Jamie Woodson

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Jamie Roberts Woodson (born March 6, 1972), is the President and CEO of the State Collaborative on Reforming Education (SCORE), a Tennessee-based education reform non-profit organization. Previously she served as a state senator in the Tennessee General Assembly (2005–11) and was Speaker Pro Tem and Chairman of the Senate Education Committee. Earlier she served three two-year terms in the state House of Representatives (1999 to 2005).[1][2][3]

Biography

She attended the University of Tennessee (UT) in Knoxville and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree and a J.D. She was a member of Alpha Omicron Pi sorority while she was at UT. She was admitted to the Tennessee Bar and works as an attorney. Her first marriage was to Jeff Hagood, whose surname she used during the first several years of her political career.[4]

She won election to a two-year term in the Tennessee House of Representatives in 1998 as a Republican, representing the 17th State House District. She won re-election in 2000 and 2002, serving in the 101st through 103rd General Assemblies. In 2004 she was elected to a four-year term in the state senate.

In the summer of 2005 she was married to Knoxville lawyer William (Bill) Woodson, Jr., at the couple's farm "Horse Fly Farm." Upon her marriage, she assumed her new husband's last name. She has three stepchildren: Joseph, Elizabeth, and Caitlin.

Woodson represents the 6th district in the Tennessee Senate. The district is composed of the majority of Knox County. After her first term in the state senate, she was re-elected in 2008 to a second four-year term. In January 2009 she was elected Speaker Pro-Tem for the 106th General Assembly (2009–2010).

During the 105th General Assembly (2007–2008) she served as the Secretary of the Senate Republican Caucus, as the chair of the Senate Education Committee, and as a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee and the Senate Transportation Committee. In 2007 she sponsored legislation that resulted in a major revision to Tennessee's K-12 education funding formula, creating Basic Education Program 2.0, often known as BEP 2.0.[5] Even though she champions the Defense of Marriage Act, she supports same-sex civil unions.[6]

In April 2011 Woodson announced that she would resign her senate seat after the 2011 session of the General Assembly. She planned to leave the legislature to become head of SCORE, an education reform organization started by former U.S. Senator Bill Frist. The Knoxville News Sentinel reported that the Knox County Commission would appoint someone to fill her seat in the senate until a special election could be held.[1][2][3] Her resignation was scheduled to take effect on July 9, 2011.[7]

References

  1. 1.0 1.1 http://www.knoxnews.com/news/2011/apr/14/jamie-woodson-announces-resignation-state-senate-s/
  2. 2.0 2.1 http://web.knoxnews.com/pdf/2011/apr/041411woodson_letter.pdf
  3. 3.0 3.1 http://www.knoxnews.com/news/2011/apr/15/state-senator-jamie-woodson-resigns-score/
  4. Jamie Hagood profile, archived website of the 102nd Tennessee General Assembly, accessed April 15, 2011
  5. Senator Jamie Woodson, campaign website, accessed November 4, 2008
  6. Ashe Smith, 'State Senator Woodson speaks to UT-K students', Out & About Newspaper, Vol. 5, No. 8, 2006, p. 20 [1]
  7. Knoxville News Sentinel, May 21, 2011, page A3.

External links