{"id":12754,"date":"2024-09-17T20:46:02","date_gmt":"2024-09-17T20:46:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=12754"},"modified":"2024-09-17T20:57:38","modified_gmt":"2024-09-17T20:57:38","slug":"milwaukee-public-schools-destined-to-fail-if-city-leaders-dont-get-engaged-heres-how","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=12754","title":{"rendered":"Milwaukee Public Schools destined to fail if city leaders don\u2019t get engaged. Here\u2019s how."},"content":{"rendered":"

This post originally appeared at https:\/\/reforminggovernment.org\/milwaukee-public-schools-destined-to-fail-if-city-leaders-dont-get-engaged-heres-how\/<\/a><\/p>\n

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\u201cProgress is incremental. It is something that we all have to show up for, because\u2026if we don\u2019t care about our kids and our public schools, then we are destined to fail.,\u201d said Milwaukee Public School Board Vice President\u00a0Jilly Gokalgandhi<\/a>\u00a0at the\u00a0Rotary Club of Milwaukee.<\/a><\/p>\n

She was right.<\/p>\n

With the start of a new school year for 66,000 students, Milwaukee\u2019s civic, business, and cultural leaders have an opportunity to consider how they have supported MPS since its financial strife in May and how the city can show up going forward. Here are four ways they could change children\u2019s lives by this time next year:<\/p>\n

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  1. Make reading reforms a citywide project. Did you know a Black student in Jackson, Mississippi<\/a>, is likely 3 years ahead in reading of a Black student in Milwaukee? Did you know students with special needs in\u00a0Miami<\/a>\u00a0become better readers than students without special needs in Milwaukee? That\u2019s \u201cthe science of reading<\/a>\u201d\u00a0at work<\/a>, and all of Wisconsin\u00a0starts copying<\/a>\u00a0them this year. But MPS needs reinforcement. Ensure tutors know phonics-centric literacy and aren\u2019t just well-meaning volunteers. Pay Marquette Coach Shaka Smart and his wife, Maya Smart, to issue autographed copies of\u00a0her fantastic book<\/a>\u00a0to every kindergarten parent in the district. Get our Boys & Girls Clubs, Milwaukee Public Libraries, and houses of worship in on the revolution.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    2. Get graduates to and through what\u2019s next. The odds<\/a>\u00a0of an MPS student graduating high school, enrolling at UW-Milwaukee, and getting a diploma are about 12%. It\u2019s not like they\u2019re pursuing alternative careers, either; just 2% of MPS students\u00a0participate<\/a>\u00a0in youth apprenticeships. Supporting organizations like\u00a0All-In Milwaukee<\/a>\u00a0solves the first problem. They build relationships with high school students, provide in-state scholarships to keep them in Wisconsin, and support their needs to ensure they graduate.\u00a0Restoring relationships<\/a>\u00a0with Milwaukee\u2019s manufacturers solves the second. The Cream City is building again, so let\u2019s produce a touch fewer delivery drivers and more tradesmen and tradeswomen.<\/p>\n

    3. Unlock affordable teaching degrees. What if you could help students become teachers for nearly free? And what if no college bothered to do it? That\u2019s exactly what happened with \u201cteacher apprenticeships<\/a>,\u201d a\u00a0bipartisan solution<\/a>\u00a0in 35 other states that gets teachers less college debt, more hands-on experience, and more often from the communities in which they will serve. Not a single Milwaukee-area 2- or 4-year college offers this new program, leading to less selectivity or outright\u00a0teacher shortages<\/a>\u00a0in MPS. If your alma mater is in Milwaukee County, tell them they can get federal dollars to save MPS through teacher apprenticeships.<\/p>\n

    4. Redevelop closed school buildings. Well, we messed up. People fled the city during the pandemic, the rest didn\u2019t have kids, and now smart people are projecting<\/a> a -20% enrollment shockwave will rip our schools apart over the next decade. Names we know and love will shut their doors, and neighborhoods will lose their central hubs. The only thing standing between innocent families and creeping blight is smart development. The city\u2019s planners, transportation experts, and entrepreneurs ought to stop that from happening (as they have elsewhere) with child care, educator housing, or shops.<\/p>\n

    Leaders, if you want families to settle down in Milwaukee, if you want to keep our Fortune 500 companies and sports franchises, if you want to stay more populous than someplace called \u201cColorado Springs,\u201d you need to start hearing our young people shouting for help.<\/p>\n

    Promise them a prosperous Milwaukee with your time, talent, and money, and they will turn tomorrow into the glory days. Show up for MPS.<\/p>\n

    \n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    This post originally appeared at https:\/\/reforminggovernment.org\/milwaukee-public-schools-destined-to-fail-if-city-leaders-dont-get-engaged-heres-how\/ \u201cProgress is incremental. It is something that we all…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":120,"featured_media":12756,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12754","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-institute-for-reforming-government"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12754","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/120"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12754"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12754\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12757,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12754\/revisions\/12757"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/12756"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12754"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12754"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12754"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}