Never mind I've got the offical numbers for you. Bristol City Schools 9-12 grades. http://www.io.com/~jsm/nph-ap.cgi/http://www.k-12.state.tn.us/rptcrd04/system.asp?sysno=821&gobutton2.x=17&gobutton2.y=13 Not bad actually.
Grades 9-12: Additional Indicators
2003 2004 State Goals
Attendance 93.2% 91.8% 93%
Cohort Dropout 2.2% 8.8% 10%
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Graduation Rate What's this?
2004
Graduation Percent 82.2% State Goal 90%
and check out this link for Campbell County
http://www.k-12.state.tn.us/rptcrd01/system.asp
I think that pretty much sums up how great the schools are in Campbell County.
Note the 66% beside the free/reduced lunch programs and the 75.6% beside the Title 1
The people here cannot read. You can say what you want, but I live here and deal with the tragedy of this area on a daily basis.
You guys can try to say this area is not poor and illiterate all you want to do so. There is not one single school in this state that I would send my children to after experiencing two different school systems here.... the best in the state to close to the worst.
If you think the schools in Sullivan County are "not bad", I suggest you educate your children in them then try to get them into college WITHOUT supplementing their education at home. Or better yet, transfer to another state and see how hard you are going to have to struggle to play catch up.
As for not wanting to live here, I intend to retire here (except over the border a few miles either in VA or NC). I was beside myself with excitement when we first came. It was a culmination of a life-long dream. Careful what you wish for, eh?
We still love the area, I simply wish we had waited until our children were grown and gone so as not to have exposed them to the lifestyle of their would-be peers.
You have given me an idea. I think I shall take my camera and create a Web site for the world to see how lovely our Tennesse Mountains are in all it's glory starting with the two huge yellow Billboards you pass in town that say, "Sunday Blue Laws are the Mark of the Beast.", going on to all the misspelled billboards, the dilapidated mobile homes with many animals tied to trees, the shocking junkyards that turn out to not be junkyards but residences where generation after generation has discarded their trash, cars, appliances... etc right outside the door, and ending with videos of interviews of our so well-educated and not poor citizens. Then the world can say "they seen" it, too.