Do Madison’s schools underperform Milwaukee’s? Let’s talk about it.
Talk to your typical Wisconsinite and they will tell you Milwaukee is the past, Madison is the future. Milwaukee is shrinking, unsafe and broke, they will argue, while Madison is flush with people, turning out votes, and have you seen all of the new construction?
I do not buy it. To keep Wisconsin strong, we need our champion cities to be at their very best. Sadly, Madison is failing to provide the quality of services its citizens deserve.
So I will say in the open what people have been whispering: Madison Metropolitan School District is as troubled as Milwaukee Public Schools is.
Madison’s district, despite an elite university pipeline, hypereducated leadership, and a shiny, new strategic plan, suffers the same frailties as Milwaukee’s: basement performance, backbreaking spending. But while Milwaukee is pulling out of its tailspin due to courageouschoices from the top, Madison is ponderously ambling to nowhere. Just ask the locals. “You need the marketing, and you need the product,” as a parent told a reporter. “I’m missing the product.”
So, what is the product?
Madison’s test scores are near the state’s bottom. Controlling for poverty (so you can see how well a district teaches, not the backgrounds of its students), Madison ranks 13th of Wisconsin’s 15 biggest districts on the Forward Exam and 12th on the ACT. That is right next to Milwaukee and far below leaders like Sheboygan and Janesville. Specifically, Madison has a tragically high number of students failing mathematics. The percentage of students scoring “developing,” the lowest tier, on the Forward math section is 14 points higher than expected for its student body. The percentage scoring “developing” on ACT’s math portion, a 15 or below, is 12 points higher. Accounting for poverty’s relationship with test performance, Madison’s district vastly underperforms the level predicted by its economic disadvantage.
Hispanic and Black students are doing no better in Madison’s district than they are in Milwaukee’s. The average ACT score for Madison’s Black students is 14.6. Milwaukee’s is 14.4. The average ACT score for Madison’s Hispanic students is 15.9. Milwaukee’s is 16.0. You cannot open the news in Milwaukee without catching another national report rightly reproaching Milwaukee for the nation’s lowest scores and worst gaps. When will Madison receive the same scrutiny?
Madison is getting critical questions wrong, possibly wrecking recovery. Take its mathematics curriculum. The district is getting away from traditional instruction: “I do, we do, you do.” That is how the nation’s best schools teach, how some of the nation’s best coaches coach, and how you teach your child to cook. “I will show you how to crack an egg. Now, we will crack an egg together. Okay, you show me how to crack an egg.” Instead, as Assistant Superintendent Cindy Green explained to Madison’s school board, “We do it together … through dialogue, through discourse, through application. Then, it’s you all go … practice that to yourself. And then, it’s I do and I show you.” That is “productive struggle,” a quick way to frustrate students, squander class time, and develop bad habits. Madison is giving a classroom of first graders cartons of eggs and hoping they do not make a mess.
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2025-2026 Madison 4k-3rd grade Early Literacy Screener report: The bar moves faster than the kids.
Joe Gothard, Becky Kundert and Sonia Spencer Remarks on Madison’s K-12 Literacy Crisis.
2026-2027 Madison K-12 $pending continues to grow, fueled by a 9.7% (!) property tax increase. Total spending will be at least $706,000,000 for 25,003 students, or $28,236 per student.
May 2026 Madison School District Presentation: 7,095 adults for 25,003 students (3.52 students per adult!)
2024-2025 Early Literacy Screener Map.
Map: Foundations of Reading Results: 2015–2024
Where have all the students gone?
3,887 Madison 4 year old to third grade students scored lower than 75% of the students in the national comparison group.
Madison taxpayers have long supported far above average k-12 tax & $pending. This despite our long term, disastrous reading results. May, 2026: 7,095 Staff for 25,003 students; $pending > $26k per student!
Madison Schools: More $, No Accountability
The taxpayer funded Madison School District long used Reading Recovery…
The data clearly indicate that being able to read is not a requirement for graduation at (Madison) East, especially if you are black or Hispanic.
My Question to Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers on Teacher Mulligans and our Disastrous Reading Results
2017: West High Reading Interventionist Teacher’s Remarks to the School Board on Madison’s Disastrous Reading Results
Madison’s taxpayer supported K-12 school district, despite spending far more than most, has long tolerated disastrous reading results.
“An emphasis on adult employment”
Wisconsin Public Policy Forum Madison School District Report[PDF]
WEAC: $1.57 million for Four Wisconsin Senators
Friday Afternoon Veto: Governor Evers Rejects AB446/SB454; an effort to address our long term, disastrous reading results
Booked, but can’t read (Madison): functional literacy, National citizenship and the new face of Dred Scott in the age of mass incarceration.
When A Stands for Average: Students at the UW-Madison School of Education Receive Sky-High Grades. How Smart is That?
