Photo credit: Scott Walker Facebook page
Get this. Republican Gov. Scott Walker, the most anti-education governor in Wisconsin history, actually expects voters in this election year to believe his reelection will usher in an era of “historic investment” in public education. Walker’s entire career as governor had been based on the largest state disinvestment in public education since time began.
Does he seriously expect the entire population to be struck with collective amnesia about his gutting of state spending on education, about his vicious attacks on teachers and about his absurd attempt to remove the century-old Wisconsin Idea from state law that specifically defined the university’s mission as extending “training and public service designed to educate people and improve the human condition” and delve into “the search for truth”?
Walker, a college dropout, wasted no time launching his anti-education agenda the moment he became governor in 2011. He immediately established his national reputation as a budget-slashing conservative with a law destroying union bargaining rights for teachers and other public employees throughout the state. He then continued dismantling institutions of learning with his first budget whacking an unprecedented $1.1 billion from education at every level, including more than $300 million from the University of Wisconsin. Two years later, Walker kicked the university in the teeth again by slashing another $250 million from UW and freezing tuition.
Then, suddenly last year, Walker increased funding for public elementary and secondary schools by $200 per pupil—followed by another $200 per pupil increase this year. Where in the world did that come from? Well, literally, it was originally proposed by Tony Evers, the state superintendent of schools, who is now a strong candidate seeking the Democratic Party’s nomination to oppose Walker in November.
Devastating Budget Cuts
But as Evers points out, state educational funding, adjusted for inflation, is still lower than it was before Walker’s devastating, scorched-earth, anti-education budgets began taking shape eight years ago. “He can pretend all he wants,” Evers said. “He has now funneled all this money into schools, but it is not back where it was. People get it, and they remember.”
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But Walker now recognizes the growing anger and activism from teachers and communities in Wisconsin and many other states run by Republicans around the country. A recent Marquette University law school poll found that 63% of state voters would choose increased spending on public schools over cutting property taxes—up from 46% in 2014. If you think that sounds unlikely, you’re wrong; it’s happened.
Since Walker’s been governor, voters in hundreds of local school districts throughout the state have approved spending in referenda raising billions of dollars in increased property taxes for their schools. Walker and Republican legislators required those referenda in the belief taxpayers would defeat additional school spending. Once again, Republicans find themselves politically on the wrong side of history.
A successful strike by literally impoverished teachers in conservative West Virginia is sparking similar activism among other poorly paid teachers around the country. Teachers—the well-educated professionals we depend upon to impart knowledge to our children and help shape their young lives—shouldn’t have to sell their blood or rely on food banks to survive.
Hatred for Education
Walker’s unhealthy denigration of education as a state priority already has taken a terrible toll on Wisconsin. The latest national embarrassment was a proposal from UW-Stevens Point to drop 13 humanities and social science majors—including English, history, philosophy, political science, geography, sociology, art, American studies and the languages Spanish, French and German. All of which raises the question: How does a university that fails to offer such studies continue to call itself a university?
The Stevens Point administration says it prefers programs with “clear career pathways” that it believes will reverse declining enrollments and begin to chip away at a multimillion-dollar deficit that has resulted from Walker’s catastrophic educational budget cuts. The immediate uproar from students, faculty and alumni has prompted the Stevens Point administration to agree to consider alternative proposals that wouldn’t include eliminating so many entire fields of what most people consider to be an education.
The hostility of Walker and other Republicans toward liberal arts education probably stems from confusion over the word “liberal.” It has nothing to do with indoctrination by subversive, left-wing professors. A liberal arts education originally referred to the subjects of study that were considered essential for a free person. Republicans claim they absolutely adore freedom, although they’re primarily concerned with freedom from taxation and freedom from regulation of corrupt or environmentally destructive business practices.
We need a governor who invests in education at every level: basic education in early childhood; elementary and secondary schools; the state’s technical college system providing vocational training for those “clear career pathways”; and elite university and post-graduate education and research creating high-paying jobs that never existed before.
We need this investment not just when the Republican governor is facing reelection and not just because his Democratic opponent could end up being a highly qualified educator at a time when the most anti-education governor in Wisconsin history has put his state’s entire educational system in jeopardy.
