LEA: means a county, city, or special school district, unified school district, school district of a metropolitan form of government, or another school system established by law. See Tennessee Code 49-3-104
State: when applied to the different parts of the United States, includes the District of Columbia and the several territories of the United States. See Tennessee Code 1-3-105
(1) Establishes goals for student achievement, including the goal of seventy percent (70%) of the LEA‘s students in third grade taking the English language arts (ELA) portion of the Tennessee comprehensive assessment program (TCAP) tests achieving a performance level rating of “on track” or “mastered” on the ELA portion of the TCAP tests, in the current school year and explains how the goals can be met within the LEA’s budget; and(2) Describes how the LEA’s budget and expenditures for prior school years enabled the LEA to make progress toward the student achievement goals established for the prior school years; provided, however, that this subdivision (a)(2) does not apply to the report submitted for the 2023-2024 school year.(b) The report required in this section must be presented to the public for comment before the report is submitted to the department. The report required by this section must be submitted to the department by November 1, 2023, and each November 1 thereafter.(c)(1) Beginning with the 2024-2025 school year:
(A) An LEA that operates a public school that receives a “D” or “F” letter grade pursuant to § 49-1-228, or a public charter school that receives a “D” or “F” letter grade pursuant to § 49-1-228 and the public charter school’s authorizer, may be required to appear for a hearing before the state board, or a committee of the state board appointed by the chair of the state board, to report on the public school’s performance and how the LEA’s or public charter school’s spending decisions may have affected the ability of the LEA’s public schools or the public charter school to achieve certain performance goals. At the conclusion of a hearing conducted pursuant to this subdivision (c)(1)(A), the board may recommend that the department impose one (1) of the corrective actions identified in subdivision (c)(2)(B); and(B) The department may impose one (1) of the following corrective actions for a public charter school or an LEA that operates a public school that receives a “D” or “F” letter grade pursuant to § 49-1-228:
(i) Require the LEA or public charter school to develop, submit to the department for approval, and implement a corrective action plan consistent with a corrective action plan template developed by the department. The department shall report on the LEA’s or public charter school’s implementation of the corrective action plan to the state board; or(ii) Require the department to audit and investigate the LEA’s or public charter school’s academic programming and spending. The department shall report the outcomes of the audit and investigation to the state board.(2) The state board shall promulgate rules to effectuate this subsection (c) in accordance with the Uniform Administrative Procedures Act, compiled in title 4, chapter 5.(3) The department shall provide information requested by the state board by the date specified by the state board, to assist the state board in making the determinations necessary for purposes of this subsection (c).(d) The department shall apportion the costs of implementing a corrective action imposed pursuant to subdivision (c)(1)(B) between the department and the LEA or public charter school on a case-by-case basis, subject to the approval of the state board.
