The State Collaborative on Reforming Education (SCORE), the nonprofit research and advocacy group that is the major partner in effecting change in Tennessee’s K-12 public education system, released its annual report on Tennessee’s education reforms earlier this month. SCORE also outlined what it believes are four priority areas the state will need to focus on in the coming year to sustain momentum and effectively implement the policy changes made in 2010-11.
1. Sustained policy leadership will continue to be critical. As Tennessee tries to meet its Race to the Top obligation, “reform efforts could lead to discomfort as new approaches replace old standards.” Continued commitment to implementation of the new teacher evaluation system will be vital (this aspect of Tennessee’s reforms has been particularly controversial).
2. Robust professional learning for educators that support performance evaluations is necessary. “Significant work” remains to help teachers adapt to the Common Core. Therefore, professional learning should be “ongoing, content-specific, job-embedded, and collaborative.”
3. There needs to be an intentional focus on strengthening teacher preparation programs. The state will need to continue to improve its Teacher Preparation Report Card to ensure new candidates will be effective educators. A partnership between the Department of Education and higher education institutions will need to be more closely forged.
4. Expanding and strengthening the principal and administrator pipeline must be a priority in the coming year. Particularly, small and rural school districts need to consider creating a pipeline through consortia models in collaboration with higher education institutions, since these areas tend to lack capacity to build pipelines from within.
To read the full report, please visit http://www.tnscore.org/research-resources/reports/
