Evers Vetoes Bill on School Sports

On Friday Gov. Tony Evers vetoed Senate Bill 39, which would have allowed virtual charter school students to play sports in their public school districts.

In a letter explaining his veto, Evers said he objects to the way the bill undermined local decision-making by school boards regarding who may participate in interscholastic athletics and other extracurricular activities.

“While a resident school district can enforce standards and expectations for its own students who participate in such activities, the resident school district would not be able to do the same for non-resident charter schools, as it would have no information regarding the pupil’s school attendance or academic performance.”

Furthermore, Evers added, the bill ignores an important difference in the way school funding works between homeschooled students who can, by law, participate in sports and other extracurriculars in their resident public school district, and students who attend virtual charter schools outside the district, whose resident school districts must pay an open-enrollment fee to the virtual charter.

The bill Evers vetoed suggested that school districts could recoup the costs of allowing virtual charter students to play sports by charging athletic fees. But, Evers wrote, “Fees a resident school district might collect for interscholastic athletics and extracurricular activities are insufficient to cover the full cost of participation, particularly when you factor in such open enrollment payments.”

Also, Evers added, the Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association voted 334 to 52 not to allow students attending nonresident virtual charter schools to play sports in their resident districts.

Reprinted with permission of Wisconsin Examiner.