Governance and Outcomes in Milwaukee

Alan Borsuk:

A couple of weeks ago, Means outlined a plan in which an unknown number of schools (maybe three?) would be designated to be part of the new program — and the agency that would run them would be MPS itself, with oversight from an independent school operator.

The teachers would be MPS employees, the money to run the schools (at the charter school funding rate, which is about $2,000 less than what MPS itself gets) would go to MPS and the schools would go back to being regular MPS schools in five years if performance improved.

There are ideas for programs at the schools raised in Means’ proposal, which generally are in-line with the “community schools” initiative that MPS itself is trying to grow. This involves extending more services to students and their families, while making changes to academic programs.

I spoke to many of the key players last week. Just about everyone is edgy and uncertain what’s going to happen next.

Related: “an emphasis on adult employment“.