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UPDATE: On March 10, 2006, Governor Doyle signed the Milwaukee private school voucher expansion plan into law. The plan passed the State Senate, 19-13, and the Assembly, 60-37. In the Senate debate, Democrats argued the bill would raise taxes in Milwaukee, devastate the public school system for 85,000 Milwaukee students and do too little in demanding accountability for voucher schools. |
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MTEA President Dennis Oulahan, WEAC President Stan Johnson, and Laura Vernon, president of the MTEA educational assistants unit announced Friday (February 17, 2006) that MTEA and WEAC are opposed to the expansion of the Milwaukee private and religious school voucher program to include up to 50% more students.
The bill would add up to 7,500 students to the Milwaukee School Choice program. The experimental program is currently limited to 15,000 students. The expansion of the program would bring its total cost to more than $140 million annually, more than $64 million of which would come from Milwaukee taxpayers.
"WEAC believes every child in Milwaukee deserves a great school, and that includes the children in the voucher program, the children who might enter the voucher program, and the vast majority of children in Milwaukee who choose to attend Milwaukee Public Schools instead of voucher schools," WEAC President Stan Johnson said.
"This proposal will hurt that vast majority by taking money out of their schools and putting it into voucher schools," Johnson said.
"There is virtually no educational accountability for schools participating in the voucher system," Oulahan said. "Expanding vouchers now, when we do not know if they are helping children, does not make sense and is a grave waste of resources at a time when our schools are suffering under severe budget cuts."
MTEA and WEAC leaders would welcome real accountability, but do not believe this agreement provides any.
"They're putting the cart before the horse: They want to expand the program first and say maybe we will know more about whether or not it is working at some point in the future," said Vernon. "To make voucher schools accountable to parents and taxpayers, the schools should be monitored and measured the way all public schools are and required to abide by the same rules and standards that ensure we're properly educating our students. If they don't want to be accountable, then the program should be eliminated," Vernon said.
While the agreement calls for a $25 million additional investment in SAGE - the successful class-size reduction program pioneered in Wisconsin - MTEA and WEAC leaders noted that the funds are not guaranteed. Also, the new funds won't benefit public school children until the 2008-09 school year, while voucher expansion happens immediately this fall.
"We know what works in Wisconsin: great teachers and staff in every classroom, small class sizes, and innovative programs like SAGE," Johnson said.
MTEA leaders point out that Milwaukee's public schools are making progress educating our children. Oulahan pointed to recent testing results that showed 3rd graders made a gain of five percentage points on the Wisconsin Reading Comprehension Test, and 8th and 10th graders also made gains in several subject areas.
"It's not because of competition, but rather the efforts of our students and high quality staff in the schools," Oulahan said. "If we want to make sure all children in Milwaukee are getting a quality education, we need to invest in reforms we already know work, not experimental programs that don't have the ability to serve all children."
Posted February 17, 2006