Search Results for: rothman
Notes on Firing Universities of Wisconsin President Jay Rothman
Dave Cieslewicz: So, the Regents wanting to part ways with their own president (the one they had selected), isn’t all that surprising or all that unusual in the annals of corporate, nonprofit or governmental settings. But usually this plays out in predictable ways which it did not in this case. Having been part of these […]
Commentary on Universities of Wisconsin Fired President Jay Rothman’s Contract
Kelly Meyerhofer:
Will Rothman clean up UW conglomerate?
John Torinus: UW Health, a $3.8 billion health system that operates in several states and earned $550 million in 2021. It contributed $50 million to the mother ship, arguably, an inadequate return to UW Madison, which owns its buildings and receives below market rent. Quartz, an HMO insurance company operates in four states. It had […]
Glenn Grothman – Wisconsin State Senator or Walker Education Policy Puppet?
In a letter to constituents, and Wednesday on “Sly in the Morning“, Senator Glenn Grothman (R-West Bend) extolled the education-saving virtues of Act 10, saying it was “…the best thing we could do for our public schools.” Grothman went on to say that “Wisconsin Schools are just not that great right now,” citing recent test scores as signs of an education emergency that only eliminating collective bargaining could remedy. Specifically noting that the “…most recent test scores show that black kids have the worst scores in the country…” and “…white kids scored lower than the national average.” Grothman stated his belief that collective bargaining is a roadblock to student achievement that had to be removed – for the sake of the kids. According to Grothman, there are too many “bad teachers” protected by unions that are “too hard to get rid of,” and that “people shouldn’t need an Education degree to teach.”
After speaking with Senator Grothman today two things are very clear – first, he was not very familiar with the full data from the scores, admitting that Governor Walker seemed to have “cherry picked” the scores he cited. The Senator was merely repeating the information he was given by Scott Walker, trusting its accuracy – even out of context. The other issue that was perfectly clear is that he (and the other Republicans) are behaving as puppets to Scott Walker and the Corporatics pulling HIS strings – believing every bit of misinformation being fed to them to demonize teachers and their unions. The best thing for Wisconsin and our children is for this propaganda to be exposed and debunked, so that a real debate about education can take place. For the record, this information was shared with Senator Grothman today.
UW-Madison plans pay raises for 548 faculty in high-demand fields
Becky Jacobs: Nearly 550 faculty members at the University of Wisconsin-Madison are set to receive pay raises this month as part of efforts to attract and retain faculty in high-demand fields of study. State lawmakers provided $27 million annually and created an annual appropriation to the UW system in the current state budget for the […]
Ousted UW president implies UW regents are to blame for dysfunction
Kelly Meyerhofer: Ousted Universities of Wisconsin President Jay Rothman cast the UW Board of Regents as dysfunctional and called for changes, such as fewer and better-educated board members. “The change must start at the top with the Board of Regents,” he wrote in a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel op-ed. Rothman lost his job April 7 when the […]
Commentary on Universities of Wisconsin Board of Regents
Jay Rothman: When I started in June 2022, it was clear that the status quo was not sustainable. I am proud of what my team accomplished during nearly four years. But now it is time to look to the future and the change that still needs to be done. While I regret that I will […]
“We are not political hacks. We are not a rubber stamp” – Wisconsin Board of Regents’ President Amy Bogost
Wisconsin Right Now: Amy Bogost, the president of the UW Board of Regents, told a panel of concerned lawmakers that the Regents are “not political hacks,” but revealed that fired President Jay Rothman’s performance review was not documented beyond her own personal notes, which she hasn’t released. State Sen. Rob Hutton (R-Brookfield) asked Bogost to […]
Universities of Wisconsin board will vote to weigh firing system president who refused to quit | AP News
Scott Bauer The Universities of Wisconsin Board of Regents scheduled a Tuesday vote to consider firing the system’s president, who refused their offer to quietly resign because he said no reason had been given for the surprise ouster. Jay Rothman said in two letters sent to regents that he would not resign from leading the 165,000-student system without […]
Leader of University of Wisconsin System Is Fired by the Board
Alan Blinder, Stephanie Saul: The board of Wisconsin’s public university system voted on Tuesday to fire President Jay O. Rothman, who angered Democrats and faculty members for bargaining with the Republican-led State Legislature and recently defied regents who had pressed him to resign. The decision was unanimous, with 17 members of the board — which […]
Politics & “Universities of Wisconsin” Governance
Recent news that current Universities of Wisconsin President Jay Rothman is being pushed out (and voting today, with several uncontested races….) brought back memories of chats with local and state elected officials over the years. As an aside, spring, 2026 election day is likely a convenient time to push Rothman out. A friend mused that […]
Universities of Wisconsin President Under Fire
