B

Letters will go out by Feb. 1 to parents of third-grade students in Grainger County regarding the controversial retention law being reconsidered by the Tennessee General Assembly.

The Grainger County Board of Education, at its Tuesday meeting, took up this issue when Director of Schools Mark Briscoe announced the letters.

The letters will go out to parents of third-graders who did not do well or any student who scored below certain percentages on their universal reader screeners on the TCAP second-grade equivalent test last year.

“We modeled our letter very similar to Clinton City Schools,” Briscoe said. “This is the second countywide communication and there’ll be a lot more to follow. This letter will probably get you all some phone calls.”

Briscoe gave some advice that Chuck Cagle, chairman of the education law practice group at Lewis Thomason, King, and Waldrop who represents over 70 school districts across Tennessee, gave him when Cagle addressed some directors of schools on this issue in Gatlinburg.

“This isn’t us,” Briscoe said. “This is the state legislature. We’re trying to make the best of it. All the groups who can lobby. We’re trying to do what is right for the students and all we’re trying to is to (make) our kids read better. I don’t know anyone who is against that. That sort of de-escalates parents a little bit until you actually retain the kid. We just want to help their kids.”

As currently constituted, the law – which would impact more than half of Tennessee’s third graders – says that any third grader who does not read at grade level on the year-end test will face three options. Students who are close to grade level may choose between summer school or intense tutoring the next year. Students who are further from grade level must take both summer school and intense tutoring.

Students who do not read at grade level and do not agree to the designated remediations will be held back.

Educators and administrators have pointed to a number of issues, not the least of which is that the law does not account for test anxiety or simply having a bad day. Many have said that focusing on a single test and not the student’s body of work is a mistake as is taken decision making out of the local educators who work with the student every day.

In addition to the fact that many studies indicate holding students back doesn’t address the underlying issue, administrators have pointed out the new law doesn’t account for paying, recruiting and training the additional teachers necessary to provide the summer school and tutoring.

There are also logistical issues in holding students back as the accreditations for third and fourth grade teachers are different.

Washburn Principal Greg Clay had a parent meeting about the third-grade retention law at the beginning of the school year.

“He sent a letter home at the beginning of the year,” Briscoe said. “He had four or five people turn up and none of their kids were in danger. There were no third-grade parents. It was just the luck of the draw.”

“I spoke face to face with (State Rep.) Rick Eldridge yesterday,” Board Member Marcus Long said. “He said that this was going back before the General Assembly for changes because of how devastating it could be to the state. They want to put control at the local level instead of the state. They want the local teachers to say, ‘Yes, this kid needs to be retained or doesn’t’ instead of the state saying they didn’t meet the score, so we’re holding them back.”

Briscoe said that students affected can get an automatic waiver from the state if they score 40.1% or above on one of the universal screeners. He said that the schools can’t do the waiver for the parents, but will open up times for the parents to submit the waivers electronically.

“They’re going to have to come to us to get our help,” Briscoe said. “We’ll do everything in our power to help.”

Clay will be leaving to take the Union County Director of Schools position at the end of January. Clay came to Washburn School several years ago from Union County and this promotion represents a return home for him.

The principal’s position will be advertised, with at least one person at the school interested in the job. Briscoe thinks a principal can be named quickly after Clay leaves.

“I know that’s a big job, but when I became interim principal at Grainger High, I was by myself from Feb. 3 or 4 to the end of the year,” Briscoe said. “Greg’s done a good job. He’s got the evaluations down to a 22. That’s a very good number to be at on Jan. 17. He is in pretty good shape. I told him that we can take time about if we have to if they need help at Washburn.”

Briscoe said that he has offered to help there on Tuesdays, if needed.

“I know we have a candidate at Washburn who wants to be principal after Greg leaves,” Briscoe said. “The bigger issue is getting an assistant principal. A lot of the assistant principals have jobs right now. I’m thinking we might be better off hiring some interim assistants to get us through the end of the year so we don’t take a teacher out of the classroom in the middle of the semester. I don’t think that’s a very good practice.

“We can put assistants over there who may not be interested in being a full-time assistant, get them to the summer, and then hire full-time assistants without pulling out of the classroom. I know that there are two there who are interested in being assistant principals, but we would have a hard time filling their teaching spots.

The Board also approved for Briscoe to determine the fuel index to be used by the school system. Presently, the index is set by the Director in August with a review in January.

Briscoe looked to the school board minutes of April, 2005 as being the last time the BOE discussed the fuel index.

“In August, I took it upon myself to set what the fuel index was going to be,” he said. “I just wanted to make sure that you all wanted me to continue to do that.”

In other action by the board, STEM grants for Rutledge Middle School and Washburn School were passed 8-0.

“The grants will be used to buy entry-level 3-D printers for middle school students to use,” Briscoe said.

The 2022-23 General Purpose Federal Programs School Nutrition and math implementation budget amendments were also passed 8-0. In a separate proposal approved, SchoolKit will come in to help to choose the new math textbooks and help teachers implement the math from those textbooks with a two-year grant at no cost to the system.

“This is all new money,” Briscoe said. “The math implementation grant is about textbook adoption and implementing high-quality instruction materials.”

A proposal to increase substitute bus driver pay was passed 8-0.

Bids for intercom replacement for Rutledge Primary and Joppa Elementary schools were approved to be awarded to the Gallaher Company. Money will be taken out of the reserve budget to pay for the replacement.

“The (intercom) at Rutledge Primary is about to die,” Briscoe said. “Joppa is having all sorts of problems, obviously it’s a bigger building. They’ve had a lot of problems out of the call buttons with teachers calling in and out of the rooms. I don’t think the intercom survived the additions and add-ons. It needs to be fixed.”

In school board policy reviews, a COVID-19 policy that has long since expired was pulled from the reviews. The other policies were approved.

Summer instructional programs will be announced at the March BOE meeting. Board members Shelia Bailey and Larry Turley were absent.