35 results
Madison School District Administration (PDF): “Inconsistency in grading and academic expectations between the middle schools may contribute to difficulty in transitioning to high school. The differences between the feeder middle schools are significant.” – MMSD Coursework Review, 2014 A recent tax increase referendum funded the expansion of Madison’s least diverse middle school: Hamilton. We’ve long […]
Gina Caneva: Even if our state and city find a way to move forward and equitably fund education, inequities would still exist between states. This fractured way of funding public education will only lead to more inequity. Of course, the most comprehensive, equitable solution is also the most far-fetched and would take a constitutional amendment—the […]
Madison School District Administration (PDF) Salary and Wage Notes: Step Advancement (background) is funded in v3.0 of the budget. The employee handbook calls for ‘step advancement’ on existing wage/salary schedules. The cost of ‘steps’ is estimated at 1.75% of total wage/salary rates. ($4,528,492) Lane Movement (background) for Professional Learning is funded in v3.0 of the […]
Alexander Russo: School spending per student drops for a third year in a row Hechinger Report: Per-pupil spending in the nation’s public schools fell for the third straight year in 2012-13*, according to the most recent federal financial data, which was released on January 27, 2016. In that school year, U.S. public schools spent only […]
Madison School District Administration (PDF): 1. Enrollment is down slightly (0.3%) since last year. Enrollment projection begin to climb again in 2017-18. 2. Six elementary schools are over capacity this year. Referendum-funded construction eliminates overcrowding among these schools in the five-year projection. 3. Most students continue to attend their home attendance area. This year 60% […]
Madison Government School District “Final” 2015-2016 Budget (5.2MB PDF): Page 39: 2013-2014 Total Spending: $408,806,234.75 2014-2015: $411,671,817.67 2015-2016: $454,414,941.93 or $16,724.26 per student (27,171 students) The United States spends $12,401 per student nationally, about 34% less than Madison. Much more on open enrollment, here.
Joseph O’Sullivan & Katherine Long. The budget gives a 3 percent cost-of-living raise to K-12 employees over the next two years, plus an additional temporary 1.8 percent increase that expires in 2017. It proposes a slight increase in health-care benefits for K-12 employees, but not enough, the Washington Education Association said, to keep up with […]
Madison School District Administration Slideware (PDF). Much more on the $413,703,424+ 2015-2016 Madison School District budget, here.
Notes and charts from the Districts’ most recent 2015-2016 budget document (5MB PDF): Our 25,364 students are served by 4,076 Teachers & Staff (6.22 students per District employee). Salaries and Wages For 2015-16, MMSD has collective bargaining agreements in place with its represented employee groups, including teachers, aides, clerical, and custodial staff. The teachers’ collective […]
Page 8 is illustrated above, with Madison’s per student spending noted, not completely to scale. 36 Page PDF Slideware Presentation. I’ve not seen a total spending number published in awhile (The last number I’ve seen was approximately $402,000,000) for 25,305 full time students and 1,962 4K participants. That’s roughly $15K per student, about double the […]
Madison School District (PDF): A. Alignment to Strategic Framework- In our vision to make every school a thriving school that prepares every student to be ready for college, career and community, these budget resources support the district’s goals and priorities as defined in our Strategic Framework. B. More equitable use of resources- As opposed to […]
Via a kind reader’s email. Despite spending double the national average per student and delivering disastrous reading results – for years – Madison’s Superintendent pushes back on school accountability: The Wheeler Report (PDF): Dear Legislators: Thank you for your efforts to work on school accountability. We all agree that real accountability, focused on getting the […]
Madison School District Administration (4.7MB PDF): Superintendent Jennifer Cheatham: In the Madison Metropolitan School District (MMSD), we have a common vision. We want every school to be a thriving school that ensures every student graduates ready for college, career, and community. Thanks to our community’s support, we are in a sound financial position to make […]
Foundations of Reading Test (Wisconsin) Result Summary (First Time Takers): May 2013 – August 2014 (Test didn’t start until January 2014, and it was the lower cut score): 2150 pass out of 2766 first time takers = 78% passage rate .xls file September 2014 – August 2015 (higher cut score took effect 9/14): 2173/3278 = […]
Enrollment Staff Budget Boston 56,650 9,125 $1,153,000,000 ($20,353/student) Long Beach 78,230 6,515 $1,133,478,905 ($14,489/student) Madison 25,231 4,081 ? $421M + “Construction” and ? (at least $17k/student) SIS: In 2013, Madison Superintendent Jennifer Cheatham said “What will be different, this time“? The Superintendent further cited Long Beach and Boston as beacons in her Rotary speech. However, […]
Valerie Strauss: In September 2015, the Chicago Tribune ran an editorial that wondered whether the Chicago Public School District would collapse under the weight of its mind-numbing financial problems. It hasn’t yet, but money mismanagement, inadequate funding and failed education policy are combining with a host of other factors to raise the issue of whether […]
Madison, spending more than $17,000 per student, is truly the land of milk and honey, as this useful comparison reveals. Achievement, however… Bruce Baker, Danielle Farrie, Theresa Luhm and David G. Sciarra: The National Report Card (NRC) evaluates and compares the extent to which state finance systems ensure equality of educational opportunity for all children, […]