Sabine Martin: In a March meeting with Rothman, Regents President Amy Bogost and Vice President Kyle Weatherly disclosed that an “unidentified majority of the Board of Regents had lost confidence in my leadership,” Rothman wrote in a March 26 letter to Bogost. Rothman said the request surprised him because of “all that my team and […]
Universities of Wisconsin leaders looking to oust system president who refuses to quit
Scott Bauer: The president of the 25-campus Universities of Wisconsin said in a letter obtained by The Associated Press on Thursday that he’s been told to either resign or be fired, but has been given no reason and won’t step aside from the 165,000-student system. Jay Rothman, president of the university system since 2022, said […]
Notes on International Higher Education Enrollment
Sabine Martin: UW system leadership last month attributed the slight increase in systemwide student enrollment to an 8% decline in the number of international students, according to preliminary estimates. UW system President Jay Rothman said in October that the availability and timeliness of securing visas had an impact on international student enrollment. “It’s an area that we […]
The president of the University of Washington system has proposed a tuition increase for in-state undergraduate students
Sabine Martin: In-state undergraduate students at the Universities of Wisconsin would pay hundreds more in tuition in the 2025-26 academic year under a proposal President Jay Rothman announced Tuesday. The plan to raise tuition by up to 5% for in-state undergraduate students would be the third consecutive increase since 2023 after the end of a 10-year freeze. Tuition […]
notes on redistributed state taxpayer funds and the University of Wisconsin
Becky Jacobs and Andrew Bahl: The leader of Wisconsin’s 13 public universities said without additional funding in the next state budget, he expects more branch campus closures, decreased affordability for students, layoffs and program cuts. “All of which will hit hardest at our most vulnerable UWs,” Universities of Wisconsin President Jay Rothman said on social media. […]
“is very rarely are there actual metrics attached to it”
Becky Jacobs “What upsets me the most about these … is very rarely are there actual metrics attached to it,” Wilde said. Mnookin will qualify for the $150,000 if she continues as chancellor through June 30 and “her performance remains satisfactory,” according to her contract with the UW system. Although her contract doesn’t specify what […]
Notes on the Universities of Wisconsin Budget Sources
Corrine Hess: The UW system’s 2023-25 biennial budget is $13.7 billion. About 58 percent of funding comes from tuition and fees, 24 percent comes from the federal government and 18 percent comes from the state. Evers’ budget includes $856M spending increase for UW Gov. Tony Evers’ 2025-27 biennial budget proposal includes $856 million for the […]
Notes on Redistributed Federal Taxpayer funds and Higher Education
Jay Rothman: Last week I sent a letter to our Congressional delegation in Washington, D.C. to express my concerns about federal financial aid amid the ongoing budget process. 1/
notes on higher education governance
Kimberly Wethal Following a rare 45-minute discussion Tuesday, the UW Board of Regents tabled a vote to change UW system policy to allow Rothman and future UW system presidents to appoint senior leadership roles without guidance from a committee. Those who spoke seemed in agreement that the current policy is wasteful and inefficient. The policy […]
Congress Can Block Student Loan Cancellation—Forever
Preston Cooper Specifically, Congress could block the Education Department from issuing new regulations or executive actions related to the student loan program that increase costs to taxpayers. Had it been in effect during the last four years, such a law would have killed all of President Biden’s attempts at loan cancellation in the cradle. During […]
Dean Chemerinsky To Pursue Disciplinary Action Against Disruptive Students
www The talk was titled “Restoring Democracy: The Debate Over Judicial Reform in Israel.” Rothman is a member of the far-right Religious Zionism party. ,,, A representative of the law school opened the event by reciting a “civility statement” and emphasizing the importance of “respectful speech.” … Rothman was joined on the stage for a […]
Higher Ed Bargaining over redistributed tax dollars and tuition inflation
Kimberly Wethal: Universities of Wisconsin schools would keep in-state undergraduate tuition steady for the next two academic years if lawmakers hike state aid by $855 million of state dollars as part of the upcoming budget cycle, UW system President Jay Rothman said in a budget request Monday. The proposed budget, which goes before the UW […]
Plummeting enrollment and competing options make them increasingly obsolete
Mark Lisheron; But however cautious and deliberative the committee is, it will be difficult to avoid the evidence that has been piling up like a jackknifed train for the last two years. With all of the alternatives available — the expansion of liberal arts programs at technical colleges and more access to four-year colleges — it’s […]
Cutting departments at the “Universities of Wisconsin”
Chancellor Mark A. Mone Today, I recommended to Universities of Wisconsin President Jay Rothman that the Board of Regents discontinue the program of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee’s (UWM) College of General Studies (CGS) and its three academic departments: Arts & Humanities, Math & Natural Sciences, and Social Sciences & Business, pursuant to Regent Policy Document (RPD) […]
Notes on higher educational facilities amidst declining enrollment
