In this Thanksgiving season many of us are taking time to express thanks in a variety of ways.  Yesterday, WASB Executive Director John Ashley wrote to Gov. Evers to thank him for supporting local school board decision-making during this difficult pandemic.

As we reported in an earlier blog post, Gov. Evers publicly supported school boards during a recent press conference where he was asked about a call by the state’s largest teachers union for the state to mandate uniform “return to school” criteria on all school districts in Wisconsin.  When asked to comment on that request, the governor responded that local school boards, administrators and teachers statewide were “doing their best” and there are places where in-person instruction is “frankly, working well” and that it is “a difficult thing for us to sit here and talk about it being a one (single, uniform) answer to 420-some school districts.”

The WASB appreciates that the governor recognized that school boards and administrators are doing the best job they can as they make difficult decisions that balance the science and their own community’s circumstances. 

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Many school districts across the state are facing teacher and staff supply challenges that have been made worse by the pandemic.  As we reported in an earlier blog post, the WASB–along with other K-12 advocacy groups–has urged legislative leaders to take up and pass a set of statutory changes to address, among other things, teacher licensing flexibility, and potential revenue losses due to fluctuations in September pupil counts.

In response to calls for greater teacher licensure flexibility amid that challenges posed by the pandemic, the DPI has initiated rulemaking changes to Chapter PI 34, the administrative rules chapter relating to teacher licensing.  The department is referring to these changes as “Licensing flexibilities during a pandemic declaration” in its scope statement. (more…)