I’m Dr. Margie Johnson. I grew up in KY, attended Western Kentucky University, and have 29 years of experience in education. I taught middle school, primarily science, for 4 years in KY, 2 in NC, and 1 year in Metro Nashville. In 2003, I moved to the central administration for MNPS as a technology teacher liaison. Since then, I have worked in a variety of leadership capacities, including instructional technology coordinator, professional development director, and now work in the world of data use and students records. I did leave the district for a few years to serve as the instructional technology specialist for the Regional Education Lab for the Appalachia Region providing support to the state departments in the region (NC, TN, KY, VA, WV, NC).

I have 3 amazing sons who came to me via international adoption. My first son came home at 15 months is from South Korea. He is 20 years old, a graduate from Nolensville HS, and attends MTSU. My second son came home when he was 6 years old from Ethiopia. He is 21 years old, a graduate from NHS, and works full time at Publix. My youngest son came home at 8 months old from Ethiopia. He is a 14 year old freshman at Nolensville HS. I am truly blessed.

Question: What is the best way to address differences of opinion on the board and the administration?

Contrary to what might be popular belief, school board members do not have all power. School board members govern the school district through 4 key roles:

1. Establish the vision/mission/strategic plan for the district—The school board leads the efforts to develop the vision, mission, and strategic plan for the district. WCS already has a strategic plan that was developed in 2023 and goes through 2028. You can read about it here: https://www.wcs.edu/about-us/strategic-plan. If needed, we can revise it before 2028. If you have feedback, I’m welcome to hearing it.

2. Hire/Evaluation the Director of Schools---The school board only has one employee, the Director of Schools. It is our job to establish his yearly evaluation goals and to evaluate and support him. If needed, the school board can fire the Director of Schools and hire a new one should a vacancy arise. The board established Mr. Golden’s evaluation goals this year at the November 2024 meeting. You can access all school board meeting at https://www.wcs.edu/about-us/meetings.

3. Policies—One of the biggest roles of the school board is policy. Policies are used to govern the district and is our biggest lever for implementing change throughout the district. You can Sunset Elementary PTO Meeting January 15, 2025 https://bit.ly/margiejohnsonnewsletter 2 access all WCS Board Policies at https://tsba.net/williamson-county-board-of-educationpolicy-manual/#_board-operations.

4. Budget—The school board establishes the school budget yearly. It is our responsibility to ensure WCS is being good stewards of WC taxpayer dollars. In a later question, I was asked how I hope to ensure fiscal responsibility, and I plan to do that by diving deep into the budget and looking at line items. Then, asking the hard questions, such as are we getting our return on investment? Is it positively impacting student achievement? What data are we using to measure the impact?

Question: What issues do you believe our district needs to address?

a. Funding—Currently, Williamson County is $1.2 billion dollars in debt. Therefore, I am taking a deep dive looking at the budget to see how we might save money. Ultimately, my goal is to get as much money as close to the classrooms as possible, particularly in teacher and school staff compensation to help retain our best employees who are with the students each day.

b. Declining Enrollment Yet Some Areas of Growth—Overall, the enrollment for WCS has been declining the past few years. However, here in district 5, we are growing.

Another question asked that ties into this issue was how are you going to address the overcrowding of schools and the 5 year capital plan? We need a deep dive into the data. For example, when I was campaigning for this office, I kept being told we need a new elementary school. However, when I looked at the capacity data, we have elementary seats (Mill Creek ES—185; Sunset ES— 18; and Jordan ES—93) for our area. The greatest need was in middle school as Mill Creek MS is at 117% capacity (Since MCES isn’t overcrowded, they use some of their classrooms.). Page MS is at 100% capacity, and Sunset MS is at 82% capacity but only has 28 open seats.). I plan to begin hosting a series of meetings to address this issue in the near future.

Question: What changes should be made at the state level regarding public education?

Schools were created to serve the communities in which they reside. Therefore, I would like to see more local control and less state involvement, which brings me to 2 issues asked about that are actually state issues as the local school board has no decision making power around vouchers and the TN Age Appropriate Materials Act of 2022.

Question: Why did you campaign as against school vouchers, yet have voted yes for them? What changed your mind or did you always intend to mislead your voters?

You’ve indicated support for parental choice in education, but as a parent of children attending public schools, I’m concerned about the potential impact of expanding school choice and voucher programs on our local public schools. How do you plan to ensure that public schools are adequately funded and supported in the face of increased competition from private schools or charter schools? What safeguards would you implement to ensure that public school students, especially those in underserved communities, continue to receive high-quality education?

What’s your opinion on the voucher system being proposed by the state? 

The Educational Freedom Act of 2025 will be decided at the state legislative level. Last year, 70 school boards out of 95 had resolutions opposing school vouchers. However, the Governor is not listening to local school board resolutions. There is BIG MONEY in the background pushing the school voucher agenda. Governor Lee has even called a special session on Monday, January 27th to try to “fast track” the legislation. You can read about it here. I have been encouraging constituents to use their voices to be heard. Look up your state legislatures and contact them. You can do that at this link: https://wapp.capitol.tn.gov/Apps/fml2022/lookup.aspx

Attend the legislative session on January 27th.

