State Budget Impacts Council #1 Members

By Joanne M. Haas
It’s not unusual for Mary Joas to work a 60-hour week as a teacher at the Ethan Allen School for Boys in Wales, because the job is tough and she believes in what she is doing.

“I love it. I wouldn’t trade it for anything else,” said Joas, whose dedication to students and community is the fuel for those extra – and unpaid – 20 hours. “We are interested in making our communities safe.”

But Joas is extremely concerned that budget cuts proposed in Governor McCallum’s state deficit-fighting proposal will make her job even more challenging, result in failures at the state Corrections school, and ultimately harm Wisconsin’s communities.

“Gov. McCallum’s cuts directly and negatively affect our communities ... if we are sending the kids back without the education they need to be literate and without job training.

“They will repeat offenses and come through a revolving door,” she said.

“We don’t deal with kids who steal candy bars,” Joas said. “We deal with kids who have done sexual assaults, murders, rapes and armed robbery. ... They are kids who are impulsive and have no vision of what their future holds when they pull the trigger or do their crime.”

Joas is firm in her belief education is the key to preventing recidivism – or repeat offenses. In the previous state budget, Joas said, Ethan Allen lost 11 to 13 teaching positions. “And we can’t afford to lose any more,” she said.

There also is concern McCallum’s budget cuts to fill the $1.1 billion state deficit may remove the single correctional officer on duty in the school, which is a stand-alone building. As many as 216 students attend 18 classrooms in a single class period.

“Teachers are expected to secure areas and keep individuals safe when all hell breaks out,” she said, adding the job can be dangerous. Many students have special education needs plus anger and anxiety problems. With fewer teachers, each remaining teacher will be responsible for more similarly challenged students. And without the corrections officer, safety becomes as much of a concern as a lack of quality education.

Not everyone makes it as a teacher for the Wisconsin Department of Corrections. “It takes a highly skilled person with human relations skills,” said Joas, a WEAC Council #1 member who taught at the junior high level before joining Corrections.

One of about 45 teachers at the juvenile correctional facility, Joas teaches all subjects. Her students are young men between the ages of 12 and 21. She teaches six class periods per day, and usually has 12 to 15 students per class.

Joas said it is important that all WEAC members stand together to fight budget cuts. She referred to a quote from her Council #1 local president Mary Turnbull:

“The bonds of unionism must cross all borders equally. ... We are the education and information professionals who are trying desperately to improve the statewide community for all persons. Just as we support public school issues, don’t forget we are an extension of the same system.”

Challenges at Challenge Academy

While Joas doesn’t know fellow Council #1 member William McLoughlin, they share a work ethic. When McLoughlin’s not teaching on the state clock, he’s likely teaching on his own clock.
McLoughlin is paid for 40 hours of work as the mathematics instructor at the Wisconsin National Guard Challenge Academy at Fort McCoy. “But I average 60 hours,” he said. Those hours swell to 80 per week when preparing students for testing for the high school equivalency diploma.

“We all know what needs to be done,” McLoughlin said of himself and his three fellow Council #1 teachers who work with the at-risk teenagers enrolled at this military school. “Because we all teach, we all volunteer quite a bit of extra hours.”

The school started in 1998 as a type of last-chance school for Wisconsin’s high school dropouts who genuinely want to get their lives on track. All students attend the school voluntarily.

While the institution is just more than three years old, a visit to the school’s Web site documents a long history of success stories.
That’s because parents, former cadets – which is what students are called at this academy – and other supporters have flooded the bulletin board with messages of strategy and support to reverse McCallum’s pending budget adjustment bill which calls for a $1.28 million cut to the school. (Update: The Legislature's Joint Finance Committee on March 5 restored funding to the Challenge Academy. The issue has moved to the State Assembly.)

Such a cut would result in the academy’s closing since 40% of its funding is from state dollars. The rest of the $2.8 million budget is from federal dollars, and the federal government is grappling with its own budget crisis.

Sharil Meeks, one of the parents who messaged the bulletin board, believes the academy got her son back on track. Her son graduated from the 2nd class in 1999 and is now a member of the 82nd Airborne Division and stationed at Fort Bragg.

“If he had not had the opportunity to attend the Challenge Academy, I truly believe he would be in prison or dead. He is just one of the many success stories of the Academy,” she wrote.

The academy has 94 students, segregated by gender, and McLoughlin sees every student. “I have six classes a day from 14 on the small side to 18 on the large side.”

Michael Moore, executive director of WEAC Council #1 – which has 720 members in various state agencies – said McLoughlin and his colleagues are solid state employees serving a population of young people who truly need that school.

“We have teachers who spent their Saturdays putting drywall in the classroom. And you know they do that kind of stuff without compensation,” he said. “And it is a sad commentary that these small agencies (are the ones) the governor is absolutely targeting.”
If McCallum’s budget goes through, Moore said, “People will lose their jobs.”

Under McCallum’s plan, most of the state agencies are required to take an 8.5% cut, which is on top of a 3% cut in the last budget, he said.

“A lot of the agencies that have gone out and sought federal dollars and sought program revenue are getting hit double hard,” he said, citing in particular the State Historical Society and the Department of Military Affairs which houses the Challenge Academy.

Other budget cuts

The governor’s proposed budget adjustment bill – now being debated in the Legislature – affects many other important state programs and Council #1 members, said Pat Sweeney, an education specialist with the state’s Educational Approval Board.

The budget cuts would cause serious harm to programs in the Department of Public Instruction, the Wisconsin Technical College System, Corrections, the State Historical Society and other state agencies where Council #1 members work.

For example, he said, cuts could threaten the jobs of curriculum specialists at DPI, technical college staff, archivists at the Historical Society, librarians and more.

WEAC President Stan Johnson said WEAC is working hard to protect funding of programs that affect all WEAC members and urged members to get involved by contacting legislators.

“We are not going to let our brothers and sisters in K-12 down. We are not going to let our brothers and sisters in the WTCS down. We are not going to let our brothers and sisters in state agencies down,” he said.

Ethan Allen teachers share ideas with WEAC President Johnson
Resource page on the 2002 state budget crisis

Members may contact their legislators directly through the OnWEAC Cyberlobby in the Members Only section of OnWEAC.

Posted March 8, 2002