MSCS board votes to terminate Dr. Joris Ray as superintendent

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (WMC) - The Memphis-Shelby County Schools (MSCS) board voted to terminate Dr. Joris M. Ray’s employment as superintendent during a special meeting on Tuesday.

The board voted 8-0-1 to accept Ray’s resignation, effective Tuesday.

Ray will also receive $480,000 in severance pay.

Following the meeting, MSCS released a statement:

Dr. Ray served the District for more than 24 years and began his tenure as Superintendent in 2019, shortly before the start of the Covid-19 pandemic. During his superintendency, Dr. Ray navigated the District through the challenges of a global pandemic, improved benefits and pay for teachers and staff, and championed initiatives that helped students recover from pandemic learning loss.

Thanks to the efforts of our extraordinary teachers, administrators, and families, in 2022, MSCS students made gains in every grade and posted the District’s highest scores in high school English in five years on the state-mandated TCAP exams. MSCS was also named a Level 5 District, the highest distinction available on the metric that measures student growth, based on TCAP gains from 2021 to 2022.

In the coming days, the board will discuss plans to determine the next MSCS superintendent.

Click here to sign up for our newsletter!

Click here to report a spelling or grammar error. Please include the headline.

Copyright 2022 WMC. All rights reserved.