Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker calls himself “the education governor” in the race against Wisconsin Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Evers, but Milwaukee teachers and union members disagree, saying that Walker’s goal for education is to privatize it and make it a commodity.
“Eight years under Scott Walker, students have been starved of basic education,” Milwaukee Teachers Education Association President Amy Mizialko said.
Educators in Milwaukee and across the state have been fighting against Walker’s proposals since the 2011 protests at the Madison Capitol building, after the bill known as Act 10 was passed, which cut union bargaining rights funding for public education.
“Starting with cuts in 2011, $1.6 billion dollars, I mean you can’t take away that much money,” said educator Ray Kremar, who has been a teacher for 13 years. “Our school was suffering during that time.”
Milwaukee teachers said they are facing inadequate funding, which makes class sizes larger, limits class materials for students and challenges teachers to help students with special needs, while charter schools and private education are being supported by Walker, the teachers charge.
“Funding needs to be equal no matter what district,” said educator Sarah Revter. “Students in Milwaukee should have the same education as Brookfield, and they don’t.”
Janet Key picks up her Evers lawn signs after the meeting.
But Governor Scott Walker believes that his initiatives have helped in the classroom, tweeting in May that Wisconsin has “invested more actual dollars into public classrooms than ever before.”
In Walker’s September weekly address, he said Wisconsin K-12 Schools would receive a historic $639 million dollar increase.
“Every child deserves access to a great education that provides them with the skills and knowledge that they need to be successful” Said Walker in his address.
Tony Evers plans to spend nearly $1.4 million dollars on Wisconsin schools, according to his campaign website. In his mission statement, Evers promises to increase funding in early childhood education, and increase funding for public schools, which Evers said has not been adequately funded under Walker and the Republican party.
In early May of 2018, Walker hinted at a possible state takeover of the Milwaukee Public School System as the district faced a $30-million-dollar deficit for the 2018-19 school year, which newly appointed MPS Superintendent Dr. Keith Poley inherited after the abrupt exit of Darienne Driver from the position.
“[Walker] has said from the beginning he’s wanted to break MPS up, they tried to do the takeover a few years ago,” said educator Casey Silkwood. “MPS is a really big district, it’s a lot of staff, a lot of students, so I guess you could say it might be better to restructure it, but he’s not using the word ‘restructure’.”
“We used to have a high school program that was state funded,” said Connie Craig, who has been a kindergarten teacher since 1991. “Thorton took the funding away when he left as superintendent, and now we are really struggling with getting supplies and things into the classrooms.”
MPS praised the “No Empty Backpacks” program, a school supplies drive sponsored by 88Nine and the Milwaukee Business Journal, which collected more than 50,000 items to be distributed to MPS students throughout the district as the school year began, according to MPS.
“School supplies are an ongoing need throughout the school year,” MPS stated in a news release.
MPS also held a Class Acts School Supply Drive, which raised $66,000. The money was used to help provide school supplies for students throughout the district.
The Milwaukee Public School District released their 2018-19 school year $1.2 billion budget, and stated that the district worked to keep the cuts away from the classroom as it worked to cover its $30 million deficit.
“The lack of significant revenue, including funding from the state of Wisconsin, will result in the loss of 125 school-based, full-time equivalent positions,” said MPS in a newsletter.
Educator Patricia Kalabunde, who has been in the classroom for 4 years, said that she wants public school support to be a priority.
“[For the] urban district statewide, the funding formula isn’t working. It really does not do a lot for some of the poorer areas in the city,” said Silkwood.
“MPS seems determined to believe that they can fix our problems with paperwork and meetings and neither of those things are going to fix what our kids need,” said educator Janet Key. “Our kids need our attention. They need small class sizes, 25 and under so that we are really able to work with them.”
“The kindergarten that used to be is now first grade, if not harder,” said Craig, and went on to say that the demand children face in academics has become an issue in their success. “[It’s] just a lot of rigor for the kindergarteners and they need to learn social skills.”
In Walker’s September address, he stated, “Across the state, or students are doing well,” citing an increase in graduation rates as well as high ACT scores for the state.
“For nearly 8 years, public educators have been blamed for the failures of the GOP,” said Mizialko. “They refuse to fund schools properly.”