Did Underly Juice Test Scores for Reelection?

Two years ago only 39% of Wisconsin elementary school students were proficient in English. Last year 51% achieved that goal. Was that the result of revolutionary new approaches to teaching? Maybe a bounce back from the pandemic?

Nope. The Department of Public Instruction simply lowered the scores necessary to be deemed proficient. It would be great if we could all do that when we fall short of our goals — simply move the goal posts closer and declare victory.

This scam raises more questions about what goes on at DPI and makes me even more eager to replace Superintendent Jill Underly with someone who will shake things up over there. In fact, it’s not unreasonable to suggest that DPI made this change to juice the test scores before Underly’s reelection next April.

But aside from that, the scores provide still more evidence of the failures of the Madison school district. MMSD scored below the statewide averages for English and math overall.

And the racial achievement gap in Madison was far worse than the rest of the state. Statewide the gaps were 43% for English and 50% for math. About 60% of white students were proficient in English compared to 17% of Black students. About 64% of white students were proficient or better in math while only 14% of Black students achieved that level.

But in Madison the gaps were 60% for English and 62% for math because the achievement levels were higher for white students than the state average and lower for Black students. About 74% of white students in MMSD were proficient in English compared to only 14% of Black students. Nearly 72% of white MMSD students scored proficient or better in math while only 10% of Black students were proficient.

And this despite the fact that for over a decade MMSD has been obsessed with the racial achievement gap. And now the district wants Madison taxpayers to pour in another $607 million in two referendums on the November ballot. They want to exceed state taxing limits by that much while they promise no changes in performance.

School board member Ali Muldrow spoke for the board when she claimed that the reason for Black underachievement was the district’s suspension policy. It’s true that far more Black students get suspended than white students, But Muldrow’s been on the board for six years and her views are echoed by the other board members. If she doesn’t like the suspension policy why didn’t she change it?

And, in fact, that policy is, if anything too lenient. The board’s notorious Behavior Education Plan was specifically designed to end an alleged “school to prison” pipeline. That questionable policy has been taken so far that when Madison police showed up at a high school to arrest a student carrying a gun the school’s security guard and some teachers taunted the cops. The guard cried out to the principal, “We’re supposed to be protecting these kids.” He didn’t mean the kids who might have been victims of a shooter.

Moreover, if a kid has been disruptive enough to earn a suspension under the BEP what are the chances that he’d be doing any listening and learning if he were in school? It’s much more likely that he would be distracting from learning done by his classmates. So, reducing suspensions of disruptive kids would probably only make the test scores even worse.

Taken together these two story lines — DPI lowers standards to show better results and MMSD obsesses over race while seeing its racial achievement gap actually grow — point to big problems in public education in Wisconsin.

Things won’t improve until we get a new direction out of new leaders at DPI and MMSD.

And on a related matter… from today’s Capital Times: “At Sherman Middle School, a new facility expected to cost $108.3 million would add over 44,000 square feet of space. The existing school is currently being used at 45% design capacity, according to the district’s facilities plan.

“University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers predict Sherman Middle will lose 12 students over the next five years. Sherman Middle shares a building with Shabazz City High School, where researchers project enrollment to drop by 15 students over the same period.”