Charter schools, parent choice touted during education forum hosted by former Gov. Haslam

For many parents from low-income, underserved communities, charter schools often seem like the only option when their children fail to thrive in their traditional neighborhood public school, some parents from across Tennessee said Tuesday.

Charter school advocates, including these parents and representatives of several statewide education advocacy groups, joined former Republican Gov. Bill Haslam for a conversation about school choice and how to improve education in Tennessee.

Rhea Groves of Hermitage has a 7-year-old at Purpose Preparatory Academy in Nashville. She's also a parent advocate with Nashville Propel, a coalition of mostly Black and brown parents representing families from North Nashville and other low-income, minority communities.

"Kids don't have a way out. Kids are dying, kids are out here committing crimes because they don't have an education," she said during a panel moderated by Haslam at the Nashville Public Library's downtown branch. "If we don't fund individual kids to meet their individual needs, they don't make it."

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Tennessee is home to 115 public charter schools, which are schools funded by tax dollars but operated privately. About 44,000 of Tennessee's nearly 1 million K-12 students attend a charter school, according to the Tennessee Charter School Center.

Charter schools are also clustered only in the state's four largest urban areas. Nashville is home to 27 charter schools, Chattanooga has five and Knoxville has just one.

The majority of the state's charter schools serve Memphis students from Shelby County Schools.

Bishop Charles Lampkin has six children in three different schools in Memphis. He felt like Shelby County Schools didn't give him an option but to send his kids to charters instead.

"I was very disappointed with Shelby County Schools in Memphis," Lampkin, who is a member of Memphis Lift, said. "My kids have some additional needs, so I needed to be sure that the people [the schools] hired to work in those areas have some real skills and expertise when working with my kids. ... For me, it was really a grand slam."

The conversation was hosted by the initiative "Better Student Outcomes Now," which launched last fall in the midst of the COVD-19 crisis to combat learning loss and advocate for improved student achievement, the Tennessee Charter School Center and SCORE.

It comes at a time when there are renewed conversations about whether public funding should follow individual students, whether they attend traditional public schools or not.

Funding already follows students to charter schools, which critics say weakens the surrounding neighborhood schools as they lose funding. Some also argue that charter schools can be more selective with students, even kicking out lower achievers or students with behavior problems.

They have long been the subject of fierce debate in Nashville.

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Last month, Gov. Bill Lee and the Tennessee Department of Education launched a review of the state's current school funding formula, or the Basic Education Program.

Lee and Education Commissioner Penny Schwinn have set their sights on creating a new student-centered formula that could give additional weights to specific student subgroups depending on need, like English language learners, students with disabilities, economically-disadvantaged students or rural students.

The department has hosted six townhalls so far where the public weighed in on their own priorities and parent choice has been one topic the department has heard about across the state.

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Parents, at least in the state's four urban areas, also have growing numbers of options. The Tennessee Public Charter School Commission, the new appellate body overseeing charter school authorization, took over the appeals process from the State Board of Education this year and already voted to overturn Metro Nashville Public Schools' denial of Nashville Classical Charter School II's application.

Some parents also feel more empowered to provide schooling themselves for their children since many schools were closed during the 2020-21 school year thanks to the pandemic.

Sonya Thomas, executive director of Nashville Propel, said the conversation isn't only about charter schools.

"It's about access," she told The Tennessean.

Propel, an offshoot of Memphis Lift, first rallied around insuring students had access to technology and the resources needed for remote learning at the beginning of the pandemic.

Nashville Propel: Nashville PROPEL parents advocate for more personalized learning for their students

Now, Thomas and her parents are showing up at conversations around charter schools and other choice options, such as how to improve student access to choice schools in Nashville.

Lampkin encouraged lawmakers to engage with parents like himself and those in the auditorium at the library Tuesday, especially as the state talks about revamping how it funds education.

"Listen to these parents. They are taxpayers," he said. "They want to do what's right for their children."

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Meghan Mangrum covers education for the USA TODAY Network — Tennessee. Contact her at mmangrum@tennessean.com. Follow her on Twitter @memangrum.

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Charter schools, parent choice touted during Nashville education forum