UFCW Local 1529
Standing strong for working families
Powering · Labor Education
Memphis-Shelby County Schools
Greatness Grows Here · Led by Superintendent Dr. Roderick F. Richmond
Tennessee's largest public school district, and one of the 25 largest in America. 110,000 students in more than 200 schools, 13,900 employees, and the second largest employer in Memphis-Shelby County. Our members' children sit in these classrooms and our union siblings staff these buildings — which makes this district a labor issue as much as an education one.
Dr. Richmond came up through Memphis classrooms — teacher, school leader, Chief Academic Officer through the historic city-county merger, Transformation Officer, Deputy Superintendent — before the board named him interim in January 2025 and then permanent superintendent, unanimously.
He runs the district on his Five A's: Academics, Attendance, Attitude, Athletics and Arts — with the “Showing Up for Greatness” attendance campaign behind the second one. He is also a personal friend of our founder from the Tennessee State University Aristocrat of Bands, carrying the TSU motto Think, Work, Serve! ever since.
Mission“Preparing all students for success in learning, leadership, and life.”
Vision“Our District will be the premier school district attracting a diverse student population and effective teachers, leaders, and staff all committed to excellence.”
MSCS employs more than 13,900 people, including roughly 6,500 teachers — plus the bus drivers, custodians, cafeteria and nutrition workers, mechanics, secretaries, aides and maintenance crews who make a school building work every single morning. Those are Memphis paychecks, Memphis benefits and Memphis retirements.
Every fight this movement wages runs through these schools. Our members' children learn here, our union siblings work here, and the graduates walking out in May are exactly who our apprenticeships and trades programs are built for.
“The Labor Education App addresses a critical gap in workforce readiness education. Too often, students graduate without understanding the career opportunities available through organized labor, apprenticeship programs, and the skilled trades.”
- Two (2) approved proofs of residence
- Required immunizations
- Photo ID of the parent or guardian
- An active PowerSchool account if the student is new to MSCS
- (901) 416-3450 — Pre-K registration
- (901) 416-5338 — Optional Schools
- (901) 416-5450 — Early kindergarten screening
- (901) 416-9875 — Homeless Education Liaison — Vequitia Barnes
Under the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act, a child experiencing homelessness has the right to immediate enrollment — even without proof of address, a birth certificate, immunization records or previous school records. Staying in a shelter, a motel, a car, or doubled up with family counts. Missing paperwork cannot keep your child out of school. MSCS Homeless Education Liaison Vequitia Barnes: (901) 416-9875.
That number is how a district this size gets help, and it is wide open to anybody who wants in — a local, a business, a church, a civic club. Sedrick Turner is one of those adopters: a Memphis business owner who has adopted MSCS schools, fed students and staff, and stood in front of classrooms telling kids what ownership looks like.
88.5 FM is licensed to Memphis-Shelby County Schools and broadcast out of the MSCS Communications Center in Midtown — a Tennessee Radio Hall of Fame station where district students learn to run a real board on a real signal, not a classroom simulation. That is a broadcast career pathway that starts in high school.
We are highlighting Marcus Taylor on it — a Memphis broadcaster, podcaster and the founder of Sports Sanitizers LLC, the company he started during COVID so MSCS athletes, his own son among them, could get their season back. “I love creating the new workforce,” he says. That is our language too.
Listen Live · 88.5 FM Memphis
WQOX 88.5 FM — The Voice of MSCS
Broadcasting Greatness, 24/7, straight off the district's own signal.
Student, school and employee counts, the mission and vision statements, and the registration steps on this page are the district's own published figures from scsk12.org. This page is a resource built by Labor Education — it is not operated by Memphis-Shelby County Schools.
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