KNOX COUNTY, Tenn. (WATE) — As the school year comes to a close, Knox County Schools is looking back at some of its biggest milestones, lessons learned, and key decisions from the year. 6 News sat down with KCS Superintendent Dr. Jon Rysewyk to talk about the district’s takeaways from the past year, and what’s ahead for students and staff next fall.
“Thinking about what do we want to be as an organization, what does our town need us to be as the public school system with 60,000 students and just really focusing in on those things. So, I think really what we saw this year was a lot of the kind of the fruit of labor of four years of our teachers and principals kind of working the systems and really investing in those,” explained Rysewyk.
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After years of focus on academic improvement, Knox County Schools says it’s now seeing results. The district was recognized as an Advancing, or high performing, district by the Tennessee Department of Education. KCS credits the improvement on better test scores, student career preparation, support for special education, and a focus on helping vulnerable student groups.
“We have a commitment to this community. Our commitment is to do our job, which is to prepare the next generation and so we want to make sure every dollar we spend, they’re not our dollars, they’re taxpayer dollars. We make sure they’re going to the outcomes for kids,” said Rysewyk…