How MNPS is addressing teacher concerns this year

As Metro Nashville Public Schools prepares to start Monday, we sat down with Dr. Mason Bellamy, chief of academics and schools, and Michele Sheriff, president of the Metro Nashville Educators Association, on Friday’s episode of This Is Nashville.

Listen to the full episode: Back to school with Nashville’s teachers

We talked about what this school year will look like and what the district is doing to address teacher concerns, including staffing shortages.

This conversation has been edited for clarity. Listen to the full interview with host Khalil Ekulona above.

How are you feeling as this school year begins? 

Mason Bellamy: I’m excited. I’m excited and ready to start the year off in what I hope is a much more normal fashion, what us educators have been used to doing for a very long time.

Michele Sheriff: We have heard from our members and teachers that there is just a buzz of excitement in the building. They’re excited to be back with their colleagues this week, and they’re looking forward to welcoming their students next Monday.

Are you confident in how this district has prepared for the academic year? 

Bellamy: I’m more than confident. We’ve got literally thousands and thousands of employees, hardworking teachers and principals that are trained to do just this and have been working hard at it for over a month now. A district our size is certainly complex. We’ll need to ask for some patience. There will certainly be a bus that runs later or an accident on the highway that might delay some buses. But I’m confident in the staff and the hardworking teachers and principals across this district, that we’re set up for success on Day One.

Michele, given everything that’s happened over the past few years and from your conversations with [MNEA] members, what do you think their overall sense of well being is right now? 

Sheriff: There is some nervousness around things that happened last year. Will those carry over, such as shortages and increased workloads? What support will be there to help with those things moving forward?

It’s been a tough three years. We had the tornado and just when schools got settled back in for three days, we were out for essentially a year with COVID and supporting school students with not only their academic needs, but making sure they had meals and other things of that nature.

Laura Deitrick, a veteran teacher who left the job, told us: “I loved my 20 years in public education, working with the most loving and wise teachers and staff and the most wonderful families and children. The main reason I left is the impact of politics and policies passed down from people who don’t care about anyone but themselves. At least that’s how they appear.” We’ve heard teachers are feeling increased scrutiny from parents and lawmakers over the past few years, especially when it comes to books and teaching materials. Dr. Bellamy, what do you tell teachers who are concerned? 

Bellamy: I want any of our teachers out there listening to be able to drop that anxiety and put that on me and my team. We have legislators that pass multiple laws every year, over 50 that I’ve just reviewed in the last month, that affect us in some way.

What I can guarantee them is if they’re using the resources that we’ve provided them, the curriculum that we’ve provided them, we have their back. If they have a parent that reaches out, concerned about a book, whether it’s about Civil Rights or seahorses, we have policies and that they can avail themselves of if they need to. They’re clearly posted on our website, and they can talk to their principal and then ultimately directly to my office. And we’ll be the ones to help parents work through what their options are.

So you’ve let the teachers know that you all are willing to absorb those pressures? 

Bellamy: I hope they know that this is me saying it right now. I’ve let the principals know I work directly with my executive directors who are principal supervisors and directly with the principals. If they feel like they need more support, they can email me directly at [email protected] and I’ll make sure they get the support they need as well, sir.

Kristen Beholf is a teacher who has concerns about staffing shortages this coming year. She says: “A lot of our contract staff, occupational therapists and speech and language pathologists have been leaving. They do not get benefits and are paid poorly.” Michele, what are you hearing from your members about teacher and staff shortages? 

Sheriff: Our teachers do have concerns about staff shortages. There are still some open positions in the district and they’re concerned, as Kristen just stated, about students not receiving their services. If teachers are shifted into positions to cover classroom positions, then students might not receive all the services that they should.

If there are shortages and the teachers are picking up the slack, it creates more work for the teachers there. And then that leads to the exhaustion that we’ve seen over the past few years that have caused teachers to leave because of unreasonable expectations and workloads.

Dr. Bellamy, how is the district working to address these shortages? 

Bellamy: We have the same concerns that our teachers have. I think there’s long-term and short-term fixes. As you heard, some of our teachers talk about the creative things they do to cover classrooms. I love that creativity and that support, but at the same time, that means they’re not focused on their No. 1 job, which is teaching their own preps. And to echo Michelle’s sentiment, we know that adds to the stress.

Long-term – Metro Nashville Public School teachers are the highest paid in the state. We’re thankful for a mayor and city council who have continued to advocate and support us with that and a strong partnership with MNEA. So we’ll continue to treat our teachers and pay them like the educated professionals they deserve to be.

We’ll continue to fill those vacancies in the long term by looking at creative paths, including growing our own students and partnerships with TSU and other universities around the city. We’re going to have over 200 scholarships for students coming out, many of which we hope will decide to teach in our schools.

Short-term, my staff and I have been working with our principals around the clock, figuring out ways that we can be on the ground, boots on the ground. The very first day, every school will have a group of support hub members assigned to it that we hope can be covering classes.