VOL. 9 NO. 25
| pp www.ShopperNewsNow.com
BUZZ Trash center to open Wednesday Mayor Tim Burchett, County Commission chair Brad Anders and others were to host a media “sneak peek” at the Karns trash and recycling center 10:30 a.m. Tuesday, June 23. The center will open to the public during regular hours Wednesday, June 24. The center at 6930 Karns Crossing Lane replaces a smaller facility on Oak Ridge Highway.
Free self-defense classes offered Three martial arts academies have partnered to offer free self-defense classes to citizens of Knox and surrounding counties. Lucas Lepri Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, Bullman’s Kickboxing and Krav Maga will offer a free 2-hour self-defense seminar from noon to 2 p.m. Saturday, June 27, at Western Plaza, 4511 Kingston Pike. Info: 865-963-2207 or bjjknox ville@gmail.com.
Lacy on state Teacher Cabinet
IN THIS ISSUE
The Legislature has abolished involuntary annexation, but no one seems to care. Victor Ashe, once the poster boy for forced annexation, didn’t seem particularly perturbed by the Legislature’s rebuke of his policies, saying, “I’m not losing any sleep over it – I’m not in the mayor business anymore.” Read Betty Bean on page A-5
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Hardin Valley Academy and Farragut High School have collaborated once again for the annual Two Blues STEM Camp, a weeklong gathering of elementary and middle school students learning firsthand about science, technology, engineering and math. A health day is thrown in for good measure. Farragut assistant principal Debbie Sayers came up with the idea for STEM camp after learning about similar camps in Tennessee and other states. At the time, Sayers was teaching at HVA and organized the first camp there. After transferring to Farragut, Sayers said she received an outpouring of support and enthusiasm from both schools’ faculty and students to cohost the camp and trade locations each summer. This year, the fourth, was hosted by Farragut.
The deal brokered between the county mayor and the superintendent of schools means that Tim Burchett will get to serve eight years without raising taxes, and Jim McIntyre will get to keep his job – at least until the next school board Patti Bounds election. By the time school board chair Mike McMillan faces re-election, he will have built two new Eighth District schools and so will County Commissioner Dave Wright, who will be term-limited out of office but may well have future political aspirations. Sixth District Commissioner Brad Anders will get to brag about delivering a middle school to Hardin Valley; ditto his district school board representative, Terry Hill. So what’s not to love about the Memorandum of Understanding, which is being hailed as a rare and welcome example of cooperation
Activities at Two Blues are modified from what is done in the classroom in order to suit the grade levels participating. Second- and third-graders learn about exponential regression, an Algebra II lesson reimagined for elementary school students using M&Ms. High school students who volunteer to help out at camp can use it as a summer project for school advisory, according to HVA junior Daniel Mountain. “We write a report and give a presentation on the experience, but I just volunteer because it’s fun,” said Mountain. “It’s great to see the campers get really into math and science, and, hopefully, they can carry that enthusiasm with them throughout their education.” Additional camp activities include creating origami animals, graphing with Lucky Charms ce-
between the appropriating side of county government (commission/mayor) and the spending side (school board/superintendent)? Quite a bit, says Patti Bounds, the Seventh District’s school board representative: “I wish we could separate the capital improvement plan out of the MOU. There are parts of it that are going to be very helpful, but when it comes to the capital improvement part, it hurts District Seven,” she said, labeling the plan to renovate rather than replace the dilapidated Adrian Burnett Elementary School “a travesty.” Bounds, who spends at least a day a week in each of the schools in her district and taught kindergarten in the district until she retired last year, said she was taken by surprise when McIntyre recommended building a new north central elementary school (which ultimately didn’t get funded) while ignoring the longstanding need for a new Adrian Burnett Elementary School, which keeps getting moved to the back of the line in favor of schools in more
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Anders has been a proponent of this park and other amenities in his Karns-Hardin Valley district. “Why not let the people who paid for it use it? Otherwise, it’s just wasted space,” he says. Arthur anticipates a ribboncutting event in late summer or
early fall – just as soon as the county paves the parking lot, and that contract is out for bid. With an “extensive list of donors,” Arthur has been able to plant an estimated $30,000 to $40,000 in wild-
To page A-3
Hardin Valley Academy student volunteers Amberly Clark, Nicole Maestri and Sara Givens transport campers Shelby McCurry, Leigh Skadberg and Cruize Furman to their next activity as camper Nicholas Lin photobombs enthusiastically in the background. Photo by Sara Barrett real and learning math through proportional drawings of Snoopy. “There’s not a lot of time to do fun things in the classroom during the school year,” said Sayers. “Here, we can make up our
own schedule and our own lesson plans. The teachers develop the lessons as a group, and we let them run with it. That’s what makes it magic.” Info: debbie. sayers@knoxschools.org.
