{"id":481,"date":"2023-02-08T14:46:49","date_gmt":"2023-02-08T15:46:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=481"},"modified":"2023-02-21T21:27:52","modified_gmt":"2023-02-21T21:27:52","slug":"what-parents-need-to-save-their-sons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=481","title":{"rendered":"What parents need to save their sons"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>This post originally appeared at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.badgerinstitute.org\/what-parents-need-to-save-their-sons\/\">https:\/\/www.badgerinstitute.org\/what-parents-need-to-save-their-sons\/<\/a><\/p>\n<h5><strong><em>A school that\u2019s making Milwaukee\u2019s future men navigates\u00a0harsh fiscal environment<\/em><\/strong><\/h5>\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"alignright size-large is-resized\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"http:\/\/wifamily.news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/02\/Young-Men-School-Opportunity-1024x663-1.jpg\" alt=\"Teacher teaching students in classroom\" class=\"wp-image-45284\" width=\"340\" height=\"219\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<p>Milwaukeean Scott Stewart sounds urgent when he talks of his son Savion\u2019s school.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThese kids need this. They need this kind of positive environment.\u201d Otherwise, he said, \u201cthere\u2019s no telling what these kids would be doing right now, especially in the city of Milwaukee.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The least Wisconsin can do is listen to what Stewart and other fathers and mothers say they need.<\/p>\n<p>That school, <a href=\"https:\/\/kplhs.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Kingdom Prep Lutheran High School<\/a>, is far different than the Milwaukee Public Schools options near Stewart\u2019s northwest side home, options he once attended. \u201cI didn\u2019t want my kid to get wrapped up in the wrong environment,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI was looking out for my kid.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>What he found for Savion was a school of about 220 boys \u2014 all boys, deliberately \u2014 most of them black, most of them from Milwaukee, though the school is in Wauwatosa.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe push these guys beyond their limits,\u201d said Charles Smith. He teaches literature and, as does everyone in the school, brotherhood. New students earn the right to wear the school uniform through rites of passage, for example. Some are team-building games. Others involve each new boy telling of some difficult circumstance he thought would defeat him. It\u2019s a lesson, said Smith, in how not to be isolated: \u201cIt\u2019s OK to be vulnerable,\u201d to trust God and the brothers among whom he put you.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou should know everybody that you\u2019re around, like everyone here is connected into one big thing,\u201d said Frederick Johnson, a senior.<\/p>\n<p>The biggest thing, in fact: \u201cWe\u2019re preparing young men for the Kingdom of God,\u201d said Smith.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Funding Wisconsin students for lives of purpose\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/wm-h2Mc4Zt4?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<p>\u201cI would love every young man here to know that they are loved, created with a purpose,\u201d said Kevin Festerling, who founded the school five years ago. If \u201cthey allow the same God who created this world and created them to name their identity and their purpose, those young men are going to be successful their entire lives.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>This means lessons in seeing what others need and figuring out how to provide it. Common to all students is the Nehemiah Project, a combination of shop class and discipleship that requires boys to identify someone else\u2019s need, figure out a solution, and learn the skills to provide it.<\/p>\n<p>Johnson made carts to hold the schools computers. Others built a garage for a woman across the street. Festerling tells of one student who wanted to design a bicycle motor because he was frustrated by the 90-minute, three-bus daily journey to school. Three months of effort yielded only failure.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe then pulls me aside and says, \u2018I think we should just bring driver\u2019s ed to our school,\u2019\u201d said Festerling. \u201cAnd then he wings a deal with the local driver\u2019s ed institution. Now we\u2019re on year five.\u201d The young man is graduated and is succeeding in construction. \u201cWithout failure, we hardly know what we\u2019re capable of,\u201d said Festerling.<\/p>\n<p>So the young men learn what they\u2019re capable of through career days and internships at area companies, service projects at nearby schools, retreats at a wilderness camp up north. They opt for long drives or bus rides to reach Kingdom Prep because it\u2019s what the boys need.<\/p>\n<p>Beautifully, Wisconsin enables this by its long-standing school choice program that lets the boys\u2019 parents \u2014 and for more than three-fourths of the boys, that means a mother having to raise a son on her own \u2014 take their state aid to the school they believe their sons need.<\/p>\n<p>If only this were sustainable.