Gregg Schneider

State Budget Listening Session

State Education Budget

May 4, 2021

 

 

“For the most part, the joint finance committee’s budget fails to support the students and the residents of the state. The deep cuts the Committee is making to the Governor’s budget recommendations for general school aid, special education aid, bilingual education, and school mental health services will make it harder for students to get the services they need to thrive. The Committee’s budget cuts also make it likely that schools will not have adequate resources to combat the racial disparities in education that harm our students and hold back our state.”

 

“Students across the state deserve access to excellent public education and residents of the state should be able to enjoy the economic benefits generated by a first-class public school system. To make sure the doors of opportunity are open to everyone; Wisconsin needs to make significant investments in our students and our public schools that offset deep cuts made in recent years and proposed for this budget.”

 

As a teacher and administrator with 32 years of experience in Wisconsin, I’ve seen Education in Wisconsin been decimated during the past several years. (2011-2019) Not just economically, but politically, socially, and emotionally. Respect for teachers and education has turned into disrespect and hatred.

 

In Governor Ever’s budget proposal, we finally are seeing a reversal of previous administrations' actions. The state is finally taking responsibility for its share of the cost of educating the youth of Wisconsin.

 

Even though our students come from a wide variety of social-economic communities, they all deserve the same quality education and access to the same opportunities. This Governor’s budget proposal ensures this.

 

The Governor’s budget finally brings the Wisconsin government back into compliance with their promises and its requirement to fund equitable education for all students.

 

I was optimistic about the education portion of the budget until I saw the actions of the Joint Finance Committee’s actions/discussions last Friday. It discussed removing 250-280 items from the budget - - mostly from educational spending. My understanding is that this committee is proposing eliminating a cap on voucher schools, thus essentially funding private and parochial schools at the expense of public schools.

 

Because of these continued cuts on special education funding, the School District of Beloit has to transfer almost 11 million dollars from its General Fund (over 10% of the district's budget) to cover Special Education expenses not covered by current state and federal aid. The property tax covers about 2/3rds of the cost – which is the amount the federal and state governments are supposed to be paying.

 

Imagine what could be done with an additional $6 million in the budget.

 

Project SEARCH would undoubtedly be hurt as well. Project SEARCH works with students with disabilities who traditionally rely on government support to survive, and provides them the skills needed to become competitively employed and be financially independent. Beloit is one of nine school districts in our consortium. Governor Walker was so impressed when he visited our site at Mercy Health that he worked to add more sites to the state.  Yet, every year we worry that we will not have enough students admitted to allow the program to be fiscally feasible. Because the total cost is fixed, if we don’t get enough students, the cost per student becomes too costly for some smaller districts to give their students this great opportunity which they would have if in a larger district. Thus these students could lose an equal opportunity to which they should be entitled.  Project SEARCH graduates go from being government-supported to supporting the government.  This is what we need, isn’t it!  Yet this program and others like it could be jeopardized in the budget hearings!

 

The future of this state and country in a global economy depends on quality education. We must invest in our future by investing in public education today.

 

Educating all youth in the state is expensive, but the cost of not doing so is much more expensive, from higher rates of crime to over-incarceration, from high unemployment to poverty, from low wages to the working poor.  

 

Governor Ever’s budget focuses on the future of this state – our youth. One day they will be leading our governments, running our businesses, providing employment, providing our health care, growing the economy for everyone’s benefit. Who do you want to take care of you and your future?  Someone dedicated, highly trained person with a strong education or someone who is doing the job only because they can’t get a better one?