fund an SRO in every school they are now actively hiring. I will not stand here today and tell you we are going to have an SRO at every school when we start the year, I am not going to tell you that. I’m also not going to tell everyone in the public forum where our SROs are going to be at all of the elementary schools. We will fill those as we do and we don’t need to tell anybody where we don’t have one all the time,” he said.

Bunch went on to explain the process of placing SROs in each school and how members of the county have helped aid the process.

“I am very pleased with the support we’ve gotten out of the county, Sheriff Mullins, Mayor Brittain, County Commissioners, everybody is very supportive of what we’re trying to do. This is on the mind of you, it’s on the mind of all our staff, it is most definitely in the forefront of all the minds of all our parents. We are aggressively working this and working with Mr. Clement. We have our priorities set up for where we’re going to place the next SROs when they come in, the goal right now is an SRO in every school and two in each high school as quickly as we can get them.”

Bunch then elaborated on new laws passed within the state that require exterior doors to remain locked at all times and the repercussions if that law isn’t appropriately followed.

“The state has passed a lot of laws in this area, law enforcement now can come check our doors whenever they want to. If we have exterior doors that law enforcement find unlocked, there are provisions in the law to withhold 2% after a certain period of time 4%, 6%, 8% and 10% of that school’s funding if we can’t remember to keep our doors locked. It will be at times, as I told you last year, inconvenient. I’m sorry, I don’t want it to be inconvenient but keep the doors locked, don’t prop them open. Work with your administrators if there are issues. We have to document when the doors are open because we’re supposed to have one main entrance, if we’re having more than one main entrance and all the other doors aren’t locked then we have to document when that is. They are trying to get us to think our way through how we’re doing this, how we’re controlling this and how we can keep it safer for the students and also for you.”

Bunch then broached the subject of intruder exercises and explained that due to the shooting in Nashville now there will be more active measures taken to ensure each school is as prepared as they can be.

“There are extra exercises this year, armed intruder exercises with law enforcement in every school. School bus emergency exercise at every school. Incident control in every school. Many of these will be done without students present but you have to remember, there is a ramp-up in this area, so please don’t try to push back on it, we need to welcome it. If the faculty and the staff at the school in Nashville hadn’t responded the way they did, then there would be a lot more deaths. We need to be ready to respond, we need to know what we’ve got to do when somebody hits an alarm, you can’t think about that when the alarm goes off. You need to think about where is the safe zone in my school, in my room, how do I communicate. If you see something say something.”

Before concluding his message, Bunch touched on the topic of cyber security and the new authentication methods that will be in place in the coming year to ensure the safety of student information.

Bunch ended with the mission and vision, concluding with thanking the teachers for their dedication to their students.

“Our mission and vision is to educate all students so they can achieve their post-secondary and career goals. Every student is important, every student deserves a high quality education, every one of our students can learn, all students can learn. They are our students so embrace them where they’re at, educate them, increase their knowledge level because they’re going to be members of this community and we need them to be contributing members of society. All our students are valuable and should be treated with respect and all of us share the responsibility of ensuring that happens.”

“It’s about students. We get a million minutes with these kids, we need to make the most out of each and every one of those minutes. We have to think every day that we are making a difference in their lives, we are shaping this county’s future. Thank you for shaping this county’s future one student at a time.”