Despite record high state spending on education, I was saddened but not surprised to hear about more Wisconsin cities struggling with their K-12 school districts.
Living in Southeastern Wisconsin, we hear a lot about Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS) and their leadership problems, financial scandals, and terrible educational outcomes. However, in the Capitol city, Forward Exam results revealed that the Madison Metropolitan School District is also in crisis. 50% of Madison students are reading below grade level, 75% of Latino students are reading below grade level, and 90% of Black students are reading below grade level. Not only are students performing poorly in reading, but the math results are equally awful. These challenges have been growing for decades.
Recently, the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty (WILL) relaunched an important tool for parents who are looking for a better understanding of how public schools are performing. The WILL School Scorecard can be accessed at
KnowMySchoolWI.com and includes several new features:
• An interactive map for side-by-side district comparisons on proficiency, graduation rates, and absenteeism
• Grade-level enrollment trends to identify potential "enrollment cliffs"
• Chronic absenteeism tracking, a crisis in many communities
• Disciplinary incidents by district to assess school climate and safety
• Contextualized math and ELA scores, showing where DPI has lowered proficiency benchmarks
• Inflation-adjusted revenue data to show real changes in school funding
I continue to support all efforts to make public education more transparent and accountable to parents, taxpayers, and all of us interested in protecting our children's futures.