MPS OKs budget, will look at new building
Milwaukee School Board members unanimously approved a $1.5 billion budget for the next school year Thursday after making five additions to the budget presented by Milwaukee Public Schools superintendent Keith Posley, including exploring the possibility of a new building.
Posley’s budget, which forecasts drops in enrollment and funding, avoids cutting school staff positions by banking on many positions going unfilled. Hundreds of positions are already vacant.
The budget also gives staff an 8% pay bump, the maximum allowed under state law to match inflation, as districts around the state compete to pay teachers enough to stay.
Amy Mizialko, president of the Milwaukee Teachers Education Association, the union for MPS staff, said not every district is matching inflation, and she pledged that MTEA would be “aggressively pursuing those workers to come work here.”
Largely keeping Posley’s budget intact, school board members approved five amendments Thursday. The district may make further changes after it becomes clear how much funding state lawmakers will provide in the state budget.
‘State-of-the-art’ school building
As proposed by school board members Jilly Gokalgandhi and Megan O’Halloran, and approved by most of the board, MPS will take $500,000 out of a fund for pandemic-related health initiatives and use it to study whether the district should build a new school and whether it should expand certain programs that would attract and keep families.
“Is there potential for a state-of-theart facility we could build in an area where our facilities are so outdated we can’t compel families to stay?” Gokalgandhi said in introducing the idea.
Administrators said the funds, which came from a federal pandemic relief package, had been allocated by the district for personal protective equipment.
The study will explore expanding “high-quality programs,” which Posley said could include Montessori, language immersion, arts, gifted and talented programs, Advanced Placement courses and international baccalaureate programs — current areas where “seats fill up very fast.”
Board members Aisha Carr, Marva Herndon and Darryl Jackson voted against the measure, expressing concern about more pressing needs. Herndon said she was skeptical that MPS would be able to find funding for any new construction that could be proposed by the study.
“Until I see more from our state government, they don’t intend for us to build a new building ever,” Herndon said.
MPS will add two assistants
Jackson, who was elected to the school board this spring, proposed adding two assistants to the MPS Department of Black and Latino Male Achievement, at a cost of about $177,000. The funding will come from anticipated staff vacancies in other areas.
Gokalgandhi, who in 2021 pushed the district to also fund programming for Black and Latinx female and LGBTQIA+ students, this week asked Jackson for one of the program assistants to serve those fledgling programs in the new Department of Gender & Identity Inclusion.
Jackson agreed, and board members supported the addition of the assistants.
More anti-racist training
Board members Carr and Henry Leonard proposed investing $387,000 in anti-racist and anti-bias training for MPS staff over the next three years, using federal pandemic relief funds.
When administrators told the board they couldn’t allocate funds for future years in this budget, Carr agreed to walk back the proposal to $129,000 for just this upcoming school year, while directing administrators to form a task force to plan the training. Board members approved the plan.
Carr suggested the $129,000 would allow for $3,000 worth of training at 43 schools she said had been identified as having disproportionately high rates of suspensions and expulsions of Black students.
At a public hearing on the budget, teachers said more training is needed at all schools.
Riley Jessett, who directs the “genius” science lab at Carson Academy, said that as a white educator, he has benefitted from talking about racism with colleagues as part of an Aspiring Anti-Racist White Educators group and equity coalition in the district. He’d like to see more colleagues engaged in such conversations.
“I’ve become more responsive and less reactive, reevaluated all my classroom practices, and held myself to a higher standard, which has resulted in better outcomes for my students,” Jessett said.
Administrators said the funding and task force would allow for training beyond the district’s current objective, which they are still working on: having all staff attend a one-day “Courageous Conversations about Race” training. They said 10 staff members have been trained as trainers for the program.
Teachers said one day was enough.
“Just imagine the impact that radically transforming our district’s current culture and climate — which some might describe as punitive, retaliatory and toxic — into a culture and climate where people’s whole selves feel safe, respected and affirmed, would have,” said Rae Chappelle, a fifth-grade teacher.
New parent liaison Expand MPS Foundation
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As proposed by O’Halloran and Gokalgandhi and approved by the board, a new employee will be tasked with advocating for students and their families during discipline hearings that could result in suspensions, expulsions or court referrals. The liaison will help families before and during the hearings.
The $98,000 for the position will come from expected vacancies in other positions. The liaison is meant to offer education about the process, emotional support, and referral to services like mentorship, tutoring, substance abuse help and other social services.
The MPS Foundation will gain a staff member, as proposed by board members Leonard and Gokalgandhi and approved by the board. The cost, about $98,000, will come out of the superintendent office’s budget.
Gokalgandhi said the foundation has raised more funds than those of other districts that have more staff. She said the foundation has three staff now and could potentially double revenues by adding another coordinator.