State Superintendent of Public Instruction Jill Underly gave her annual “State of Education” address on Thursday afternoon. WMC asked three questions of Underly in relation to her address: what will DPI do with additional taxpayer dollars to improve student outcomes, why did DPI lower academic standards and will the department commit to restoring rigorous and transparent measures of student achievement, and how can taxpayers trust that additional education funding will be used effectively.
After the address, WMC’s Associate VP of Government Relations Rachel Ver Velde joined the Dan O’Donnell show to discuss the actual state of public education in Wisconsin. While Underly requested more funding, Ver Velde pointed to the fact that two-thirds of students in the state are below grade level for math and 70 percent of students are below grade level for reading.
“Even adjusting for inflation, revenue per student has gone up from 2000,” Ver Velde shared. “In 2000, it was $16,000. And now it’s almost $19,000 per year. That’s more than 50 percent higher than the tuition to attend Madison.”
Those numbers are particularly alarming considering there has been a 7 percent decrease in enrollment, Ver Velde argues.
Additionally, Dan and Rachel discuss how DPI has lowered the test standards and used additional funding to increase administrative staff rather than teachers.
