WMC Senior Policy Director Rachel Ver Velde joined Meg Ellefson on WSAU to discuss WMC’s involvement in education policy and its support of school choice.

“WMC has been hearing from our members more and more that the kids that are graduating from the public K-12 schools are not prepared for the workforce,” Ver Velde shared. “56% of our members said they have workers that are struggling to read and do math. Reading and doing math is essential to almost any job in the state, particularly manufacturers.”

Ver Velde also emphasized that employers should form partnerships with their local schools to expose students to career opportunities and experiences. Students can use these settings to learn both hard skills and soft skills, getting priceless hands-on experience that will translate into any industry.

Choice and charter schools are popular, receiving bipartisan support from a majority of voters in recent polling. Families, communities, and employers see choice and independent charter schools as viable options to better educational outcomes, especially as choice and charter students score higher on standardized tests than their public school counterparts.