The Tennessean -

Only two weeks removed from the battles in the state Capitol, outgoing state Sen. Jamie Woodson made a call that shows just how quickly her place in Tennessee politics is changing.

Woodson, the new head of the education reform group SCORE, wanted to have breakfast with Gera Summerford, president of the state’s teachers union. As a Republican leader in the Senate, Woodson had cast important votes this spring for the new state law that strips Summerford’s organization, the Tennessee Education Association, of its exclusive power to negotiate contracts on teachers’ behalf.

But Woodson says she’s leaving the political life behind, and she wanted to show Summerford the two could be allies.

“She told me she was interested in meeting in a friendly manner in her new role,” Summerford said after the two met Tuesday. “I think one of the strengths of SCORE has been its ability to bring some people together, and I think Jamie sees her role there as continuing that.”

The State Collaborative on Reforming Education, which is better known by its initials, SCORE, has helped set the stage for the efforts over the last two years to remake Tennessee schools. Now, SCORE wants to have a say in how those reforms are put into place.

In Woodson, the organization has named as its new president a political up-and-comer with a reputation for avoiding ideological battles. But Woodson’s profile has been battered by her party’s confrontation with the TEA, a conflict that Woodson is seen as having done little to defuse.

Repairing that damage could be the key to SCORE’s efforts to lead the effort to improve Tennessee’s struggling schools.

Woodson wants to move SCORE beyond its supporting role in the education reforms championed by Govs. Phil Bredesen and Bill Haslam. She wants SCORE to be seen as a major source of independent expertise — a group that can help state and local officials turn the ideas debated in Nashville over the last two years into concrete results.

“I think it’s very important for us all to keep our eye on the ball, and that’s improving student achievement,” Woodson said. “Sometimes those conversations get a little bit uncomfortable, but at the end of the day, you’ve got to ensure that you’re keeping your priorities and moving forward.”

Leaving politics

Woodson will resign her seat representing eastern Knox County next month, but she will nonetheless bring to SCORE her 13 years of experience as a state lawmaker. Throughout her legislative career, Woodson has focused on schools, as she eventually became the chairman of the Senate Education Committee.

Woodson also brings to SCORE the connections she has gained by rising steadily through the legislature’s hierarchy to the position of Senate speaker pro tempore.

But those credentials aside, Woodson says lobbying is not going to be part of her job description. Instead, she says she wants SCORE to be seen as an organization that administrators and educators can turn to for help without bias.

“When you look at executing a plan, the policy work is really 10 percent of the work, and implementation is the other 90 percent,” she said. “SCORE should be that safe place for folks to know that we’ve got data-driven policies, if you need solid information, no agenda, other than this is what the data shows you.”

Woodson’s job is to manage SCORE on a day-to-day basis and to work with its board to plot its course over the next several years. Woodson also will be the group’s main fundraiser.

SCORE has support

SCORE is generally believed to be well-funded, with gifts from corporations such as Blue Cross/Blue Shield; national education groups like the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation; and Tennessee charities such as the Hyde, Ayers, Niswonger and Lyndhurst foundations. But Woodson will be responsible for keeping companies and nonprofits involved, both financially and directly.

Former U.S. Sen. Bill Frist said Woodson’s priorities are in line with the vision he set out for SCORE when he founded the organization two years ago.

“We really are a collaborative, and it has been very important to me to keep everybody who is interested in improving education for kids at the table,” Frist said.

Woodson beat out 16 candidates for the position. Woodson was the only politician considered for the job, but her selection was based on her reputation as a bridge-builder, Frist said.

“She has an ability to listen very carefully to both sides,” he said. “It is not the political skills as much as the leadership skills.”

That reputation has taken a hit during the most recent legislative session. TEA officials had hoped Woodson would be a moderating force in Republican efforts to overturn the 1978 law that gave teachers the ability to form unions and negotiate contracts with school boards.

But Woodson cast important votes for the legislation, backing even the versions that the TEA saw as the most extreme.

Those votes, combined with SCORE’s ties to Frist, place doubt on the group’s neutrality, said Jerry Winters, TEA’s manager of government relations.

“Jamie Woodson is going to have to separate herself from some of the Republicans in the legislature and what they’ve done this year,” he said. “SCORE has credibility, but they’re only going to maintain that credibility … insofar that they show they’re not an arm of the Republican reform movement.”

Race to the Top

Such doubts might have come as a surprise a year ago. Woodson’s credentials as a middle-of-the-road expert on education were strong enough that Bredesen, a Democrat, selected her as one of the five people who pitched the state’s successful entry in the Race to the Top competition.

Bredesen then named Woodson to the advisory council that oversees the $501 million grant the state won in the competition. She currently chairs that group.

Race to the Top also helped build SCORE’s reputation.

Although SCORE officials are quick to say the organization was started before the competition and Bredesen’s reform package, the group made its name by issuing policy papers, holding conferences and putting on town halls around the state in support of education reforms.

These efforts helped gin up enthusiasm for reform among businesses, nonprofits and voters, said Will Pinkston, a Bredesen aide who helped write the administration’s plan.

“They helped create the atmospheric conditions to make everything ripe for reform,” said Pinkston, who went on to work for SCORE briefly after leaving the administration. “The fact that we had a group working from the outside in was invaluable.”

Laying the groundwork for Tennessee’s unexpected victory bolstered SCORE’s reputation nationally, said Suzanne Tacheny Kubach, executive director of the Policy Innovators in Education Network, a group that works with education policy organizations.

Tennessee “is a strong example for us of a state in which the lead folks came together and pretty much changed the civic landscape,” she said.

Role may change

Haslam says he may take up more education reforms, but SCORE’s part in the effort appears to be changing.

SCORE, which employs only seven people full time, including Woodson, may add more people who can help individual districts implement the reforms that have been passed so far. The group also wants to work with state officials to work out the kinks in the reforms passed by the legislature.

SCORE will continue to produce policy papers. It will also continue to hold conferences. Next month, it will host a conference at Lipscomb University dedicated to reforming rural school districts.

To achieve its goal of improving schools, SCORE will need everyone involved in education to believe in it, say officials and outside observers. That means bringing together businesses, nonprofits, public figures — and teachers.

The turmoil of the last few months aside, Woodson says she’s up to the task.

“There’s no single issue that should make or break important relationships,” she said, “and I think if we all keep our eye on that important goal … those things will come out in the wash.”

Contact Chas Sisk at 615-259-8283 or csisk@tennessean.com.