Why Does the Wisconsin Legislature Under Fund Our Public Schools? And What Can We Do About It?

In recent years, Wisconsin has run a budget surplus in the billions. Pictured here is the penny jar the Joint Finance Committee pulls from to pay for Wisconsin Public Schools.

It's budget season in Wisconsin and it's looking likely that the Wisconsin legislature will continue to drastically under fund our public schools. While Governor Evers has proposed a budget that aligns with his vision for “the year of the kid,” which includes $3.15 billion to support public education as well as other priorities for kids and their families such as increased support for childcare and mental health care, all signs suggest that the Republican-heavy Joint Finance Committee will again scrap his proposal and put forward their own. 

We don’t know what this two-year budget will include, but history suggests that this legislature will once again underfund and undermine public education. Our current formula for school funding lags inflation by $3,380 per student, which is why school referenda have become so common in Wisconsin. In fact, since the last budget was passed, a staggering two-thirds of Wisconsin districts have had to go to referendum to keep the lights on.

So the question is, why?

These elected officials –  most of them Republican – will give you some standard responses. They’ll say that the “market does better” and that more competition – in the form of voucher-supported private schools and charter schools – is a good thing for education. But there’s plenty of data to refute this, with lots of research in particular showing how public schools suffer when public money is diverted to private schools.

They’ll also tell you that this “competition” enhances parents’ rights, giving parents more choice in schools. “Parents’ rights” might sound good at first. But beneath the surface you’ll see that it’s always a select group of parents whose rights or choices are upheld to the exclusion of others. There’s data on this too: school vouchers tend to benefit the wealthy and kids who were already enrolled in private school. And private schools have a pattern of rejecting kids with disabilities. 

So what are the real reasons the legislature refuses to effectively fund public schools? 

It’s public. 

One reason is that it’s public education, meaning that it is designed to serve all kids and families, whether Black, brown, white, rich, middle-class, or poor, as well as everyone else who depends on an educated populace. Public education is one of the last remaining spaces we have that could be considered a “commons,” a shared benefit and a shared responsibility, and as such, it is antithetical to the extreme rightward turn of today’s Republican Party. These politicians see every public service as something to privatize and sell off, a way for someone (maybe even them!) to make money. In the most extreme version of this worldview, everything must make a profit and nothing deserves public investment, not even children. 

Education leads to empathy and critical thinking.

Another reason the current legislature won’t fund public schools is because quality education promotes critical thinking and that’s not something they want everyone to have (i.e., "Education is power"). Importantly, public education also helps inoculate us from the Right’s myths of scary “others,” whether immigrants, Trans folks, socialists, or otherwise. When we know each other, cultivate empathy with one another, and build community, we recognize these lies and know that we are not each other’s enemies. We build the base for a powerful collective to resist and the Right certainly doesn’t want this.    

No one has the courage to flout the party line. 

And then there’s the reason the legislature really won’t talk about: since Tea Party-darling Governor Scott Walker introduced “winner takes all,” scorched-earth politics to the state of Wisconsin, very few Republican legislators have been willing to break with the party line. (And in fact, the few who provided an independent voice have long since left politics). Current legislators actively undermine the schools in their districts, even though their constituents are overwhelmingly in favor of keeping those schools open. Polarization and cowardice are also reasons they undermine public education. 

So, what can we do? It’s true that this pattern of under-funding and attacking public education in Wisconsin has been around a long time, since 2011 at least, and that it will take a committed effort to turn this around, but we are not powerless in this fight and no outcome is a foregone conclusion.

There really has never been a better time to tell the legislature why public education is essential to you, your school, your community, and our state, and to demand full funding. 

Here are some things we can do now:

1. Contact the Joint Finance Committee (JFC) to tell them we need to fund and support public education now. You can submit comments through the month of April to the biennium budget public comment forum or attend one of two remaining listening sessions. (Note: These require a hike, as the JFC seems to avoid south-central Wisconsin for these.)

   
   

2. If you have friends and family in other parts of the state, talk to them about why you support public schools and their full funding. Encourage them to attend the JFC listening sessions or submit public comments. If their representative is a JFC member, a personal email, call, or visit can be even better.

   
   

3. Sign Wisconsin Public Education Network’s petition to close the special education funding gap. Only 29% of public schools’ special education costs are reimbursed currently by the state (though 90% of private schools’ costs are), and this significantly adds to the gap districts face.

   
   

4. Talk with other families, teachers, and staff at your schools about this attack on public education. Recognize the impacts it’s having here and now and build our capacity to fight back for the long run.

Families for Justice is a network of people working to dismantle white supremacy in Dane County and beyond through multi-generational community organizing and direct action. Learn more here.