At first blush, it's a shame that we've come to the point where we need a political action committee - aka PAC - to help shape the direction of education in Hamilton County.
But this is 2018 and education reform can't just happen in school administration offices, even when the leaders in those administration offices - like Superintendent Bryan Johnson and members of his new team - are taking that reform in a positive direction.
Staff photo by Doug Strickland / Visitors enter the Passage bus at a stop for UnifiEd's Action Plan for Educational Excellence at the Highland Park Commons last December.The reality is that Hamilton County schools need the right leadership on up the ladder at the Board of Education and county commission level as well. And this year all nine Hamilton County Commission seats, the county mayor seat and five school board seats are up for election.
That's where the PAC comes in. There's a lot of leadership up for grabs and it's high time that candidates understand they are being graded by - and will be beholden to - a group that includes the organized voice of parents, and business leaders not just the political arm of the Hamilton County chapter of the Tennessee Education Association, the local teachers union.
Last fall, UnifiEd, an education advocacy group started here in 2014, launched a new nonprofit organization, UnifiEd Action, along with the UnifiEd Action PAC, to take the new goals of improving public education here one step further. The aim of the new group and the PAC is to inform, lobby and ultimately endorse candidates for local office.
"There's nothing more vital to our community than providing a great education for our kids ... and leadership matters, leadership in those positions matters," said Paul Brock, president of UnifiEd Action, a 501(c)(4).
He couldn't be more right. And there is no better time than now, while we have both a public appetite for educational improvement and a new administrative team with fresh vision in the superintendent's office.
There's no better time than now to remember how many years and how many votes it took to get additional funding for local schools.
There's no better time than now to recall how local school board members reacted and continue to react to school test scores, to school hazing incidents, to public input at board meetings, and even to current-events questions like school safety and guns in schools.
Staff photo by C.B. Schmelter / UnifiEd Executive Director Jonas Barriere will lead new education PAC for UnifiEd Action.There's no better time than now to ask incumbents and new candidates why we still have five schools that after years - decades - have performed so poorly the state had to threaten to take them over before the board agreed to compromise with state officials for special actions proposed by Johnson. There's no better time than now to ask why 60 percent of our third-graders can't read at grade level and why about 60 percent of our high-school graduates aren't jobs ready.
This week, we learned that UnifiEd Executive Director Jonas Barriere is stepping away from the local education-focused nonprofit to lead the PAC, which has a completely separate board from either UnifiEd or UnifiEd Action. Barriere, who has led community organization efforts for UnifiEd for two years, says the organization will begin meeting with candidates this week. When the meetings are over, endorsements will be decided.
In November, Lorie Runge, the PAC's president, said meaningful change in public schools will only happen when elected officials are committed to education reform "at every level" of local office.
"This PAC will support incumbents and candidates who are ready to take bold action to ensure a brilliant future for every child in Hamilton County," she said.
It's a shame that politics - and money politics, at that - has to be part of our education reform.
But since this is our reality, it's good that a group like UnifiEd is going to lead the effort.