School deal puts Bounds in a bind
SUMMER SALE
Bring your VHS, slides, film and more into the digital age.
Two ponds hold stormwater runoff at Harrell Road Park. Donors have enabled the planting of more than $30,000 in wildflowers. Photos by Roy Arthur
The summer of STEM
By Betty Bean
Annexation dies; nobody notices
(but the parking lot)
By Sandra Clark Harrell Road Park is all done but the parking lot, according to Roy Arthur of Knox County’s stormwater division of Engineering and Public Works. What can folks do there? “Walk – we’ve got half-mile of crushed stone trails – and just enjoy it,” said Arthur. The 11-acre passive park on Harrell Road off W. Emory between Karns and Powell was created from a 19-acre tract donated by Scott Davis, developer of Painter Farms subdivision. Arthur has led the development, writing grants and securing donations. “We’ve got a half-million-dollar park in there for about $75,000 from Knox County government,” he says. The land was initially given to the Legacy Parks Foundation which installed deed restrictions and then was gifted to Knox County. County Commissioner Brad
By Sara Barrett
Farragut High School math teacher Wanda Lacy has been named as one of 18 Tennessee teachers to serve on the first Governor’s Teacher Cabinet. The cabinet will meet quarterly with Gov. Bill Haslam and state Education Commissioner Candice McQueen to share real-time information from the classroom, advise on policy considerations and provide a direct line of communication to schools and communities. Teachers will serve two-year terms on the cabinet. The first meeting is planned for July. At Farragut, Lacy teaches AP Calculus. She was named Tennessee Teacher of the Year in 2014.
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June 24, 2015
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vocal communities. She said that renovating the wooden structure is not a legitimate solution to the problems with a building that has no gymnasium and has hallways being used as classrooms. “I don’t believe in throwing taxpayer dollars away, and that’s what you’re doing trying to renovate that building.” She sums up her feelings this way: “The chair of the commission is Brad Anders, who is lobbying for a new Hardin Valley school. The assistant chair is Dave Wright, who is getting a new school in Gibbs. Meanwhile, in my district, we have 51 portable classrooms housing about 2,200 students, and subpar conditions in portables that date back to 1980. “Does it bother me that we are building in anticipation of overcrowding in Hardin Valley while you’ve got 2,200 students in portable classrooms? That’s half of the students housed in portables in Knox County. Maybe we could send some of our portables to Hardin Valley.”
PAIN PILLS?
On the other hand, Bounds likes many elements of the MOU – the fact that Knox County will be overseeing school construction, selling the Andrew Johnson Building, delivering additional money to teachers (although she wishes it were more). But beyond bricks and mortar and dollars, there’s another aspect to this bind: the politics of the school board. Bounds is part of a four-member faction that includes McMillan, Hill and Amber Rountree. Hill and McMillan will benefit politically from delivering new middle schools to Hardin Valley, and Gibbs, respectively. And Bounds, in her first year as a school board member, must weigh her frustrations about her own district against the value of preserving these alliances. So where will she land when the agreement already approved by County Commission lands on the school board agenda July 1? “Has this put me in a bind? Yeah, it has. And I just don’t know how I’m going to vote,” she said. “This is very difficult.”
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