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cEvery time I meet a student and I\u2019m recruiting,\u201d said Festerling, \u201cI get this heavy feeling of, \u2018Oh, that\u2019s another $5,000 debt we just went into.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The state provides just over $9,000 per student. \u201cMost good high schools that I study, they\u2019re spending $14,000 to $16,000, minimum,\u201d said Festerling. Statewide, district schools spend about $15,200 a student when you include cheaper K-8 grades. By law, Kingdom Prep parents cannot pay tuition atop the state\u2019s money, so Kingdom Prep must rely on extensive fundraising.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s a barrier to parents and students who are \u201cvoting with their feet and with long bus routes,\u201d said Festerling: \u201cIf every student who was enrolled in our school came with the same amount of money they would get at another district school,\u201d he said, then none would have to be turned away for lack of fundraising capacity. \u201cWe could open up five more of these tomorrow.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>That not only is what parents say their kids need, it\u2019s what Milwaukee needs. In the Milwaukee Public Schools, half the 8<sup>th<\/sup>-graders were <a href=\"https:\/\/www.badgerinstitute.org\/wisconsin-didnt-buck-national-trends\/\">incapable of reading<\/a> last year. One in every four kids fail to graduate from high school. As Stewart put it, children need something better, academically and socially, than \u201cwhen you wake up, somebody across the street from you got killed last night.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s becoming more and more important that we raise up generations of young people who know what\u2019s right and wrong, who know what\u2019s truth and what\u2019s false,\u201d said Festerling.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf we don\u2019t do that, they\u2019re going to go off to these wolves who will eat them alive. And so I\u2019m just so thrilled that school choice is giving guys who have a book called the Bible, that can preach the truth and the gospel, and if parents like that and want that, they\u2019ll subscribe to it and send their kids.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><em>Patrick McIlheran is the Director of Policy at the Badger Institute. Permission to reprint is granted as long as the author and Badger Institute are properly cited<\/em>.<\/p>\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide\" \/>\n<p><em>Right now in Wisconsin, traditional public schools receive an average of approximately $15,000 per student in funding from federal, state and local taxpayers. Independent, public charter schools and private schools\u00a0that are part of one of Wisconsin\u2019s parental choice programs receive thousands of dollars less. The Badger Institute is part of a coalition (other members include\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/schoolchoicewi.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">School Choice Wisconsin<\/a>, the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/will-law.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Wisconsin Institute for Law &amp; Liberty<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.wmc.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Wisconsin Manufacturers &amp; Commerce<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/americansforprosperity.org\/state\/wisconsin\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Americans for Prosperity<\/a>, the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.federationforchildren.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">American Federation for Children<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.k12.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">K12\/Stride<\/a>) advocating for funding parity.<\/em><\/p>\n<div class=\"wp-container-2 wp-block-buttons\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-button\"><a class=\"wp-block-button__link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.badgerinstitute.org\/choice-stories\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Click here for more choice stories<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>The post <a rel=\"nofollow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.badgerinstitute.org\/what-parents-need-to-save-their-sons\/\">What parents need to save their sons<\/a> appeared first on <a rel=\"nofollow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.badgerinstitute.org\">Badger Institute<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This post originally appeared at https:\/\/www.badgerinstitute.org\/what-parents-need-to-save-their-sons\/ A school that\u2019s making Milwaukee\u2019s future men navigates\u00a0harsh fiscal&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":483,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-481","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/481","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\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=481"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/481\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":484,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/481\/revisions\/484"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/483"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=481"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=481"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=481"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}