Kimberly Wethal UW-Stevens Point leadership is warning that its two branch campuses in Marshfield and Wausau can’t survive unless enrollment increases. The campuses’ enrollment has dropped nearly 70% in the last 13 years. UW-Stevens Point Chancellor Thomas Gibson said in a viability report to Universities of Wisconsin President Jay Rothman this spring that other revenue […]
Notes on the “Universities of Wisconsin” system
“Facts & Trends” In December 2022, the Board of Regents approved a five-year Strategic Plan for the Universities of Wisconsin for 2023-28. The broad objectives of the plan include enhancing the student experience and social mobility; fostering civic engagement and serving the public good; creating and disseminating knowledge that contributes to innovation and a better […]
“enrollment has declined by nearly 67% over the past 10 years”
Wispolitics: Oshkosh Chancellor Andrew Leavitt announced the university’s Fox Cities campus will close in June 2025 due to low enrollment — the sixth two-year campus in two years to either end in-person instruction or shut completely. Leavitt confirmed the news Thursday after Outagamie County Exec Tom Nelson blasted him and UW President Jay Rothman for […]
Notes on downsizing Universities (!) of Wisconsin Campuses
Liam Beran: The UW System hopes to downsize its remaining branch campuses amid declining student interest in associate degrees and ongoing enrollment struggles, according to an October briefing by UW System President Jay Rothman Isthmusobtained via records request. Five campuses have already been targeted for closure or a transition from in-person learning — UW-Platteville Richland will be completely […]
“I am continuing to assess the decision-making process that led to this result.”
Kate Morton: NEWS: Universities of Wisconsin President @JayORothman says he is “disappointed” in UW-Milwaukee’s agreement with student protesters related to a pro-Palestinian encampment: “I am continuing to assess the decision-making process that led to this result.”
That extra money will go toward rising health care costs….
Becky Jacobs: When in-state undergraduates start classes this fall, they’ll pay more to attend the Universities of Wisconsin. That extra money will go toward rising health care costs and pay increases for university employees and financial aid for students, among other things. Earlier this month, the UW Board of Regentsapproved a 3.75% tuition rate increase for […]
‘Ideological bias’ training mandate, other provisions were taken out of UW System deal
By Ava Menkes and Liam Beran Republican lawmakers and University of Wisconsin System President Jay Rothman reached an agreement in December to restructure diversity, equity and inclusion positions, but records show other systemwide plans were taken out at the last minute. A Music Hall restoration, a mandate to have UW System employees complete a module to address “ideological […]
External review raises alarms about financial future at multiple UW campuses
Sarah Lehr: A newly released third-party analysis raises concerns about the financial future of multiple state universities. Last year, a forecast from the Universities of Wisconsin projected structural deficits at 10 of Wisconsin’s public universities ranging from millions to tens of millions of dollars. Only three campuses — Madison, LaCrosse and Stout — were projected to generate enough revenue […]
UW system Governance
Kelly Meyerhofer At noon, Rothman and Mnookin videoconferenced with Vos. The deal called for restructuring 43 DEI positions to focus on broader student success efforts. In exchange, lawmakers would approve the pay raises, fund the engineering building and reverse a $32 million budget cut. “Frankly, I think it’s a reasonable compromise deal in both directions – though we […]
Proposed 3.75 percent tuition hike comes after 5 percent raise this year
Corrinne Hess: Wisconsin’s in-state undergraduate students will see a tuition hike of 3.75 percent in the fall, Universities of Wisconsin President Jay Rothman announced Thursday. The proposal will be considered by the Board of Regents April 4. This year tuition increased 5 percent. That was the first increase in 10 years. It came after the state […]
Leaders have put off making tough decisions about their public colleges for decades. The options have only grown more difficult
Erin Gretzinger: Declining enrollments. Changing demographics. Tightening budgets. And, above all, an “evolving student marketplace.” All these elements led Jay O. Rothman, president of the University of Wisconsin system, to announce in October that the system was closing one two-year campus and ending in-person instruction at two others. More closures may be on the horizon, […]
“As the once great University of Wisconsin continues its decline you can no longer blame Assembly Speaker Robin Vos and the Republicans”
Dave Cieslewicz You can blame Gov. Tony Evers and the majority of his appointments to the UW Board of Regents. The grand compromise that Universities of Wisconsin President Jay Rothman negotiated with Vos was a great deal for the UW. Vos has been withholding inflationary pay increases for UW employees, approval of a much needed […]
“I was grading papers for my freedom of speech class when I saw the announcement that the deal had fallen through”
Mike Ford (UW Oshkosh) It is unmooring to read critiques regarding the system’s hostility to freedom of speech and intellectual diversity while teaching a class specifically on freedom of speech and intellectual diversity. Earlier this semester I moderated a panel on freedom of speech and expression on campus with UWO professors, President Rothman, and a […]
It may be too harsh to call it a death spiral, but the University of Wisconsin System is in trouble. Consider what’s happening.