Emma Brown: The Detroit public school system is running out of cash so quickly that it likely will not be able to make payroll after April 8 unless state lawmakers take action soon, the new state-appointed emergency manager said Wednesday. Steven Rhodes, who assumed the helm of Detroit Public Schools at the beginning of March, […]
Doug Erickson: Gary Bennett, a former public school teacher, will begin April 1, according to the UW System. He will establish and lead the new Office of Educational Opportunity, an entity proposed by Darling and other Republican legislators and approved last year as part of the state’s biennial budget process. The office will have the […]
Chris Rickert: Charter schools that overhaul the usual public school model — such as the proposed Madison Preparatory Academy, which the school board rejected in 2011 — are another approach. Madison has not embraced the charter school movement with nearly as much vigor as some other districts with race- and income-based achievement gaps. This is […]
Tap for a larger version. Wisconsin Reading Coalition, via a kind email: LETRS Training For the fourth year, the Milwaukee Summer Reading Project will offer free training in Language Essentials for Teachers of Reading and Spelling (LETRS) in Milwaukee. Ten Saturday classes run from March into June. There are approximately ten open spots, with registration […]
The Beaver Dam, Wisconsin School District embraces direct mail with a glossy postcard: Tap for a larger version. It appears that the District is preparing for the financing and construction of a new high school facility. The website is attractive and information discovery is not too bad. That said, Beaver Dam, like Madison, could make […]
Bruce Baker A short while back, I explained how, in our fervor to rapidly expand charter schooling and decrease the role of large urban school districts in serving their resident school-aged populations, we’ve created some particularly ludicrous scenarios whereby, for example – charter school operators use public tax dollars to buy land and facilities that […]
Gillian Tett: Earlier this month, I visited a hilly corner of North Carolina to spend time with family friends. As we sat around the kitchen table, a former musician whom I shall call Dave revealed that he had recently started an entrepreneurial sideline to supplement his meagre family income. During part of the week, he […]
David Leonhardt: When the Education Department releases its biennial scorecard of reading and math scores for all 50 states this week, Florida and Texas are likely to look pretty mediocre. In 2013, the last time that scores were released, Florida ranked 30th on the tests, which are given to fourth and eighth graders, and Texas […]
Abigail Becker: Test results released in October from the 2015 National Assessment of Educational Progress, a set of tests known as the Nation’s Report Card, reaffirmed Wisconsin’s poor record of educating black children: The state had the worst achievement gap between black and white students in fourth- and eighth-grade reading and math. This is the […]
Kevin Crowe: Median household income fell by a significant margin in two-thirds of Wisconsin counties from 2009 to 2014, according to figures released Thursday by the U.S. Census Bureau. In Milwaukee County, the median income fell by 10.3% to $43,385. Waukesha County, which had the highest median income in the state at $76,319, saw a […]
Doug Ericsson: The financial ramifications are significant. A school district gaining a student receives a share of the student’s home district’s state aid to help pay for educating that student. The Madison School District will lose about $6.5 million in state aid this school year because of open enrollment, the report said. “Obviously, I am […]
Madison School Board Member Ed Hughes: Is it misguided, inefficient and wasteful to compel school districts to resort to referenda for authority to meet the rising costs of school operations? Not everyone thinks so. For example, Republican Jeremy Thiesfeldt, chair of the Assembly Committee on Education, does not see a problem with government by referendum. […]
Economist Taken as a whole, Ms Clinton’s plan is an eclectic grab-bag. It is as if her advisors brainstormed every possible policy to boost wages, and then kept them all. Some—such as greater investment in skills and infrastructure—are welcome. Wages, ultimately, reflect workers’ productivity. Ms Clinton is also right that the impact of technology on […]
Chris Rickert: District officials were able to close about a third of the budget deficit by negotiating rate freezes with the three insurers it contracts with for employee health coverage — which is great, but isn’t going to put any more of those 79 positions back in the classroom. The district, like local taxing bodies […]
Pat Schneider: “I will consider contributions to health care, depending on what we see in terms of costs and the budget,” Burke said. “But we need to look at compensation in its entirety to make sure we remain competitive while we are accountable to the taxpayers.” The school district is in the process of preparing […]
2005: When all third graders read at grade level or beyond by the end of the year, the achievement gap will be closed…and not before On November 7, Superintendent Art Rainwater made his annual report to the Board of Education on progress toward meeting the district’s student achievement goal in reading. As he did last […]
Chris Rickert: But there’s still little doubt vouchers mean taxpayers are going to be on the hook for educating some indeterminate number of additional kids than they would be in the absence of vouchers. That isn’t necessarily a bad thing, according to Jim Bender, president of the pro-voucher School Choice Wisconsin. He notes that government […]
In 2013, Madison Superintendent Jennifer Cheatham said “What will be different, this time“? The Superintendent further cited Long Beach and Boston as beacons in her Rotary speech. However, based on recently released 2015-2016 budget slides (PDF) and Molly Beck’s summary, it appears that the same service, status quo governance model continues, unabated. A focus on […]