Fred Clark: All of our schools matter

Making Wisconsin eligible for a slice of $4.35 billion in federal "Race to the Top" funds, Governor Doyle and our Legislature last week passed a package of modest education reforms. This new funding is expected to flow primarily to urban schools facing the greatest achievement challenges, including the Milwaukee Public Schools. I supported this legislation because I believe that everyone in Wisconsin benefits when we can improve the quality of education — and the quality of life — in our largest cities.

As valuable as Race to the Top might be however, I do not believe it is a substitute for the essential reform that remains needed for all our schools. And it remains unclear how much Race to the Top will bring direct benefits to school districts and students throughout rural Wisconsin.

So we have more fundamental work to do.

Our current Wisconsin school funding formula leaves in place a system that caps growth of school spending at levels well below the rate at which the actual cost of education increases. No school district in the state can operate indefinitely under this scenario. And since 2003, when the state stepped back from a commitment to fund two-thirds of school costs, property taxpayers have been increasingly forced to shoulder the burden of supporting our schools.

As school boards across the state make increasingly difficult decisions to cut spending, the effects on our children and their future will become apparent. I believe we must continue to find ways to help schools innovate and improve efficiency. But I strongly believe that we cannot simply run schools like factories: cutting costs and increasing "output." Increasing class sizes, eliminating music, arts, foreign language, and sports programs, and simply replacing teachers with more technology will negatively affect the achievements of students, and will ultimately cost us all far more than we would save.

Former Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice William Bablitch wrote in a 2000 court opinion, "Unquestionably, the cost to fix the system is high. The cost of not fixing it will be much higher. Uneducated citizens will extract extremely high social costs in the future. As the mechanic on television says, You can pay me now or pay me later."

When our economy is in transition and state revenues are down, it can seem counter-intuitive to suggest we should be investing more in our public schools. But we should be, because we cannot afford not to.

We know that a quality education is the engine that drives economic progress because business and industry tell us so. We know the value of a high school diploma is measured in millions of dollars, not just for individual graduates but for our society. We know that employers choose to locate in a community and families choose to live there based largely on the quality of its schools.

The state government will spend $23 billion during the next two years—over 37% of our entire budget—on shared revenue to support Wisconsin’s K-12 schools. Collectively, this is our state’s single biggest expenditure and is one issue we cannot look to the federal government to solve. Education is fundamentally a state responsibility.

We cannot completely rebuild a school funding system overnight, but even in the midst of a difficult economy, we must make forward progress on this issue. The districts I represent —as well as many others around the state — are making choices today that reduce their ability to teach, and that affect our children, our families, and our communities.

I am convinced that school funding reform will only occur as a result of pressure from students, parents, teachers, administrators, business leaders, retirees, volunteers, and everyone who has a stake in stronger schools — in short, all of us. Despite pressure from those of us who represent rural areas of the state, the agenda in Madison is still inclined toward the status quo. Achieving real reform will require a collective effort from entire communities to keep this issue on the front burner.

So please, continue to share your ideas and concerns about our schools with me, so that I and my colleagues can keep fighting in the Capitol to ensure that our children have the resources, the opportunity, and the expectation for a bright future . We have no more important responsibility.

As always, it is an honor to serve as your representative.

Fred Clark of Baraboo is the State Representative for Wisconsin’s 42nd Assembly District. His column appears on the third Thursday of each month in the News Republic. Contact Clark by phone, (608) 266-7746, or e-mail — Rep.clark@legis.wi.gov