Posted on 08/15/2026 8:31:35 AM PDT by Libloather
A Tennessee teacher who was named Teacher of the Year has quit after accusing the school district of directing her to change a failing student’s grade.
Samira Hardcastle, named the 2025-2026 Teacher of the Year at John F. Kennedy Middle School in Antioch, Tenn., submitted her letter of resignation in May after eight years teaching art in Metro Nashville Public Schools.
“District leaders asked me to fabricate grades for a parent who sat in the office for hours until her daughter’s failing grades were changed,” Hardcastle said in an impassioned speech at Tuesday’s school board meeting.
“It creates false entitlement. What happens when these kids lie, cheat and cry their way through school and end up as future doctors, police or politicians? When will you protect the future of our society?” she demanded.
Hardcastle accused the district of allowing that same parent, whom she said had harassed more than 30 teachers, to continue entering school property.
“Teachers have filed police reports and entire schools have had restraining orders against her,” Hardcastle alleged. “Yet she is still allowed onto the property showing up to fill tricks her child didn’t earn and filming other students. When will you stop prioritizing parents’ feelings over the safety of our students?”
The grade dispute began when Hardcastle gave the student a failing mark for not finishing an art project, which prompted the student’s parent to intervene and administrators to tell Hardcastle to change the grade, according to WSMV4.
Hardcastle refused to do so, though the administrators changed it anyway, the outlet reported.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
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And some top-notch school should be recruiting this excellent, upstanding teacher!
Since when is a parent (or anybody else for that matter) allowed to come on to school property without permission?
From 1st grade to twelfth that was never allowed when I was in school. To do so triggered an immediate response from law enforcement.
Of course my 1st assumption is it’s “them” again....I mean why WOULDN’T we all assume it?
A student has to do very poorly to fail a class. Showing up would guarantee a D grade minimum otherwise the student has to repeat the course. Do those schools really want to continue teaching those underperforming?
Remember those 3rd year freshmen in Peoria who rioted at a high school football game? Did they really try harder in their 2nd year?
None of this is surprising.
How do you flunk art class?
By being unruly or not even participating.
When I was in school they had art teachers float from school to school, showing up
every one or two weeks.
Wouldn’t it be great to have had a teacher named Mrs. Hardcastle?
When I was in school parents could, and did, walk into my school at any time and go directly to classrooms to deliver forgotten lunches, etc. Didn’t need to check in with anybody. Didn’t need permission. Nobody died.
Of course, that was when people lived generally decent lives, and before prayer was removed from schools.
Happens everywhere. How else do students keep being promoted when they cannot even read at their grade level?
Public school bureaucracy cannot be reformed. Give every parent a school voucher allowing them to choose their school; public, private, religious, etc.
There are a lot of kids out here who would be better off if they were held back a grade or 2. Im speaking from experience. I was a horrible kid. I hated school and i screwed around all through high school until late in my junior year when the councilor callled me in and told me that i was almost at the point of no return. If i didn’t pull my head out of my arse i wouldn’t graduate, which would have been a huge problem since i was already signed up for the Navy under the DEP program. Senior year i was sweating it BIG TIME. I was taking zero and 7th periods. As much extra credit as I could take. And i still graduated with the required credits needed, on the dot. I know here in Northern CA everyone graduates now, short of the criminal kids who are expelled and sent off. Maybe even then, im not sure if those kids are just promoted anyway.
“””Wouldn’t it be great to have had a teacher named Mrs. Hardcastle?”””
My junior high gym teachers name was Mr. Gorilla.
Given the historical background in the article, Boo-Boo doesn’t have to ask.
“”I had not figured out yet that grades at that school weren’t based on performance..”””
You get an A. You get an A. EVERYBODY gets an A.
Grades are meaningless now.
This is neither recent nor is it confined to big city/urban schools.
Maybe a quarter of a century ago in my small rural school the science teacher, in her first year and thus on probation, was ordered by the superintendent to raise the grade of a student’s science fair project to an A from an F. The student involved was the son the the school board’s president.
His father had bought the project from a high school student at another school. When quizzed during the science fair judging, the student had no idea what ‘his’ project was about. I believe she, very reluctantly raised his grade to a ‘B’.
To be somewhat fair, it was also the superintendent’s first year on the job, the third superintendent the district had had in three years, so he kind of had to do what he did.
Retired urban public school teacher here. In my district, administrators don’t have to ask a teacher to change a failing grade. The teacher is simply bypassed.
The district’s computers are programmed to change any score less than 50% to 50%. So let’s say a student scores 15% on exam. The teacher enters 15% into the computer. 50% shows up on the screen.
It’s disheartening.
Administrators have the power to change any grade on their own. So let’s say an administrator wants to bump that automatic 50% up even more. He just goes on his computer, and changes it.
Oh, and one more thing. Teachers who demand excellence, and so give fair grades… they will be called in for “counseling”. Gotta get their minds right.
Maybe it was an art class and the kid is a future Pollock?
“cannot even read at their grade level”
I never understood the measurement “grade level”. What is it? Who determines it? Does it mean what’s typical/normal for that grade in school? What’s typical for the 21st Century, or what was typical in the 1970s? Who determines how much dumbing-down the “grade level” should be reduced at any particular time? The same people who lower standards for SATs, Regents Exams, etc.?
Seems like an arbitrary measurement like Fauci’s 6-foot social distancing decree?
If a kid can’t read and understand “Moby Dick” in 10th grade, he can’t read. People have failed him — parents and teachers.
Her model student might be a good bassaball player.
“Hardcastle refused to do so, though the administrators changed it anyway, the outlet reported.”
Here is the real story. They want the teacher to do it so they have plausible deniability.
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