Wisconsin's financial commitment to its public schools is immense. We will spend more than six billion dollars on our K-12 schools this year. The state's share of that amount represents approximately 40 percent of the total state budget.
Despite the increasing flow of dollars to the public school system, there is more and more dissatisfaction with it -- from parents, teachers, students and employers.
A survey by the Governor's Commission for a Quality Workforce found one-fourth of Wisconsin employers reported their employees had severe deficiencies in reading, writing, and math.
Businesses complain that more and more often potential employees, even those with high school diplomas, lack basic skills.
According to a recent USA Today/CNN/Gallup survey, six in ten Americans say academic standards are too low, and youngsters are not expected to learn enough. Eighty-seven percent said students should not be allowed to graduate from high school if they do not pass academic examinations.
If we need further evidence of the problem, take into account what this labor analyst from the Fox Valley hears from employers.
"(They tell me) the basic skills are lacking ... communication skills, the ability to understand complicated instructions, directions and the high-tech work enviroment. Possibly more than anything else graduating students lack basic knowledge in math. For instance, they don't know that .25 is the same as one-fourth. Math is critical in the high-tech work enviroment, and many come out of high school with very poor skills," he said.Many of us have probably seen check-out clerks who cannot make change, receptionists who cannot spell, recent high school graduates who cannot identify well-known historical figures.
This, remember, from high school graduates. People with diplomas. I am appalled...and concerned. If the public school system does not produce educated young people, we are headed for disaster.
Wisconsin high school seniors should have to pass a skill assessment test - a graduation test - in order to receive their diplomas.
The Governor's Task Force on Education and Learning, and the Subcommittee on Standards and Assessment has been working on this problem since January.
Our goal is to recommend a means to establish basic academic standards and an assessment to guarantee graduates have the knowledge and skills necessary to succeed in life after high school.
We must set high expectations of all students. High school diplomas should mean that the student who earns them have basic skills to allow them to succeed in the work place or in post-secondary education.
The standards would also be a guide for students and parents. Families will know what is expected of a high school graduate and be able to measure their children's progress.
And employers and post-secondary institutions would know that graduates who earned a diploma have the basic skills to allow them to succeed.
Mandatory graduation standards would enable us to measure educational quality not just by how much we spend on it, but by the end-product.
The state should develop model standards in core academic subject areas including reading, writing, math, science and social studies.
The model standards and the student assessments that accompany them should be concise and easily understandable by everyone.
The assessments must be knowledge based -- not process oriented. Until we can address the significant concerns over performance assessments we should not emphasize this form of evaluation.
Once the state develops model standards and assessments, individual school districts and their communities should have the option of adopting or adapting the state's models or creating their own, which are at least as rigorous.
Finally, I'd like to emphasize how critical public participation is in setting up these standards locally. We know from past experience that there is a direct link between the amount of community support a project garners and its success.
Recommendations on standards and assessments are scheduled to be released by the task force later this fall. In addition to this work, the Department of Public Instruction has drafted model standards, which it will also present to the public soon. This is the time to get involved. Your voices as parents and employers must be heard by the DPI throughout this development process.
Attend the public hearings, write letters to the editor, submit written comments to DPI or your local school board.
Business leaders need to speak openly about the gap between what the schools are producing and what their firms need. Parents must provide their perspectives on what should be expected from their children, and what they feel their children should know when they finish high school.
We must trust the ability of local communities to provide the best education possible for their children, instead of simply rubber stamping the ideas from the bureaucracy in Madison.