Chalkbeat Tennessee reported on the Legislature’s recognition that the “Achievement School District” is a failure.
The ASD was launched by the Obama-Duncan Race to the Top on the theory that charter schools were a magic solution to low test scores. Duncan awarded $500 million to Tennessee, one of the first RTTT winners; $100 million was allocated to the ASD.
The ASD gathered the lowest-performing public schools in the state and clustered them into a new, all-charter district. Chris Barbic, leader of YES Prep charter schools in Houston, was selected to lead the ASD. He boldly predicted that within five years, the ASD schools would rank among the top 25% in the state. ASD started with six schools and eventually expanded to 33..
Blogger Gary Rubinstein has followed ASD over the years, with growing disillusionment. None of the ASD schools ever broke into the top 25%.
The state has spent more than $1 billion to help the ASD.
Chalkbeat wrote a few weeks ago that the Legislature is ready to throw in the towel:
After a decade of painful takeovers of neighborhood schools, contentious handoffs to charter networks, and mostly abysmal student performance, Tennessee’s Achievement School District appears to be on its way out.
Several of the GOP-controlled legislature’s top Republicans are acknowledging that the state’s most ambitious and aggressive school turnaround model has failed — and should be replaced eventually with a more effective approach.
Meanwhile, Democrats continue to push for legislation designed to end the so-called ASD, created under a 2010 state law aimed, in part, at transforming low-performing schools.
“I expect we will move in a different direction,” Sen. Bo Watson, the powerful chairman of his chamber’s finance committee, recently told reporters.
The Hixson Republican called the charter-centric school turnaround model an “innovative” idea that fell flat, at least in Tennessee. It would be foolish, Watson added, to keep spending money on an initiative that isn’t working and already has cost the state more than $1 billion — a sentiment echoed by Lt. Gov. Randy McNally and House Speaker Cameron Sexton.
But if the legislature decides to shutter the ASD and Gov. Bill Lee signs off, important questions remain about how Tennessee will support thousands of students in its lowest-performing schools.
There are currently 4,600 students enrolled in ASD schools, 12 in Memphis and one in Nashville.
Initially, the ASD attracted some of the nation’s biggest charter chains.
Evaluations showed that students in ASD schools gained no more in tested subjects than students in schools that received no interventions at all.
Now Tennessee must revise its contract with the federal government to revise its plans to help the lowest performing students.
Chalk up another loss for the “Disruption Doctrine” imposed by Bo Child Left Behind and Race to the Top. One can only imagine the difference that might have been made if the same sums were invested in full-service community schools and reduced class sizes.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Let’s not kid ourselves: another profit motive scheme is waiting in the wings.
These proposed miracle turnarounds fail to understand the devastating impact of poverty. Students do not exist in a vacuum. They are sentient beings. In order to improve academics, any intervention must consider addressing the needs of the whole student. Moving forward, Tennessee should consider locally supported community schools. Poor students already face lots of disruption in their daily lives. What they need is stability and positive staff members that can guide, support and address some of their personal as well as academic needs.
was about to say this. The thing that hurts Memphis is its poverty. Urban poverty features disruption as s way of life. Introducing more disruption by design is silly at best, pernicious and purposeful at worst.
Any bets that Tennesse will only fund another Disruption Doctrine under a different name, that continues to rob the taxpaying working class to increase the wealth of a few members of the richest 1%.
It matters less what follows than the admission that the aggressive school turnaround model has failed.
Poverty (not unionized/public school teachers) is the number one determiner of low academic achievement.
Income and tax disparity are the twin Mastadons in the room.