Image Credit: Canva
By Sam Stockard [Tennessee Lookout -CC BY-NC-ND 4.0] –
Key House lawmakers say the state’s Achievement School District needs major changes amid the apparent dismissal of the state director charged with running the program after just five months.
The Department of Education confirmed Bren Elliott, who took over the post Aug. 31, 2023, is no longer with the agency and that it is searching for a new leader. The department refused to comment further because the matter involves employment.
With constant turnover plaguing the district designed to bolster the state’s lowest-performing schools, state Rep. Antonio Parkinson said Monday Elliott’s removal is further proof the Achievement School District needs to be dropped, calling it a “ball of confusion.”
“It’s just indicative of the disarray that has been the Achievement School District since its inception. It just hasn’t worked,” Parkinson said Monday.
He pointed out the state has spent more than $1 billion on the program, made up mainly of charter schools in Memphis, yet the state-run district has struggled academically and administratively, failing the schools in a “more disastrous way” than under previous efforts.
House Education Administration Committee Chairman Mark White has supported the state-run district since it started 12 years ago but said Monday “there may be a better way to move the needle now.”
“I think we need to seriously look at our (Achievement School District),” White, an East Memphis Republican, said.
Elliott worked as a Metro Nashville Public Schools administrator from 2001 to 2007 and was in charge of school improvement in the District of Columbia from 2017 until her hire at the state level last year by new Education Commissioner Lizzette Reynolds. In addition to leading the state-run district, she supervised improvement efforts for about 300 schools statewide in the bottom 5% based on test scores.
Parkinson, a Memphis Democrat, said he received no word from the Department of Education that Elliott had been “terminated.” He believes the director’s dismissal would bring support to a bill he is sponsoring that would “restructure” the state’s school “turnaround” efforts and provide more support for struggling schools.
His measure maintains efforts required by the federal government to receive funding and creates “smaller government” by removing administration yet gives those schools more support.
White noted Parkinson’s bill could garner more support in light of administrative problems within the state-run district.
Lisa Settle left the Achievement School District in 2022. Previously, it ran into problems when an audit found administrators were spending money on parties and alcohol.
The district at one point had more than 30 schools, including a couple in Nashville, but is now down to about a dozen.
About the Author: Sam Stockard is a veteran Tennessee reporter and editor, having written for the Daily News Journal in Murfreesboro, where he served as lead editor when the paper won an award for being the state’s best Sunday newspaper two years in a row. He has led the Capitol Hill bureau for The Daily Memphian. His awards include Best Single Editorial from the Tennessee Press Association. Follow Stockard on Twitter @StockardSam