Tennessee SCORE

Yesterday I attended a press conference held by former U.S. Senator Bill Frist and Governor Phil Bredesen. They were kicking off a new initiative called the Tennessee State Collaborative on Reforming Education (SCORE). This program is an initiative to jumpstart long-term educational change in Tennessee to ensure that every child graduates high school prepared for college or a career. In the fall of 2008, Governor Phil Bredesen set a high bar for Tennessee's K-12 education system with the Tennessee Diploma Project, and SCORE will focus on jumpstarting reforms that will help Tennessee schools, teachers, and students meet this bar.

According to their website, SCORE intends to achieve this goal by (1) developing a strategic plan for K-12 education reform in Tennessee via a statewide Steering Committee of key stakeholders (2) launching a number of Project Teams to initiate both statewide and local education projects and (3) running a grassroots campaign to promote the state's new standards, identify education activists across the state, and create converastions among local community leaders about how each community can improve its local schools.

The Tennessee County Services Association and its affiliates (including the Tennessee County Commissioners Association) are partnering with this effort to pursue positive reforms and improvements to K-12 education in Tennessee. For more information on this initiative, check out its website at: http://www.tennesseescore.org/.