Recent News

Students, faculty and staff at Tennessee’s community colleges and colleges of applied technology collected and donated the equivalent of 163,175 food items during TBR-The College System of Tennessee’s 27th Annual Food Drive Challenge.

The donations go to campus food pantries for students in need and to local food banks and programs serving their communities. In addition to food donations, campuses collected cash contributions, which count in the collection totals as two items per dollar raised. This year’s food drive greatly surpassed last year’s total of 110,851 items.

Belmont University and TBR-The College System of Tennessee today announced a new transfer pathway for nursing graduates of Tennessee’s community colleges to advance their education at Belmont’s Inman College of Nursing, including bachelor’s degrees in nursing.

Students earned a record number of diplomas and certificates – 8,309 awards conferred – at the Tennessee Colleges of Applied Technology (TCATs) during Academic Year 2024-25, eclipsing the previous record set nearly 15 years ago, according to the annual TCAT student access and success report to the Tennessee Board of Regents Dec. 9.

The Tennessee Board of Regents (TBR) will hold its next regular quarterly meeting Dec. 9, 2025, at the TBR system office in Nashville. Agenda highlights include but are not limited to consideration of search criteria for the next presidents of Cleveland State Community College and Tennessee College of Applied Technology (TCAT) Oneida/Huntsville, a new degree program in Artificial Intelligence Technology at Southwest Tennessee Community College, and reports on the system foundation’s fundraising, TCAT student access and success trends, and the Tennessee Direct Admissions initiative.

The Foundation for the College System of Tennessee has been an invaluable partner to TBR - The College System of Tennessee—by supporting our students, faculty, and staff across our community colleges and Tennessee Colleges of Applied Technology beyond what state funding provides.

A new report from the Tennessee Board of Regents (TBR) highlights a decade of transformative progress in student success at the state's community colleges, driven by reforms to academic support known as corequisite learning support.

Each year, two-thirds of incoming students at Tennessee community colleges are identified as academically underprepared in math, reading, or writing. These students often face barriers to success before they even begin credit-bearing coursework, making innovation in academic support a critical priority for the state’s colleges.