A day after hearing how Tennessee's Department of Education would handle a 9% budget cut, Governor Phil Bredesen returned to the classroom.

Bredesen toured the new Whitwell Middle School, home of the Children's Holocaust Museum.  He stopped in several classrooms, encouraging students to work hard to turn their dreams into careers.

Bredesen says the visit provides some additional motivation to fully fund education, but he knows putting that funding to work will be key to boosting student performance. "The standards, the way they've been increased in the state and changes going on there and teacher certification those are all very important things for getting these kids ready to compete in the kind of world we're going to have in the decades ahead.  And I come here and I see them and they're smart and interested and you just want to go back, roll your sleeves up, and work a little harder."

The Department of Education proposed cuts to the Coordinated School Health program, some teacher raises, and inflation adjustments for local districts.

Bredesen asked all state departments to show him what a 6% funding reduction would look like, and then what another 3% would do to programs, should the economy get worse.