Top 10 names
The top 10 names Tennessee parents chose for their new babies born in 2014 are as follows: Girls — Boys 1. Emma — William 2. Ava — Elijah 3. Olivia — Mason 4. Sophia — James 5. Isabella — Noah 6. Abigail — Liam 7. Harper — Jackson 8. Elizabeth — John 9. Madison — Jacob 10. Ella — Ethan
Emmas and Williams will continue to dominate Tennessee elementary school attendance sheets for the foreseeable future.
For the fourth year in a row, Emma and William together dominated Tennessee parents’ top picks for baby names, according to 2014 data released by the Tennessee Department of Health.
William has stayed at the No. 1 spot on Tennessee’s list of newborn boy names for eight straight years, while Emma has led the girl names since 2011.
This year, two new girls’ names — Harper and Ella — broke into the top 10 list, bumping Emily and Addison out of the top 10.
Meanwhile, the most popular names for boys remain largely unchanged from the previous year. All 10 top boys’ names remain from the 2013 list, though all but William and Noah changed their former rankings.
Tennessee Department of Health officials used the annual names announcement to tout a new program called “Welcome Baby,” aimed to connect new parents with better information about how to care for their infants.
All Tennessee newborns are now greeted with a “Welcome Baby” package, which contains information on the kidcentraltn.com website — a website that connects parents with information and resources provided by state agencies. The website features a comprehensive directory of state services for children and families.
The package also includes a congratulations letter from first lady Crissy Haslam, sign-up material for the family’s local Imagination Library chapter and more. More than 71,000 Tennessee babies received a Welcome Baby packet in 2014.