Legislature Considers Breaking Up MPS
Republican bills create four to eight smaller districts, remove income limits from school choice.
Bay View High School. Photo taken May 20th, 2020 by Carl Baehr.
Republican lawmakers in the Wisconsin Legislature defended their plan to break the state’s largest school district into between four and eight smaller districts at a Wednesday hearing.
State senator Alberta Darling, R-River Hills, pointed to Milwaukee Public Schools students’ low reading and math scores as a sign MPS needs drastic change.
The hearing also covered proposals to remove income limits for the state’s school choice programs and institute a parental bill of rights.
The bill, which has support from conservative groups like the Institute for Reforming Government, is not the first proposal to change the structure of MPS — a 2009 bill backed by Democrats floated the idea of a mayoral takeover of the school district, and a Republican plan later that year suggested breaking the district into eight smaller districts. In 2015, the Opportunity Schools and Partnership Plan, also sponsored by Darling, would have allowed Milwaukee County to take over struggling public schools.
This plan would have MPS divided by July 2024. The current plan targets only Milwaukee, though the bill’s sponsors noted they would be open to expanding it to break up other school districts if needed.
“We’re starting here because as has been said in other committees that I’m in, Milwaukee is the biggest economic engine in this state,” said Rep. Robert Wittke, R-Racine, who introduced the bill. “The Legislature has to pick up and do something.”
“I realize the bills that you’re taking up currently, including this one aimed at dissolving Milwaukee Public Schools, may feel appropriate and in alignment with other tactics inflicted on urban communities across the country,” said Jennifer Hofschulte, president of Parents for Public Schools Milwaukee. “But really, there are actually useful tactics we could take together to have a near-immediate effect on student outcomes.”
MPS superintendent Keith Posley highlighted current programs in the district that he said are already improving student outcomes, and urged lawmakers to give school districts the resources to expand and support those programs.
“I’ll be the first to say we need to make improvements,” Posley said. “I have the same commitment and zeal for all those children that go in the doors of the Milwaukee Public Schools, I want to see them be as successful as anyone else — and I would say I want to say, even greater than others.”
The bill must still be voted on by the Assembly Committee on education before it reaches the full Assembly. If passed, Gov. Tony Evers has said he would veto the plan, though gubernatorial candidate Rebecca Kleefisch tweeted her support for the measure.
Listen to the WPR report here.
Wisconsin Legislature takes up plan to break up Milwaukee Public Schools district was originally published by Wisconsin Public Radio.
The real issue is the Republican white supremacism and poverty that they like to create for power.
The question is “how does breaking up MPS and creating more bureaucracy improve student outcomes.” Breaking up of urban school districts is a tactic that Republicans have used over the years across the county and nothing changes.
Darling is correct the low scores of MPS students screams for change. Stop taking money from MPS to fund wealthy white students attending private school.
Low test scores overall scream for a caring and humane society, but under Republican administrations that’s a pipedream.
Darling, a former teacher, seems to have checked everything learned about kids needs at the door when she entered politics. I’ve watched over the years as this once sensitive individual’s positive intentions became a dulled instrumentality of the self interested. Sad. Very sad.