Education 101 - An Overview of Recent Education Reforms in Tennessee | Page 2

Taking Note

Superintendent Selection in Tennessee: A Brief History
January 2011

Momentum for Reform
Over the past two years, Tennessee has begun to dramatically reform
its education system. As outlined below, these reforms have begun
to create the political, policy, and funding conditions to dramatically
improve Tennessee’s schools.

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support, passing by a vote of 29-3 in the Senate and 83-10 in the
House. The bill made significant changes to how the state evaluates
principals and teachers as well as how the state intervenes in lowperforming schools.

Tennessee Diploma Project
In 2007, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce published a report card
outlining the rigor of each state’s academic standards, which measure
the knowledge students are expected to know in each grade and
subject. Tennessee received an “F” on this report card, ranking behind
every other state in the nation.vii Motivated by this poor performance and
with significant support from the business community, then Governor
Phil Bredesen announced that Tennessee would launch the Tennessee
Diploma P