E Q U I T Y

CLOSING EQUITY GAPS

HIGHLIGHTS

Update: Point of Departure and Nashville Transit Plan

Mayor O'Connell released his transit plan for Nashville, Choose How You Move, in April 2024. Here are a few of the transit recommendations from Point of Departure that are addressed in the mayor's proposal:





TCASN Shares 2023 NSR Policy Scan

TCASN has partnered with New Skills Ready to release its annual policy scan for 2023. Over the course of the past year, TCASN interviewed numerous stakeholders across the NSR Nashville Network to highlight policies that create direct or indirect barriers for students and explore potential solutions. To access the report, please use the button below.

New Skills Nashville Releases Point of Departure Report on Transit Access

Transportation has emerged as a consistent equity issue on our work, particularly as a barrier preventing students from accessing postsecondary education and training and work-based learning. In the hopes of advancing this issue from a policy perspective, New Skills Ready Nashville funded Point of Departure, a report on navigating Nashville as a college commuter. The report, authored by project partner the Tennessee College Access and Success Network, includes a series of findings about transit access and a set of recommendations that would address these barriers.

Social Capital Grant Awarded to Nashville

New Skills Ready Nashville was selected to participate in the Building Social Capital Initiative by Education Strategy Group (ESG). This initiative, funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, aligns with our existing New Skills work around pathways and will provide our team with additional tools related to social capital best practices. Our team's participation in the project includes $100,000 in additional funding to support milestones related to social capital.


Nashville joins four other cities in this initiative. We were selected due to our "commitment to equitable student outcomes, your strong cross-sector leadership team, and your impressive work to date to strengthen career pathways, work-based learning, and career advising to put more students on a path to postsecondary success."

MNPS Equity Roadmap

Metro Nashville Public Schools released their Equity Roadmap in May 2022. This document will drive a district-wide focus on equity over the next 5-10 years. In summer of 2022, every MNPS teacher and school administrator will participate in multi-day trainings on the equity roadmap and advancing equitable practices across every school in the district.


For more information about the Roadmap, contact Ashford Hughes, Executive Officer for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion at Metro Nashville Public Schools at Ashford.Hughes@mnps.org.

Nashville State Community College Equity Training

Nashville State Community College is investing in equipping faculty and staff to better serve students from diverse backgrounds and ensure equity informs decision-making across the institution. A variety of investments in professional learning opportunities for faculty and staff include:


For more information about Nashville State's investments in equity, contact Mia Sneed, HR Administrator, Employee Relations and Equity for Nashville State Community College at mia.sneed@nscc.edu.

Racial Equity Institute Training

New Skills Ready Nashville trained over 400 K12 professionals, higher education leaders, and members of the business community on racial equity. Trainers from the Racial Equity Institute conducted multiple virtual Groundwater training sessions across our project team and broader stakeholder community as we embarked on New Skills Ready so that we would have a shared understanding of systemic racial inequity. This foundational component was a critical early investment in our work to address equity gaps.

REI_Groundwater_White Paper (1).pdf

Groundwater Training

Learn more about the groundwater training our team participated in.

RESOURCES