Dave Cieslewicz Rothman could help by taking meaningful actions, not just renaming the Titanic. For example, he could compromise on DEI, a concept that I have problems with myself. Instead of just absorbing the $30 million cut and refusing to touch DEI positions, he could call for a Legislative Audit Bureau study. DEI is a […]
Enrollment fell at eight campuses, while it grew 1.3% in Madison.
Associated Press The largest percentage growth was 3.4% at UW-Whitewater, while the steepest drop was 3.5% at UW-Stout. Rothman said the numbers show a continuing rebound in freshmen students that is a “great sign” because that signals stronger overall enrollment. The estimates are based on first-day registration numbers and projections of other new students. Total […]
DPI ‘equity’ speakers talk revolution; Wisconsin parents just want their kids to be able to read
Patrick Mcilheran: The series of day-long webinars, four per school year, is an initiative of the DPI, the regulator of every Wisconsin school. The agency says it doesn’t necessarily endorse everything said by every one of the academics it invites, but since racial equity is the first quality it mentions in its mission statement, one can see why 2,500 […]
“The number of administrators in UW System increased 47% last year alone, while enrollment declined”
MacIver: While the numbers of administrators increased, instructional faculty and staff have decreased. Years of DEI focus has pushed down enrollment of white students so they are now underrepresented. Unrestricted PR balances are higher than they were when the legislature uncovered the secret slush fund a decade ago. Admissions changes have brought in more underprepared […]
Notes on DIE $pending at the University of Wisconsin
David Blaska: Requiring prospective employees to attest to their DEI faithis a prohibited political test, President Rothman told legislators. “If people think we are imposing litmus tests on them at that stage in the employment process, we are not being inclusive,” he said. “We need to be inclusive.” Doubtless, the UW system boss was responding to Assembly Speaker Robin […]
No more DIE hiring statements in the UW System
Via Wispolitics: Accordingly, I am directing that each of you take action to eliminate the requirement for a mandatory diversity statement as part of any written employment application at your respective university. Please effect this change for all postings on or after June 30, 2023.
Notes on taxpayer funds used for DIE staff
Kelly Meyerhofer: The UW System spends about $13.6 million annually on 185 administrators related to DEI, with most of the positions concentrated at UW-Madison and UW-Milwaukee, according to records first reported on by WisPolitics. The $13.6 million in salaries represents about 0.2% of the UW System’s $6.9 billion annual operating budget. Vos called for eliminating […]
Civics: Rules were bent, GOP voters defected, and real fraud hasn’t turned up.
Wall Street Journal: At his first big political rally of 2022, President Trump was again focused on 2020. “We had a rigged election, and the proof is all over the place,” he said. Mr. Trump was apparently too busy over Christmas to read a 136-page report by a conservative group in Wisconsin, whose review shows […]
“The educators who are intent on adding this symposium of op-eds to the syllabus have every reason to fear their critics.”
Noah Rothman: Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Gordon Wood described the project as “wrong in so many ways.” Lauded chronicler of the Civil War, James McPherson, called the project a “one-sided account” that “left most of the history out.” In these pages, author and University of Oklahoma history professor Wilfred McClay observed that the Project’s claim that America’s capitalistic […]
The Booming Market for Gloom
Noah Rothman: Peruse the media landscape today, and you’re likely to come away thinking that Americans are more or less content with their current circumstances. The press is replete with a new phenomenon: trend pieces that don’t identify trends but rather forecast them, and the future is quite bleak. Thus, these clairvoyant trend pieces speculate, […]
We all agree that inequality is bad. But what kind of equality is good?
Joshua Rothman: Michael and Angela have just turned fifty-five. They know two people who have died in the past few years—one from cancer, another in a car accident. It occurs to them that they should make a plan for their kids. They have some money in the bank. Suppose they were both killed in a […]
Anthony Kronman on the ‘aristocratic ethos’ in higher education
Len Gutkin: Since stepping down from his 10-year tenure as dean of Yale Law School, Anthony T. Kronman has been thinking a lot about the larger purposes of a humanities education. He’s addressed the topic in two books, Education’s End: Why Our Colleges and Universities Have Given Up on the Meaning of Life (Yale, 2007) […]
Why Is Academic Writing So Academic?
