Here & Now

On the Issues: Education

Shawn Johnson:

For many families, education is at the top of their priority list: the achievement gap, funding, vouchers, a tuition freeze for higher education. The candidates for governor all have their ideas in what’s best for Wisconsin students and their families. Again, here are the candidates in their own words when asked about the state of Wisconsin education.

Shawn Johnson:

We begin with Governor Scott Walker.

Scott Walker:

We’re able to make historic investments in schools because of our reforms that put our school districts back in charge. Our school board members, you know the people we duly elect to run our schools, they’re back in charge again now again instead of the big government special union– big government special interest out there.

Shawn Johnson:

Here’s the republican challenger Robert Meyer.

Robert Meyer:

If you look at our National Assessment of Education progress scores, our mean average 4th grade African American student score is 1.7 years behind, at 4th grade, behind Alabama and Mississippi. That’s a composite. And then our mean average white student, it’s not just kids living in poverty or it’s not children of color. Our mean average white student score is a year and a half behind New Jersey. Fundamentally, there is a structural problem in education that we’re not addressing.

Shawn Johnson:

On the democratic side, we start with Tony Evers.

Frederica Freyberg:

One of the things you call for is investment in early childhood education. What would that look like?

Tony Evers:

Well, to put it in a nutshell, the worst– the most difficult poverty-ridden part of the state of Wisconsin is in one of our urban areas. There is no high-quality, five-star early childhood programming in that area. We have to start where the need is. I would invest in making sure that every child in that, as a pilot I think we can do this in the next budget, every child that lives in that zip code has a right to five-star early childhood programming. We start to expand that statewide. All data shows that that’s where a change has to happen.

Frederica Freyberg:

What zip code are you talking about? What city, what district?

Tony Evers:

In Milwaukee, 53206 and there are no five-star early childhood programs there.

Shawn Johnson:

Here’s Matt Flynn.

Matt Flynn:

My proposal is not K-12, it’s Pre K- 14. I’ll put more into early education too– early childhood. But for the first two years, there are a lot of kids in this state when they turn 18 think they can’t afford college or trade school. They go off to Duluth, Minneapolis. They go to Chicago. We’re losing a lot of good people.

Shawn Johnson:

Now to Mike McCabe.

Mike McCabe:

We’ve now got a state budget that spends more on prisons than on the entire university system. We are literally as a state, spending more locking people up than we are unlocking human potential. A big driving force behind that is the fact that Wisconsin locks up so many nonviolent offenders. We’ve simply got to stop using prison as a punishment for nonviolent offenses.

Shawn Johnson:

This is Mahlon Mitchell.

Mahlon Mitchell:

I would actually have those 5th graders, 6th graders get off their phones, get off the video games and actually do public service, actually do community service. Meaning that they go back in their communities, they’re going to shovel snow and rake leaves for a senior who shouldn’t be doing it and can’t do it. They’re going to help the veteran who served our country. They’re going to help at the vet hospital. They’re going to help at the local soup kitchen, help at the homeless shelter. And then once they meet a threshold of hours, then they’ll have earned tuition paid for by the state for a four-year program.

Shawn Johnson:

Here’s Josh Pade.

Josh Pade:

Getting our focus back on education. Both K-12, then higher education. Focusing on closing that skills gap. Across the state of Wisconsin, the economy overall across the country is doing well. We just found out it grew about 4.1% in the last quarter, but it’s not translating into wage growth particularly here in Wisconsin. What that means is that we need to get people into those jobs that are paying well. I’m focused on trying to think new– rethinking ways of doing things. New and innovative ways of getting people into those jobs. So that means using technology, partnering with technology companies to understand how one person in one industry could have a set of skills that would be applied to another industry that don’t appear on its face.

Shawn Johnson:

Up next, Kelda Roys.

Kelda Roys:

We should have free tuition for all students going to our two-year colleges, technical colleges. And I think — I’m very supportive of the plan by the chancellor at UW-Madison to make tuition free for students’ whose families earn less than the median income in the state. I think we have to also address the student loan debt crisis because there are now decades of students, nearly a million people in Wisconsin who still have student debt. It’s a massive weight around our economy as well as the individuals.

Shawn Johnson:

Now, Paul Soglin.

Paul Soglin:

From the work we’ve done, from the feedback I’m getting from the people of this state, they recognize and they are prepared to pay higher taxes for better education. And let’s point out that the question of good schools goes beyond the classroom. We were talking here about — well, there was a New York Times article this past week “Is Arena Going to Survive?” What happens when you don’t have a school?

Shawn Johnson:

And Kathleen Vinehout.

Kathleen Vinehout:

We need to change the way we fund schools. We need to get rid of the antiquated notion of funding on property taxes and instead focus on children’s needs and fund based on children’s needs. That includes things like recognizing that poverty has doubled over a ten-year period. Many more students have problems with mental health. They’re facing trauma. All of these factors need to be a part of the way we fund schools.

Frederica Freyberg:

Shawn, once again, we know that Governor Scott Walker is calling himself the education governor for what he calls his historic investments in education. National news stories have picked up on this this week and they have quoted Tony Evers saying in response to that that Governor Walker being the education governor comes close to being a joke.

Shawn Johnson:

If those two are the general election match-up, that could be a back and forth you hear for a few months because Tony Evers has been state superintendent of public instruction ever since Governor Walker has been governor. So he’s been there for those early Walker budgets which were very hard on schools, deep cuts. He’s also been there when Governor Walker’s budget came up to the marker that Tony Evers wanted in terms of funding and had what Tony Evers said at the time was a budget he supported in this last education budget.

Frederica Freyberg:

A budget that some people were calling an election year budget.

Shawn Johnson:

And here we are.

Frederica Freyberg:

That’s right. So midweek, Tony Evers, again, the superintendent of public instruction released his state schools budget. In it among other things, he was calling for $60 million in mental health services. Something that some of the candidates talked about. And $600 million for special education. So again, here we are with the DPI superintendent on one hand doing his job in schools for education and then the governor calling himself the education governor.

Shawn Johnson:

Right, and maybe Tony Evers’ budget, proposed budget, would not be well received by a “Governor Walker” next year but maybe a “Governor Evers” would like it.

Frederica Freyberg:

I’m sure so. The other thing that Governor Walker is calling for is another four years of a tuition freeze, something that’s really popular of course among parents and students. But it puts the squeeze on campuses also working with low enrollments.

Shawn Johnson:

Because this has been a tuition freeze that has gone on four years now and that’s a big source of revenue for the university system. It’s been just a continuation of a trend. They’re not going to find that new revenue if the governor were to get his way.

Frederica Freyberg:

But meanwhile a lot of candidates are calling for free tuition plans or debt relief.

Shawn Johnson:

Yeah, especially when it comes to two-year colleges. It’s something that Kathleen Vinehout has talked about quite a bit. Kelda Roys also talked about it. In fact, during the last democratic gubernatorial debate that was televised, they were all asked whether they supported free tuition for two-year colleges. All but Evers raised their hands. Evers said that he thought the student should have some skin in the game but that has become an issue that kind of has defined where the rest of the field is at when it comes to higher education.