Question: You have stated that you do not support banning books but instead want to focus one nsuring that children are not exposed to inappropriate content. Can you confirm that you trust our school teachers and administrators have the experience, responsibility and the knowledge to make those decisions for the students?

In December, you voted to remove three high school books from our school libraries: Where the Crawdads Sing, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, and the Perks of Being a Wallflower, despite the existing mechanisms already in place that allow any parent to limit what their children can access in school libraries. By voting to remove books, you've taken away the freedom of ALL children and young adults in Williamson County to select these books from their libraries. For parents who are unaware that these three books were removed, here is some context: None of these books were required reading and Per BoardPolicy, WCS librarians from the schools where the books were challenged read and reviewed each. They were unanimous in their professional opinions that while each of the books did contain mature content, the material is suitable for the age and maturity levels of all students who may access it. Where the Crawdads Sing was used on the 2021 Advanced Placement Literature exam by the AP Board as a novel choice for answering Free Response Questions. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close was an AP Literature option for independent reading in six WCS high schools. The AP exam allows high school
students to receive college credit. This means removing these books is potentially harming high-achieving students by limiting their ability to easily access books that will help them excel. All three books have won national awards. Where The Crawdads Sing was the 2023 winner of Ravenwood High School’s annual “Book Madness” contest, votedon by Ravenwood students in a bracket format and winning the Championship Round with 98 of 172 votes. This suggests the book is highly popular among high school students. All three have also been made into films by major studios with PG-13 ratings.

Lastly, the previous bipartisan Williamson County School Board voted overwhelmingly to follow the book review committee's recommendation to not ban books, and abide by case law that says restricting said books would violate students' first amendment rights. Can you please explain why you voted to ban these books, and are you planning to vote to ban any books at the elementary school level? Why do you see the need to remove books from the libraries when there are already easy mechanisms in place for parents to restrict their own children's access to books without also restricting ALL students access to these
books? Did you identify any students that were harmed by reading these books? What proactive measures are you taking to ensure book removals don’t put Williamson County students at an unfair disadvantage compared to any other county that does not remove books?

One misunderstanding that occurred with the books is people thinking that this school board brought these books up for vote. This board was court ordered by a judge to use the TN Age-Appropriate Materials Act of 2022 to re-evaluate the books due the loss of a lawsuit. You can read about the lawsuit here. Also, the TN Age-Appropriate Materials Act of 2022 was passed by state legislatures and has very  specific language about the definition of age appropriateness of content that can be in books within K-12 libraries. You can read the act here.

Also, the TN Age-Appropriate Materials Act of 2022 was passed by state legislatures and has very specific language about the definition of age appropriateness of content that can be in books within K-12 libraries. You can read the act here.

Each school board member was provided with copies of the books to read in October prior to the meeting in December. You can view the meeting at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ZGy1ARj05g. 

Question: How do you think the board should balance the to provide quality education with the need to respond to the local taxpayer burden? You’ve mentioned your focus on fiscal conservatism and the importance of engaging the community before making decisions. How do you plan to balance fiscal responsibility with the need for funding in crucial areas such as teacher salaries and school infrastructure? Do you recognize that our school has building needs that the county does not cover and therefore falls on the PTO and parents to fund? Ie new furniture, technology apps and needs, school and building improvements; opportunities to grow our teachers. What specific strategies would you implement to ensure that our public schools remain competitive without sacrificing essential services?

Part of my response goes back to the information I shared earlier. Currently, Williamson County is $1.2 billion dollars in debt. Therefore, I am taking a deep dive looking at the budget to see how we might save money. Ultimately, my goal is to get as much money as close to the classrooms as possible, particularly in teacher and school staff compensation to help retain our best employees who are with the students each day. Attending your meeting was the first I had heard about the PTO funding essential items like furniture, so I need to investigate that further. If you have a list of needs, please send them to me at
Margie.johnson@wcs.edu, so I can pass them along to Superintendent Golden.

Question: How can we incorporated teaching students to type properly, into the curriculum? They  are given a laptop in kindergarten and are never taught how to properly type. What is the role of schools in teaching children about topics such as sex ed, cyber safety, wellness, bullying? 

Dr. Johnson, in your statement, you mention that personal beliefs should not be  introduced in classrooms and that content should be age-appropriate. Given the current political climate around educational content, how do you ensure that policies to limit ideological influence are balanced with students' need to learn about diverse perspectives and critical thinking skills? What steps will you take to ensure that such restrictions do  not limit students' access to accurate and diverse information? 

As a Republican candidate, how do you plan to address the teaching of civics, history, and government in a way that is balanced and inclusive of all perspectives? In your opinion, how can we ensure that students are exposed to a variety of viewpoints, especially on controversial topics, without promoting a particular political ideology in the classroom?

Curriculum is outside of the scope of the role of a school board member. We have policies about  curriculum, which if there are specific ones you have thoughts about revising, I am happy to discuss with  you and advocate for the policy changes. Some of the above items could be addressed that way. If you want to reach out, my email is Margie.johnson@wcs.edu. My cell is 615-482-0081, and we can schedule  time to talk so I can learn more.

Conclusion:

Thanks again, for the engaging questions and conversations. I am sad that we ran out of time, but hope that I was able to answer at least at a high level all the questions. If you have other questions or want to discuss something further, please do not hesitate to reach out to me at Margie.johnson@wcs.edu or 615-482-0081.