Bowman: State Was Late In School Reopening Plan

“Districts, schools, and educators have been subjected to a lot of unjust criticism, when it’s really the state that had a flawed reopening plan.”

That is what Professional Educators of Tennessee Executive Director JC Bowman said about how the state handled the school reopening plan. He said State Educational Commissioner Penny Schwinn took too long to create a plan.

Bowman said a reopening plan should have been send to school districts June 1 at the latest.

“They need to own some criticism and take ownership of the failure to have done that,” Bowman said. “You know, the districts waited for the state to take action, but finally they had to take action themselves because parents in the community were waiting to see how that would come back. ”

Bowman said the state did not sent PPE to school districts in a timely fashion. He said a proposed monthly mental check for the students would have made the teacher load heavier and more like DCS employees.

Once the state issued guidances, Bowman said it was not enough. He said the guidelines were regurgitated information from the federal department.

“The guidelines were vague and they were more like suggestions,” Bowman said. “It’s kinda like instead of the Ten Commandments it’s suggestions: ‘well you probably want to be good to your parents.’ Well define what good is.”

Bowman said he and other PET members are contacting local legislatures to address this issue. He hopes legislatures will give guidance to Commissioner Penny Schwinn and that the state will own responsibility for their mistakes.