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SCORE Joins Highlands Town Hall Debate 2010

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COOKEVILLE — The Highlands, Nashville’s WTVF NewsChannel5, Tennessee Tech University, and the League of Women Voters of Tennessee today announced that the State Collaborative on Reforming Education (SCORE) is joining as a sponsor in the Highlands Town Hall Debate 2010, a general-election gubernatorial debate scheduled for September 14 at TTU in Cookeville.

SCORE, a not-for-profit, non-partisan group led by former U.S. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, encourages sound education policy decisions at the state and local levels. Earlier this year, in January, the group co-sponsored a NewsChannel5 gubernatorial debate that included all major candidates in the Democratic and Republican primary fields.

“SCORE has a track record of promoting a non-partisan focus on important issues in this election,” Sandy Boonstra, news director of NewsChannel5, said. “We’re pleased to work with them once again.”

Frist, a surgeon who represented Tennessee in the U.S. Senate for 12 years, said SCORE supports a renewed focus on key issues, including education and health care. “Ensuring a better education for Tennessee students is critical as we work to improve health outcomes and promote a better quality of life for all Tennesseans,” he said. “SCORE is proud to support an open dialogue on the important issues in this election.”

As the first televised general-election gubernatorial debate held outside of Nashville, Memphis, or Knoxville, the Highlands Town Hall Debate 2010 will give focus to hometown issues facing rural and suburban areas — with an emphasis on economic development, education, and health care. The Highlands is a public/private economic development initiative between Overton, Putnam, and White Counties managed by the Cookeville-Putnam County Chamber of Commerce.

Using guidelines established by its partners, the debate will offer a unique perspective on voter attitudes by soliciting video questions in advance via YouTube and allowing Tennesseans to vote on which questions they want asked of the candidates. Written questions may also be submitted via the debate’s web site. The debate will include a section for live audience questions and a section for candidate-to-candidate questions.
On the Web: www.HighlandsDebate2010.com.

Frist Statement on Race to the Top

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NASHVILLE — Former U.S. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, who chairs the education-reform group Tennessee SCORE, today issued this statement following news that Tennessee is a finalist in the federal government’s groundbreaking Race to the Top competition:

“Tennessee’s spot as a finalist confirms what we’ve known:  The Volunteer State is poised to move farther, faster in public education reform than any other state in the nation.  Governor Bredesen, the General Assembly, and stakeholders including the TEA are to be commended for their bipartisan work in positioning us for success.  Thanks also to Secretary Duncan and the U.S. Department of Education for recognizing the extraordinary opportunities that exist here.  Statewide, the education-reform community stands ready to help make sure that Tennessee is ‘first to the top.’”

The Tennessee State Collaborative on Reforming Education (SCORE) is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that promotes education innovation.  In October 2009, SCORE released “A Roadmap to Success,” a report outlining comprehensive strategies for improving Tennessee schools.  Many of the strategies were adopted in January’s special legislative session on education reform.

SCORE is used as Case Study in National Report

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03.26.10

Tennessee SCORE is a case study in a new Policy Innovators in Education (PIE) Network report, “The Race to Reform: How Education Reform Advocates are Leveraging Race to the Top,” which tells the stories of state advocacy groups with an “outsized” impact on public education policy. The report opens with a description of SCORE and the collaborative process that supported passage of Tennessee’s First to the Top Act, a sweeping bipartisan overhaul of the state’s education reform law. Happy ending to the story – at least for now – is that Tennessee is one of 16 Race to the Top finalists.