School Leaders Decry Representation in Madison

Over the past five years, legislators cut the the state aid trickling into Menomonee Falls schools in half. As the spigot of state funding continues to tighten for the next two years, school leaders and parents are feeling the pinch.

A School Board - tasked with balancing a built-in $2 million budget deficit next year  and the year after – collectively asked its legislators for help.

Well, they didn’t get much. The Joint Committee on Finance recently passed a budget that would increase funding to voucher and independent charter schools by approximately $2,370 for each of the 96,000 students enrolled. Public school students, roughly 872,000 of them statewide, would receive a $150 per-student increase.

The budget goes for approvals in the Assembly and Senate in the next two weeks. 

Conservatives Shaking Their Heads? 

“I think it’s a good idea to go meet our legislators face-to-face again. I think it’s hard to dismiss direct discussion,” said School Board member Scott Ternes. “I’m conservative, but some of this is not logical. The math doesn’t make sense. You’ve got to keep pushing. If you’re passive as a parent or taxpayer, it’s time to get involved, listen, see the numbers and start judging the facts.”

School Board member Paul Tadda, who won a board seat after running as a conservative candidate, also questioned local state leaders. Tadda received an endorsement from the Menomonee Falls Taxpayers Association during that April 2012 election. 

“I do support vouchers, and I do think lower income people should be able to choose where they put their children,” Tadda said. “But because of what they did, we are presented with a funding problem. That’s not good local representation.”

The district met with state Sen. Alberta Darling, Rep. Dan Knodl, and Rep. Don Pridemore earlier this year. They plan to meet with Knodl and Darling at 4 p.m. Monday. Darling is the chair of JCF, and already has given her approval to the budget in committee. The board also sent a white paper outlining four major requests to help alleviate the budget squeeze, and outlined the district's financials. 

“Of the four conditions we submitted to our legislators, none have been met. And vouchers have been most extended,” Greco said.

In Menomonee Falls, the per-student revenue increase amounts to $56,000 for next school year. That’s a small drop of funding to fill a $2 million deficit. Now, annual cuts to programming could be the norm in Falls public schools. 

Earlier this week, a committee met to brainstorm innovative ways to save the orchestra program, which is on the chopping block next year.

However, cutting the orchestra program is just $70,000, which again is far from the  $2 million hole the board will have to fill. The committee threw out numerous ideas to creatively keep the program alive. 

Patch attempted to set up interviews with Darling, Knodl, and Pridemore to respond to the criticism coming from the School Board. Pridemore returned a call the same day. Knodl’s office withheld comment until they had time to review the minutes of the meeting and request a document from the JCF. Darling did not arrange a telephone interview.

“I think the School Board is concerned about making the schools look as good as they can. They have to take responsibility for what goes on in the school system,” Pridemore said.  “I met with them and have held listening sessions in Menomonee Falls. I don’t know what else I can do to listen to their concerns. What I can’t to is fulfill all their desires.”

The School District’s Requests

Basically, the school district has four requests for legislators to consider, according to a signed letter that went to all three legislators.

Here are its requests:

1. School leaders would like per-student revenue to increase by the Consumer Price Index. That would amount to roughly $238 per student rather that the $150 currently in the budget.
2. The district would like to waive state mandates from the original 20 program standards. It’s a program created in the 1980s that mandates the start date, and the hours of instruction.
3. Tax money from Menomonee Falls should not go to Milwaukee for voucher schools and independent charter schools. Any mandates waived for charter or voucher schools should also be waived for public schools.
4. A restricted fund should be opened to co-curricular activity, and private funds should be allowed to support local teams.

Pridemore said he would like to make the standards between voucher schools and public schools closer in line. He said he would work during session toward that end. However, he said that parents demand the vouchers program, and a little competition never hurt anyone.

“If Falls schools are worried about losing students to voucher schools I think they should start looking at improving the performance of the school. If they want to compete they should be improving,” Pridemore said. “If they don’t like the public schools, or the curriculum, or that God is taken out of the history books, or they are teaching fuzzy math, parents don’t’ have to send their kids to those schools.” 

School Board member David Noshay said earlier this week there’s a growing disconnect in the perception of voucher schools.

“I have to say, just point blank, incredibly disappointed and disconcerted by the seeming the disconnect between what people think vouchers are going to for education, versus the public school system,” said School Board member David Noshay. “The variations in the mandates and the tracking methodologies are appalling to listen to. It scares the living hell out of me for our kids.”

The growing disconnects between the Falls School Board and Pridemore can best be summed up using business terms. In fact, both Pridemore and School Board member Gina Palazzari used business jargon to elaborate their opposite views on where the state’s education system is headed. 

“Wisconsin was one of the first states to employ the voucher program. We have to look at the enthusiasm that the parents have to put their children in a choice school,” Pridemore said. “Prior to that period, the public schools had a monopoly on education, and with that come stagnancy of performance.”

Palazzari disagreed.

“I think this whole thing what went down in (JCF) was something that was ideologically driven and fiscally irresponsible with the expansion of vouchers statewide,” Palazzari said. “This is part of an agenda nationally, and Wisconsin has been picked as a laboratory for these experiments in school privatization.”