Joshua Rothman: A few years ago, when I was a graduate student in English, I presented a paper at my department’s American Literature Colloquium. (A colloquium is a sort of writing workshop for graduate students.) The essay was about Thomas Kuhn, the historian of science. Kuhn had coined the term “paradigm shift,” and I described […]
Want to Spy on Your Children? Call It Monitoring…and Get Their Blessing
Wilson Rothman: Parents, it’s OK—essential, even—to spy on your children’s internet use. Children are getting smartphones, tablets and iPods at earlier ages, but that doesn’t mean they’re laying low in “Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood.” Just peek at your child’s browsing history; sometimes elementary schoolers google like teenagers.
The Next to be Left Behind
Noah Rothman: These days, somewhat paradoxically, Forgotten America is on everyone’s mind. Even before Donald Trump won the presidency by appealing to demographics and themes that effete, urban Americans found gauche, books like J.D. Vance’s Hillbilly Elegy and John Judis’s The Populist Explosion focused elite minds on those left behind in the Great Recession’s “recovery.” […]
How Marcuse made today’s students less tolerant than their parents
April Kelly-Woessner When Samuel Stouffer first wrote on political tolerance during the McCarthy era, he concluded that Americans were generally an intolerant bunch. Yet, finding that younger people were more tolerant than their parents, he also concluded that Americans would become more and more tolerant over time, due to generational replacement and increases in education. […]
A Revolt of the Coddled
Noah Rothman: It has been said that college is where students go to learn how to learn. That is increasingly looking like an assumption based only in faith. The crisis of enforced intellectual homogeneity on America’s college campuses has been an acute one for several years. Despite the public’s growing concern for the integrity of […]
Fixing The PhD
Joshua Rothman: Everyone knows that English departments are in trouble, but you can’t appreciate just how much trouble until you read the new report from the Modern Language Association. (The M.L.A. is the professional association for teachers of literature and language.) The report is about Ph.D. programs, which have been in decline since 2008. These […]
Why Is Academic Writing So Academic?
Joshua Rothman: A few years ago, when I was a graduate student in English, I presented a paper at my department’s American Literature Colloquium. (A colloquium is a sort of writing workshop for graduate students.) The essay was about Thomas Kuhn, the historian of science. Kuhn had coined the term “paradigm shift,” and I described […]
The Academic Writing Thing
When Nicholas Kristof, the soft-hearted liberal on the New York Times op-ed page, decided that political scientists had given up on writing for a broader public, a digital avalanche of blog posts, letters to the editor, and tweets, followed. The APSA, Corey Robin, Claire Potter, and basically the entire editorial collective of Jacobin took the man to task for, basically, channeling the laziest version of Tom Friedman. Why, Kristof seemed to be asking, casually leafing through the past few issues of the New Yorker, can’t more people write like Jill Lepore? This is a fine question, but – as Robin points out – it isn’t the right question at all, and it probably isn’t an honest question, either.
Now, just as Kristof’s more recent and weak apologia has been begrudgingly accepted, here comes Joshua Rothman, writing in the New Yorker itself, and asking, with an eye on the recent contretemps, “Why is Academic Writing so Academic?” Where Kristoff seemed detached, Rothman is engaged, and genuinely interested in trying to understand why the professoriate writes for itself. Our gnomish academic audiences matter more, he sums, because they determine tenure and promotion. “Academic writing and research,” he concludes, “may be knotty and strange, remote and insular, technical and specialized, forbidding and clannish–but that’s because academia has become that way, too. Today’s academic work, excellent though it may be, is the product of a shrinking system. It’s a tightly-packed, super-competitive jungle in there.”
Yes, there is is truth to this. A tight labor market means increased specialization and less risk-taking, leading one to assume that writing a dense essay that is sure to be published in a top journal is a safer bet (for promotion and hiring) than trying to publish in N+1. (Though there are plenty, despite the assumption, who do both). And when we read each other’s work for venues that are chiefly academic, we tend to wonder more about the disciplinary stakes and less about the quality of the prose. Generally, that is.
Why is Academic Writing so Academic?
A few years ago, when I was a graduate student in English, I presented a paper at my department’s American Literature Colloquium. (A colloquium is a sort of writing workshop for graduate students.) The essay was about Thomas Kuhn, the historian of science. Kuhn had coined the term “paradigm shift,” and I described how this phrase had been used and abused, much to Kuhn’s dismay, by postmodern insurrectionists and nonsensical self-help gurus. People seemed to like the essay, but they were also uneasy about it. “I don’t think you’ll be able to publish this in an academic journal,” someone said. He thought it was more like something you’d read in a magazine.
