TENNESSEE, USA — In Tennessee, the state's board of education proposed a set of emergency rules to address how districts should act in response to the coronavirus.
Members of the board voted unanimously to pass new emergency rules on Thursday.
Those new rules include changing required credits from 22 to 20 credits for graduating high school seniors.
The SAT and ACT requirement will also be waived.
Students are also permitted to not receive a grade lower than what they had on March 20. However, they can participate in remote learning to improve the grade. The remote learning can only improve, not lower the grade.
The emergency rules also stipulate districts may take attendance during distance learning but are not permitted to issue unexcused absences or report truancy if a student fails to participate in distance learning activities.
"Many of our students statewide do not have access to reliable internet service," one board member said. "We did not want to penalize students via unexcused absences."
Spring TCAP testing, which includes TNReady assessments, is suspended for the 2019-2020 school year.
These rules will now be sent to the Attorney General for approval and filed with the Secretary of State’s office.
They will go into effect immediately upon filing with the Secretary of State’s office and will remain in effect for 180 days.
Schools will remain closed until at least April 24, in accordance with Gov. Bill Lee's recommendations. The next board meeting will be held in May.
The board also gave a play by play of each part of the agenda as they were voted on. You can take a look at how it unfolded here.