Plans for municipal districts move forward with Shelby County’s cooperation

As the school year winds to a close, Shelby County Schools and suburban leaders in the Memphis  area are preparing for a county with seven school systems next year.

Arlington, Bartlett, Collierville, Germantown, Millington, and Lakeland were granted official school district status by the state of Tennessee last week. Districts celebrated on social media:

Post by Arlington Community Schools.Shelby County superintendent Dorsey Hopson II met with suburban leaders earlier this week to discuss just how staff information will be transferred between districts and which services will be shared, among other issues, the Daily News reports.

The districts are also determining how to ensure a smooth transfer of the buildings from Shelby County Schools to the municipalities. Each municipality submitted a list of materials in the school buildings that will become part of their district earlier this spring.

The municipalities are also discussing sharing services among themselves, including nutrition, transportation, planning, benefits, and purchasing. Germantown, which had initially hedged on committing to sharing with the other municipalities, voted this week to join the other districts.

And a recent county commission vote that added capital funding for the new municipal districts went through with the cooperation of Shelby County administrators, the Commercial Appeal reports.

Plans for six new school districts in the suburbs of Memphis have been in the works since it was determined that the Memphis City district and the suburban Shelby County district would be merged. After a series of legal battles, the merged district’s board came to agreements with six suburban towns that transferred school buildings to them and cleared the way for the new school districts.

The merged Shelby County district has existed just since July 1, 2013.