Was that a compliment, a dismissal, or both? It’s hard to say. Academic writing is a fraught and mysterious thing. If you’re an academic in a writerly discipline, such as history, English, philosophy, or political science, the most important part of your work–practically and spiritually–is writing. Many academics think of themselves, correctly, as writers. And yet a successful piece of academic prose is rarely judged so by “ordinary” standards. Ordinary writing–the kind you read for fun–seeks to delight (and, sometimes, to delight and instruct). Academic writing has a more ambiguous mission. It’s supposed to be dry but also clever; faceless but also persuasive; clear but also completist. Its deepest ambiguity has to do with audience. Academic prose is, ideally, impersonal, written by one disinterested mind for other equally disinterested minds. But, because it’s intended for a very small audience of hyper-knowledgable, mutually acquainted specialists, it’s actually among the most personal writing there is. If journalists sound friendly, that’s because they’re writing for strangers. With academics, it’s the reverse.
Are Computers Making Society More Unequal?
Ever since inequality began rising in the U.S., in the nineteen-seventies, people have debated its causes. Some argue that rising inequality is mainly the result of specific policy choices–cuts to education, say, or tax breaks for the wealthy; others argue that it’s an expression of larger, structural forces. For the last few years, Tyler Cowen, an economist at George Mason University and a widely read blogger, has been one of the most important voices on the latter side. In 2011, in an influential book called “The Great Stagnation,” Cowen argued that the American economy had exhausted the “low-hanging fruit”–cheap land, new technology, and high marginal returns on education–that had powered its earlier growth; the real story wasn’t inequality per se, but rather a general and inevitable economic slowdown from which only a few sectors of the economy were exempt. It was not a comforting story.
“Average Is Over,” Cowen’s new book, is a sequel to, and elaboration upon, “The Great Stagnation.” In many ways, it’s even less comforting. It’s not just, Cowen writes, that the old economy, built on factory work and mid-level office jobs, has stagnated. It’s that the nature of work itself is changing, largely because of the increasing power of intelligent machines. Smart software, Cowen argues, is transforming almost everything about work, and ushering in an era of “hyper-meritocracy.” It makes workers redundant, by doing their work for them. It makes work more unforgiving, by tracking our mistakes. And it creates an entirely new class of workers: people who know how to manage and interpret computer systems, and whose work, instead of competing with the software, augments and extends it. Over the next several decades, Cowen predicts, wages for that new class of workers will grow rapidly, while the rest will be left behind. Inequality will be here to stay, and that will affect not only how we work, but where and how we live.
Why aren’t voucher schools subject to open records law?
Last week, Sarah Karon of the American Civil Liberties Union argued in a Cap Times column that voucher schools should be held to the same standard of public scrutiny to which public schools are currently subjected.
She noted that many private schools that participate in the Milwaukee School Choice Program receive the great majority of their money from taxpayer-financed vouchers.
Open records advocates, such as the Wisconsin Newspaper Association and the Wisconsin Freedom of Information Council, agree. If voucher schools are receiving taxpayer dollars, then shouldn’t the fourth estate be allowed to shine a light on them?
“We feel that because there’s a significant amount of money from taxpayers and because there is intense public interest in the metrics (for evaluating schools), they should provide a comparable level of transparency that public schools provide,” says Bill Lueders, president of the WFIC.
Among Republicans, there appears to be a divide over just how much accountability taxpayers can demand from vouchers. Whereas the GOP leadership and Gov. Scott Walker are pushing measures that will subject vouchers to the Common Core academic standards and include voucher student test scores in the statewide Student Information System, conservative stalwart Sen. Glenn Grothman, R-West Bend, one of the loudest advocates of voucher schools, believes those measures pervert the entire idea behind school choice.
Best thing to happen to Wisconsin schools? Repealing of collective bargaining
Wisconsin Senator Glenn Grothman:
The repeal of much of Wisconsin’s collective-bargaining law with regard to many of Wisconsin’s public employees has not been adequately explained. This repeal will do more to improve the quality and lower the cost of Wisconsin government than anything else we’ve done. There are approximately 275,000 government employees in the state of Wisconsin. About 72,000 work for the state, 38,000 for cities and villages, 48,000 for counties, 10,500 (full time equivalent) for technical colleges, and 105,229 for schools. Only half of state employees are unionized, but almost all school employees are.
As you can see, the biggest impact will be on Wisconsin’s schools. Since my office has received the most complaints from school teachers, let’s look at how collective bargaining affects both the cost and quality of our schools.
