Governor Scott Walker continues his war of attrition against public education, especially in Milwaukee. Despite the fact that the public schools of Milwaukee outperform its voucher schools, Walker is cutting the budget of the more effective public schools and increasing funding for the less effective voucher schools.
The following article was written by Molly Beck of the Wisconsin State Journal.
“The state will spend $258 million in the 2016-17 school year on private school vouchers, a new estimate shows.
At the same time, the amount of state aid sent to public schools will be reduced by $83 million to offset the voucher spending, for a net cost to the state of $175 million, according to an analysis drafted by the nonpartisan Legislative Fiscal Bureau in response to a request from Senate Minority Leader Jennifer Shilling, D-La Crosse, who opposes vouchers.
“The amount spent each year on vouchers will have increased by 77 percent next school year over 2011 levels, according to the estimate, as lawmakers have expanded the number of vouchers available to students and where they can be used.
“The amount of money spent has risen from $146 million in the 2011-12 school year to $236 million this school year.
The state spent $5.2 billion on public schools in 424 school districts last school year, according to the LFB, when it spent $213 million on vouchers used in 159 private schools.
“Over the six school years, $1.2 billion will be spent on school vouchers and about $30.6 billion will be sent to public schools during the same time, according to LFB and Department of Public Instruction data.
“The number of students using school vouchers to attend private schools grew from 22,439 during the 2011-12 school year to 29,609 last school year, according to the DPI. At the same time, 870,650 students attended public schools last year — which is about the same number that did in the 2011-12 school year. Enrollment grew to 873,531 in the 2013-14 school year before decreasing last school year.
“Gov. Scott Walker and Republican lawmakers have created new voucher programs in Racine and statewide to join the program in Milwaukee, created in 1990 as the country’s first.
“Milwaukee and Racine school districts have been allowed to raise property taxes to offset their reductions in state aid.
“Starting this school year, each voucher used outside of Milwaukee will be paid for using aid set aside for school districts. The districts won’t be able to raise taxes to make up the money, but will be able to start counting students using vouchers in their enrollment to determine state aid levels and revenue limits.
“Voucher payments are $7,210 for K-8 students $7,856 for high school students.
“Earlier this year, the LFB estimated between $600 and $800 million could be diverted from public schools over the next 10 years.”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
My hope is that Scott Walker is on his way out. His policies have shown not to work to help citizens of his state. I hope that Wisconsin people are finally waking up to the fact that what was promised and what actually happens don’t match.
You get what you vote for and ‘Enough is Enough’. (That’s a saying from Bernie Sanders’.)
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So is this like when a recipe calls for apples and the chef decides to put grapefruit in it. The stupidity of doing just the opposite of what is needed is driving me crazy….and it might be short trip.
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Milwaukee school buildings paid for by the public will be sold off soon, only charter and private schools can bid on them, otherwise developers can jump in. The report in EdWeek says some of the buildings have been vacant for seven years.
Thought experiment: What happens when Wisconsin politicians decide to defund public institutions of higher education, transfer some of those funds to business for their workforce development, including recruiting “talent” from anywhere in the world. Betcha this idea is going to be fostered by the fans of disruptive innovation.
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It’s all insanity for $$$$$ and perks. SIC.
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“Voucher payments are $7,210 for K-8 students $7,856 for high school students.”
I have seen that Milwaukee public schools spend on the average about $14,000 per student. This is near the top spending in public schools in this country. Therefore the student who takes the voucher for $7210 or $7856 and leaves the public school district and goes to a private school is actually saving the district about $6200 to $6800. This is a a plus for the public school district. The school districts do not have to raise taxes, they just do not have to educate the student who took the voucher money and left and they save money to boot. This is just simple math the author of the above and most biased followers of this blog fails to see.
It must also be noted that the Wisconsin state provides only a small fraction of the funding for public education, most of the funding comes from local property tax revenue. Therefore a reduction of state funding is not very important.
And finally they are not selling the public school buildings to charter schools, developers etc. That is is just fear mongering with no basis on facts.
All the rest of the numbers quoted above just adds obfuscation. One needs to analyze the impact of the reduction of state funding without bias. Extreme bias propagated against private schools and those parents who use vouchers is unfair in this blog.
On the other hand when was the last time this blog has promoted a fair discussion?
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“I have seen that Milwaukee public schools spend on the average about $14,000 per student. This is near the top spending in public schools in this country. Therefore the student who takes the voucher for $7210 or $7856 and leaves the public school district and goes to a private school is actually saving the district about $6200 to $6800.”
Raj — Can you think of any reasons why what you wrote might be wrong?
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What are the long term savings? If the voucher schools are performing worse than the public schools, is that truly a “savings”?
In NC, many of the schools accepting vouchers are small Christian schools. I did a quick google search and there found several voucher schools follow Abeka curriculum.
https://www.abeka.com/AbekaDifference.aspx
“A Beka Book science texts teach that modern science is the product of Western man’s return to the Scriptures after the Protestant Reformation, leading to his desire to understand and subdue the earth, which he saw as the orderly, law-abiding creation of the God of the Bible.
The A Beka Book science and health program presents the universe as the direct creation of God and refutes the man-made idea of evolution. Further, the books present God as the Great Designer and Lawgiver, without Whom the evident design and laws of nature would be inexplicable. They give a solid foundation in all areas of science—a foundation firmly anchored to Scriptural truth.”
“Unlike the “modern math” theorists, who believe that mathematics is a creation of man and thus arbitrary and relative, A Beka Book teaches that the laws of mathematics are a creation of God and thus absolute. Man’s task is to search out and make use of the laws of the universe, both scientific and mathematical.”
“We present government as ordained by God for the maintenance of law and order, not as a cure-all for humanity’s problems.”
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Dear Raj,
Most of the people who respond to this blog are teachers, parents or retired teachers or people who know what is happening and support us. Working conditions for teachers has gone down and their salaries are too often not enough to live on. What is your profession when you say, “…when was the last time this blog has promoted a fair discussion?” Indiana is underfunding public schools and actively promotes giving more money to charters and vouchers.
Here is the result:
A quote from the Washington Post states: (Headline: “Indiana has a Problem: Teachers don’t want to work there anymore”).
“Indiana’s got a problem: Teachers increasingly don’t want to work in the state anymore. The problem has become so acute that some school districts have have had a hard time finding enough teachers to cover classes for the new school year — and some lawmakers want a legislative committee to discuss the shortage.
The percentage of all teachers getting a teaching license — including veterans — fell by more than 50 percent from 2009-10 to 2013-14 — and there was an 18.5 percent decline in the number of licenses issued to new teachers during the same period, according to Indiana Department of Education figures.”
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