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The Tennessee Conservative [By Paula Gomes] –
The latest State of the Child Report shows gains in education but less than half of Tennessee’s children are meeting benchmarks.
According to TCAP scores, there continues to be improvement in the percentage of students meeting or exceeding expectations in English Language Arts (ELA) and Math, at the elementary, middle, and high school levels, since the pandemic. However, the progress that has been made is still far from where Tennessee’s children ought to be academically.
On average, less than half of all elementary students are meeting benchmarks, with 43.4 percent of students on track for ELA compared to 45.4 percent for Math.
In middle school, closer to a third – 34.5 percent – are meeting standards for ELA, with 40.7 percent doing the same in Math.
When it comes to high school, proficiency in ELA goes up to 46.8 percent – still less than half of all students – and Math proficiency takes a dive to less than a third of students – 30.7 percent.
The report also highlighted the dire state of many schools in need of significant infrastructure improvements.
Building Tennessee’s Tomorrow: Anticipating the State’s Infrastructure Needs is the most recent in a series of legislatively required reports which maintains an inventory of these needs across the state. Reviewing needs over a five-year period, the 2025 report covers July 2023-June 2028 and found that the fourth and fifth highest needs to be school renovations and new public schools and additions, totaling $11.2 billion.
One in 10 schools in Tennessee had infrastructure that was rated in fair or poor condition.
School districts where at least 1 in 3 schools have such pitiful infrastructure included Germantown, Lake County, Bledsoe County, Davidson County, Marion County, Fayetteville, Humphreys County, and Milan Special School District. In addition, a third of the state’s public schools need improvements to be in compliance with state and federal laws to the tune of $79.6 million.
$17 million is needed for asbestos compliance, $47 million for Americans with Disabilities Act compliance, $13 million for Education Improvement Act compliance, and $8.6 million for fire codes compliance.
School districts with the greatest need for compliance funding are Shelby County ($36.7 million), Bristol ($6.7 million), Sullivan County ($5.2 million), Collierville ($4.2 million), Madison County ($3.5 million), Germantown ($3.5 million), McNairy County ($3 million), Lauderdale County ($2 million), Montgomery County ($1.9 million), and Oak Ridge ($1.9 million.)
$6.6 billion is needed across all existing Tennessee public schools to bring all existing components of public schools up to good or excellent condition according to the report’s Facility Rating Scale. This averages out to $6,885 per student.
The greatest need for this funding is in the following districts:
Davidson County – $4 billion
Shelby County – $432 million
Wilson County – $241 million
Rutherford County – $240 million
Williamson County – $196 million
Montgomery County – $143 million
Robertson County – $74 million
Maury County – $57 million
Bartlet – $56 million
Last year, Governor Bill Lee finally succeeded in establishing a universal school voucher program during a special legislative session, and lawmakers will likely debate the possibility of expanding the program upon reconvening in Nashville despite the state of current public school infrastructure.
Criticized for diverting much needed funding from the state’s public K-12 schools, the program cost Tennessee $144 million in its first year alone and is projected to exceed $1 billion over its first five years even if it is not expanded to include more students.
Compared to the last State of the Child Report, the mental health of youth in Tennessee appears to be improving.
It was previously reported that more than 1 in 5 students between 12 and 17 said they had thought about committing suicide in 2021 and more than 1 in 6 had made a plan to take action to that end. The stats for those actually following through was 1 in 7.
Among this same cohort in 2022-23, 1 in 7 thought about suicide seriously, with 1 in 15 making a plan, and 1 in 24 having made an attempt.
When it comes to adversity and resilience, 83.5 percent of Tennessee children 6 months old to 5 years were found to be “flourishing,” better than the national average of 79.7 percent.
For children between the ages of 6 and 17, the numbers are also better than the U.S. average with 63.1 percent flourishing compared to the national average of 61.5 percent.
The report also shows that while the number of children in state custody has declined over the last few years, the median length of time in foster care in Tennessee has increased. In 2023, a child could be expected to remain in state care 13.4 months compared to 10.7 months in 2019.
The Tennessee Commission on Children and Youth (TCCY) releases the State of the Child Report annually, assessing the well-being of the state’s children in several different categories: crime, poverty, mental health, safety, education, and youth justice.
An independent and nonpartisan agency, the TCCY was created to track the effectiveness of state policies and programs on the health, well-being and development of Tennessee’s children, youth and families.
The Tennessee General Assembly established the TCCY as a permanent commission, reporting to the governor, the state assembly, and to the state’s depository libraries, making it a central resource for information for the state and an advocacy agency to assist in the making of policy and coordinating resources.
Additional Sources:
About the Author: Paula Gomes is a Tennessee resident and reporter for The Tennessee Conservative. You can reach Paula at paula@tennesseeconservativenews.com.
2 Responses
Public “education” is an unaffordable failure.
“Criticized for diverting much needed funding from the state’s public K-12 schools, the program cost Tennessee $144 million in its first year alone and is projected to exceed $1 billion over its first five years even if it is not expanded to include more students.”
Huh? Public schools lost zero funds due to the vouchers. They had an increase in funding and lost no funding that went to vouchers. Only the work left, not the money. For this statement from the report to be true, the 20,000 vouchers would have to increase to $50,000 each.
They have other claims that don’t pass the sniff test, especially related to crime data. They are finding a way to call guns the leading cause of deaths (by including all suicide and accidental deaths), while claiming crime reduction in Memphis and Nashville at the same time. We know 80%+ of TN gun deaths occur in Shelby and Davidson counties. Another anomaly is the 42% increase in crime in Hamblen county…with all the Hispanics. That “per 100,000” metric doesn’t work so well on small populations.