Under current law, virtually all conditions of employment have to be spelled out in a collectively bargained agreement. Consequently, it is very difficult to remove underperforming school teachers. It may take years of documentation and thousands of dollars in attorney fees to fire a bad teacher. Is it right that two or three classes of second-graders must endure a bad teacher while waiting for documentation to be collected? Just as damaging is the inability to motivate or change the mediocre teacher who isn’t bad enough to fire. Good superintendents are stymied when they try to improve a teacher who is doing just enough to get by.
It’s Time for a National Digital-Library System
William F. Buckley Jr., my political opposite, once denounced the growing popularity of CD-ROM’s in student research. Shouldn’t young people learn from real books?
I disagreed. Why not instead digitize a huge number of books and encourage the spread of book-friendly tablet computers with color screens and multimedia capabilities? (Decades later, we have a version of that in the iPad.) Buckley loved my proposal (“inspiring”) and came out in the 1990s with two syndicated columns backing the vision. As a harpsichord-playing Yalie famous for political and cultural conservatism and cherishing archaic words, Buckley was hardly a populist in most respects. But he fervently agreed with me that a national digital library should be universal and offer popular content–both books and multimedia. The library should serve not just the needs of academics, researchers, and lovers of high culture.
Fat China: How Expanding Waistlines are Changing a Nation
Paul French and Matthew Crabbe:
An analysis of the growing problem of obesity in China and its relationship to the nation’s changing diet, lifestyle trends and healthcare system.
‘When Deng Xiaoping said ‘To get rich is glorious’, he probably didn’t realize that getting wealthy would make many Chinese fat… In an informative and entertaining style, French and Crabbe reveal the dark side of China’s growing middle-class: a fast increase in obesity-related illnesses such as diabetes. A great read on an important topic.’ Andy Rothman, China economist, CLSA Asia-Pacific Markets, Shanghai
‘In this remarkably well researched and thought-provoking book, French and Crabbe expose a darker side of globalisation in China… Western multinationalists have submerged the Chinese consumer in a sea of chocolate and ice cream. The consequences for public health are incalculable.’ –Tim Clissold, China investment specialist and author of ‘Mr China’
‘While some people around the world agonize about the rapid spread of China’s global influence, others within China are more worried about the spread of the country’s waistlines – or at least they should be, according to this fascinating and exhaustively researched study by Paul French and Matthew Crabbe. By turns colourful, witty and alarming, this book provides fascinating insights into China’s fast-changing society.’ –Duncan Hewitt, Shanghai correspondent for ‘Newsweek’ and author of ‘Getting Rich First: Life in a Changing China’
Wisconsin State Senator Seeks to Stop 4K Funding Growth, Including Madison’s Planned Program
A Republican lawmaker wants to kill Madison’s fledgling 4-year-old kindergarten program before it even begins.
Sen. Glenn Grothman, R-West Bend, said Wednesday the state shouldn’t encourage new 4K programs — now in 85 percent of the state’s school districts and with three times as many students as a decade ago — because taxpayers can’t afford them.
“We have a very difficult budget here,” Grothman said in an interview. “Some of it is going to have to be solved by saying some of these massive expansions of government in the last 10 years cannot stand.”
Madison Superintendent Dan Nerad called Grothman’s proposal “very troubling.”
“I don’t know what the 4-year-olds in Madison did to offend the senator,” Nerad said. “There are plenty of studies that have indicated that it’s a good idea to invest as early as possible.”
Last month the Madison School Board approved a $12.2 million 4K program for next fall with registration beginning Feb. 7. Madison’s program is projected to draw $10 million in extra state aid in 2014 when the state’s funding formula accounts for the additional students. Overall this year, school districts are projected to collect $223 million in state aid and property taxes for 4K programs, according to the Legislative Fiscal Bureau.Much more on Madison’s planned 4K program, here.
It appears that redistributed state tax dollars for K-12 are destined to change due to a significant budget deficit, not to mention the significant growth in spending over the past two decades.The recent 9% increase in Madison property taxes is due in part to changes in redistributed state tax funds.
I spoke with a person active in State politics recently about 4K funding. Evidently, some lawmakers view this program as a method to push more tax dollars to the Districts.
Why We Can’t Afford Not to Create a Well-Stocked National Digital Library System
E-book gadgets have finally cracked the mass market here in the United States or at least have come a long way.
Consider a memorable Kindle commercial from Amazon, in which a brunette in a bikini one-ups an oafish man reading off a rival machine. Mr. Beer Belly asks about her e-reader. “It’s a Kindle,” she says by the pool. “$139. I actually paid more for these sunglasses.” Mad Men would be proud. A year or two from now, count on twice as much ballyhoo and on better machines for less than $99.
