Fri. Feb 14th, 2025

MSCS Superintendent Feagins faces possible termination, according to MSCS Board

By:

MEMPHIS, Tenn. – The Memphis Shelby County School (MSCS) Board has decided to postpone Superintendent Feagins’ termination resolution to January of 2025, according to MSCS board members.

The MSCS School Board announced the meeting on Tuesday, a little more than 24 hours before board members met to discuss terminating Feagins.

The same board, consisting of four different members, announced the hiring of Feagins just 10 months earlier in February. Her brief tenure as the lead educator in Tennessee’s largest public school district has consisted of challenges and successes.

Feagins’ inherited a teacher shortage when she moved to Memphis. At the end of the 2023-2024 school year, MSCS had more than 500 open teacher jobs. Feagins got retired teachers back in the classrooms to fill some of those vacancies. She also pushed to reassign MSCS employees to fill some of those empty seats. This idea, which could theoretically see an employee moved from an office job to a teaching job at a different salary, was met with opposition by the school board.

Also waiting for Feagins in Memphis were a number of outdated buildings and infrastructure woes. Multiple schools let out early or closed outright some days throughout the year due to aging HVAC units. Notably, in August 2022, and well before Feagins took office, a ceiling collapsed at Cummings K-8 Optional School. The school was still not functional for the 2023-2024 school year. In June 2024, Feagins expressed concerns that the dated infrastructure could impact the health of students and staff. FOX13 found that 273 students had seizures during the 2023-2024 school year, and 3,465 students in the district face complications from asthma. In August 2024, Feagins told FOX13 that she planned on presenting a plan to the school board regarding investing in the district’s infrastructure challenges.

Frustrations between Feagins and staff have plagued her tenure as MSCS Superintendent. Along with the sentiment shown by some board members in the abrupt meeting to discuss Feagins’ termination, school resource officers (SROs) also displayed their displeasure. In August 2024, SROs threatened to walk out of Memphis schools while demanding that the school district increase officer safety, adjust their pay scale, hire more officers, and address “policy violations.” Feagins soon laid out a new salary schedule for MSCS SROs, allowing for an additional $1 per hour.

Under Feagins’ leadership, MSCS lost their contract with Fresh Start, a janitorial contractor formerly used by the school district, after several paychecks were delayed due to labored communication between the school district and Fresh Start. Communication with the communication department itself also became an issue this past year. While Feagins and the school district navigated a flood of school threats, FOX13 obtained a letter that showed tension between the two parties. Parents voiced their outrage at a perceived lack of communication from the school district as every MSCS school was put on lockdown. Feagins eventually addressed the public in a Facebook Live video. Parents were also left scrambling when given, in some cases, minutes notice that schools would let out early due to the remnants of a hurricane washing through Memphis. The letter obtained by FOX13 accused Feagins of forcing The Coms team to become her personal PR puppets…to combat any negative attention the district and the superintendent receives.”

Throughout those internal struggles, some new life has been breathed into MSCS schools. On Tuesday, the day the school board announced its special meeting to discuss terminating Feagins, the Shelby County Commission approved funding for a new high school in Frayser, a project that could cost $112 million and allow for additional funding to other Shelby County school districts.

Feagins also oversaw an increase in MSCS teacher salary. Thanks to a $28 million budget that was approved in May 2024, MSCS teachers earn an average of nearly $50,000 a year. Some specialized positions and teachers with advanced degrees make even more.

And while those teachers saw a raise in pay, students saw a slight raise in standardized testing. In June 2024, TCAP tests showed that 26.6 percent of MSCS third-graders met or exceeded expectations, a three percent rise from the year before. Among fourth graders, that number grew to 28.5 percent, nearly a two-point increase from the previous year.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.

Connect With Us

Stay Connected Everywhere With Us