The Education Trust – Tennessee statement on announcement of new Commissioner for the Tennessee Department of Education

The Education Trust – Tennessee looks forward to continued engagement with the Tennessee Department of Education and Lizzette Gonzalez Reynolds in her new role as Commissioner for the Tennessee Department of Education. Ms. Gonzalez Reynolds’ track record as a collaborative leader at the state and federal levels in policy and legislative affairs, and her commitment to ensuring success for every student is encouraging. We welcome her expertise as we work to drive change so that our public education system better serves students of color and students from low-income families, pre-k through college. 

We wish Dr. Penny Schwinn continued success in her next endeavors and appreciated the opportunity to provide important stakeholder feedback on a range of equity issues during her tenure, including adopting a new student-weighted school funding formula, setting teacher diversity goals for Tennessee, and advancing evidence-based literacy strategies for our youngest learners.  

The Education Trust – Tennessee, along with our Alliance of over 80 education, civil rights, student-led and community organizations look forward to engaging Ms. Gonzalez Reynolds so that together we can work to expand excellence and equity in education for every student in Tennessee.