I myself own both a Kindle 3 and the Brand X iPad and can attest to the improved readability of the latest E Ink from Amazon’s supplier, even indoors, despite lack of built-in illumination. Outside on walks, as with earlier Kindles, I can listen to books from publishing houses savvy enough to allow text to speech. No matter where I am, I can instantly see all occurrences of a character’s name in an engrossing Louis Bayard novel. I can also track down the meanings of archaic words that Bayard’s detective narrator uses in this murder mystery set at West Point and featuring a fictionalized Edgar Allan Poe.
The Online Learning Imperative: A Solution to Three Looming Crises in Education
Governor Bob Wise & Robert Rothman340K PDF:
In his blockbuster best-selling book, writer Malcolm Gladwell identified a phenomenon called ―the tipping point.‖ This point marks the level at which the momentum for change becomes unstoppable and something happens that, in either large or small measure, turns the world on its axis. For those who have been working to improve education, it appears that the tipping point may have finally arrived.
Currently, K-12 education in the United States is dealing with three major crises, each of which on its own is capable of wreaking havoc on schools and communities around the nation, but together are an all-out perfect storm. Simultaneously, the U.S. education system is facing
- global skill demands vs. educational attainment;
- the funding cliff;
- and a looming teacher shortage.
These three factors have brought our education system to a point where the need for change and innovation is no longer something to be researched and discussed. We must do what people have done for centuries and turn crisis into opportunity, somehow making progress in the face of enormous challenges.
Via the Alliance for Excellent Education.
Behind the Classroom Door: A rare glimpse indicates the extent–and persistence–of variation in teacher practice
In recent years, a raft of research has called attention to the importance of effective teaching in influencing student achievement. Yet federal and state accountability policies continue to focus primarily at the school level: using schools as the unit of performance, identifying “failing schools,” and more recently targeting “turnaround schools” for special intervention. One of the best-kept secrets in educational research, it seems, is the fact that differences in the quality of instruction from classroom to classroom within schools are greater than differences in instructional quality between schools. This finding has been documented in a variety of studies, most of which used indirect measures to evaluate instruction (such as relying on teachers’ perceptions or looking at curriculum materials to determine how much time they spent on particular topics). Despite the limitations of these measures, these studies have suggested that there is considerable variation in practice even among teachers in the same building.
Over the past five years, however, researchers led by Brian Rowan, the Burke A. Hinsdale Collegiate Professor in Education at the University of Michigan, have asked teachers in 112 schools to keep detailed logs of their actual practice. The newly released results of the Study of Instructional Improvement (SII) document dramatic differences in the kinds of skills and content taught from classroom to classroom. For instance, the study showed that a fifth-grade teacher might teach reading comprehension anywhere from 52 days a year to as many as 140 days a year. Similarly, first-grade teachers spent as little as 15 percent to as much as 80 percent of their time on word analysis. Thus, the study found, students in some classrooms may spend the majority of their classroom time on relatively low-level content and skills, while their peers in the class next door are spending much more time on higher-level content.Jay Matthews has more.
More on Wisconsin 4 Year Old Kindergarden
On the heels of news that better than two-thirds of the state’s school districts now offer 4-year-old kindergarten, an apparent backlash has turned the tide in several southeastern Wisconsin school districts.
First, there was the Elmbrook School Board narrowly rejecting administrators’ proposal to extend a 4K pilot that’s several years old. Then, on Monday, the Muskego-Norway School Board unanimously shot down a proposal to start junior kindgarten.
Last night, the Plymouth School Board held an hours-long hearing into whether to continue a 4K program that was started just last year. One of the guests was Republican state Sen. Glenn Grothman, a vocal opponent of 4K who has previously compared the publicly funded preschool program to communist schemes.Related – Marc Eisen: Missed Opportunity for 4K and High School Redesign.
Building ‘Smart Education Systems’
Robert Rothman: As the unprecedented push to improve American education enters the midpoint of its third decade, reformers can claim some success. Yet no one would argue that the job is done, particularly in the nation’s cities. Even the most successful urban school districts, the winners of the Broad Prize for Urban Education, would acknowledge […]
Why the GMCC Opposes the Taxpayers Protection Amendment
Greater Madison Chamber of Commerce [pdf] The Greater Madison Chamber of Commerce (GMCC) Board of Directors opposes the Wisconsin Taxpayer Protection Amendment and has urged legislators to vote against SJR 63 and AJR 77. What the Wisconsin Taxpayer Protection Amendment (WTPA) proposes and what the likely outcome will be are two different things. While we […]
Colorado’s TABOR Battle
Jason DeParle: The stricter Colorado cap does three things: it imposes firm spending caps (which grow only to reflect population and inflation), returns any excess revenues to taxpayers and allows only voters, not legislators, to override the caps. Both sides agree that the measure reined in the budget. The growth in per capita spending fell […]
