Rutherford County has agreed to pay up to $11 million to settle a large, class-action lawsuit over its policies for arresting and detaining children. The settlement, filed in federal court on Wednesday, is the largest in a string of lawsuits surrounding the county’s juvenile court.
Meribah Knight, Senior Reporter/Producer of Special Projects
Meribah Knight is the reporter and host of the Peabody award-winning podcast, The Promise, an immersive series from Nashville Public Radio about inequality and the people trying to rise above it. She is currently a fellow in ProPublica’s Local Reporting Network.
Her writing has appeared The New York Times, The New Yorker, O, The Oprah Magazine and The Chicago Reader. Her radio and multimedia work has been featured on NPR, Marketplace, Here and Now, WBEZ, The PBS NewsHour and Chicago Public Television.
A native of Cambridge, Mass., Meribah has a Masters of Journalism from Northwestern University and a BA from New York University. She lives in Nashville with her husband, a photojournalist with the Tennessean, their toddler son and the family’s five cats.
Listen: The Promise Radio Special
The hour-long special delves back into history, chronicling the city’s epic 43-year battle over school desegregation and the devastating sacrifices one Black family made in the name of progress and equity.
The Disaster Year: A Reporter Reflects On A Year Marked By Suffering
The night still runs on a loop in my brain, resurfacing too many times a day to count. Especially that particular moment, when the tornado peeled off our roof as I held my son, debris flying, running for the basement. It’s nearly a year later and we’re still not home. So everything reminds me of the storm.
Season 2, Episode 8: The Final Exam
It’s February 2020, and Warner Elementary is rising from one of the lowest performing schools in Tennessee to one of the best. But we all know what happens next. And at a school with low-income students, the challenges of a global pandemic hit especially hard.
Season 2, Episode 7: The Recruitment Divide
There was a time when the decision of where to send your child to school was relatively simple: public or private. Now, those choices have multiplied — and the resulting system of school choice hasn’t solved the inequalities at play.
The Promise: ‘I Want White Families To Realize The Power They Hold’ In Public Education
Two years ago, WPLN’s Meribah Knight reported on how parents at one East Nashville elementary school were pushing to reverse a troubling trend: Despite the diversity of the neighborhood, it had almost no children of color anymore.
Season 2, Episode 6: A Reckoning
Last fall, parents from Lockeland Elementary met to talk about the elephant in the room: Their school was now the whitest school in the entire district. But not that long ago, an idea was floated that could have changed the makeup of Lockeland’s student body — and it did not go well.
Season 2, Episode 5: Warner’s Hope
Warner Elementary is about to turn itself around. It finally has all the right tools to be successful — an infusion of cash, an energetic principal. But will white families choose to send their children there?
Season 2, Episode 4: What You Can’t Unsee
In a neighborhood with tons of Black families, Willie Sims’ daughter was the only Black child in the kindergarten class of one East Nashville elementary school. Then he started hearing murmurings from other families, white families. They were mobilizing against resegregation. Did he want in?
Season 2, Episode 3: The Unraveling
After 43 years of courtroom battles, Nashville’s landmark school desegregation lawsuit was settled. In the eyes of the law, the city finally made an honest effort to racially integrate its schools. But in truth, the matter was far from settled.
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