Madison Metropolitan School District (MMSD) hosted a media event for its superintendent, Dr. Joe Gothard, to answer a litany of questions from local news outlets and provide updates on the district’s direction.
On Feb. 10, news outlets across Madison gathered at the Doyle Administration Building, 545 W. Dayton St., to meet with Dr. Gothard. At the event, he spoke on MMSD’s “Excellence Together” initiative, continued contention with public school fundings, students’ safety, cooperation with ICE, if a similar operation as Minnesota were to happen in Wisconsin, progress on curriculum changes, student achievement, transportation and more.
Excellence Together Initiative
The initiative brings a set of core beliefs across the district. It intends to establish clear and common goals, starting with its youngest students, to ensure their experience throughout MMSD is strong.
Excellence Together helps develop the district’s roadmap through 2031. It started with its referenda projects in 2024, and works to plan for growth with Madison’s expected population growth of 100,000 by 2050.
Issues with public school funding continue
Previously, MMSD asked for a 42% reimbursement for special education from lawmakers, which it did not receive. Instead, Wisconsin is only providing 35% reimbursement. The rate prior to the 35% reimbursement rate approval was 32%. Wisconsin schools hoped for 42% with a rise to 45% the following year.
“To short change us by — WASBO [the Wisconsin Association of School Business Officials] put out a memo last week or the week before — it’s like a $70 million shortfall; 45% is like a $150 million shortfall,” Dr. Gothard said. “So by one word in that law, that’s $250 million less than it should. And it’s things like that that are troubling.”
There have been discussions of a quid-pro-quo possibility for a higher special education reimbursement rate if Gov. Evers is willing to let go of the 400-year line veto that would increase per student funding to $325, Dr. Gothard said.
“It is an agreement for the next 400 years that we will receive $325 per student in additional funding so that per pupil allotment will go up,” Dr. Gothard said. “It represents about 2%, so if you look at the history of the consumer price index on inflation, find me the number of years that have been 2% or less. You will not find very many. “
He stated that the issue with the increase in per student allotment is that it only accounts for costs today. It does not account for the potential future cost of education and the value of that $325.
No ICE in MMSD
Concerns about ICE operations have grown across the country with the events of Minnesota. As the former Superintendent of St. Paul, Dr. Gothard was asked how MMSD would react if an operation of similar scale were launched in Madison.
“I’ll share with you that for over a year, we’ve been meeting weekly as an internal planning team, not ever thinking that it would get to where it is in the Twin Cities, but wanting to be prepared in the event that it does,” Dr. Gothard said.
Plans have been in the works, but MMSD has not released a plan at every turn. However, the district affirms that it firmly differentiates between a judge’s administrative warrant and a criminal warrant.
Federal agents are not allowed inside the school without a criminal warrant signed by a judge; administrative warrants are not sufficient, Dr. Gothard said.
“We will not share student or staff records with ICE or any other federal representatives, except in a rare case… We do not and will not ask our students and families about their immigration status,” he said.
Bus over-capacity issues solved
In late 2024 and into early 2025, parents reached out to Madison365 over a capacity issue with Metro buses leaving their children behind. The district does not use the typical yellow buses for its high school students, rather it partners with Metro Transit to offer bus services instead.
Buses would simply not pick up students on the way to school or back home when they were full.
New bus capacity issues impacted students’ ability to make it to school either on time or after all. How widespread the issue actually was remained unknown to MMSD and Metro Transit. The two worked to figure out a solution with the use of monitors to gauge actual bus capacity — to see if the bus was front-loaded — and have another bus come back through.
The problem has since been solved. Strategies have worked to alleviate the issue,
“We were able to make some adjustments, and since we haven’t heard about it, it sounds like those adjustments are working,” Dr. Gothard said. “Transportation is vitally important. We have a 90% attendance goal that every child is there, and if children aren’t able to get to school every day consistently on time and ready to learn, we know it has adverse effects on the school community and the child.”
Working towards changes in the curriculum
Wisconsin worked towards changing its reading curriculum back to the science of reading after decades of whole-word-based instruction. The former, which was an evidence-based approach using phonics and building reading comprehension, was replaced by whole-word instruction. The latter emphasizes the memorization of word shapes.
Gov. Tony Evers pushed for the change in 2023 with Wisconsin Act 20 in an attempt to improve literacy outcomes in the state. The next couple of years saw schools work towards training teachers to work the new standard curriculum.
“A big piece of it is making sure our core group, and especially our K-2 teachers, are trained in letters so that they can implement with great confidence and fidelity,” Dr. Gothard said. “I think it’s going well. I mean, again, we’ve had stability, so we really have the ability to really look now at data and identify students who might need intervention and support.”
The district also announced earlier this year that it would be working towards changing its math curriculum for K-8. The last time the curriculum was updated was in 2014.
MMSD has identified a vendor — Illustrative Math — and plans to bring the plan to its board in March.
Madison365 asked if there was any focus on improving the curriculum with specific targeting for its Black eighth-graders. Wisconsin ranks as dead last for states in math proficiency for Black eighth graders, and only outranked by the District of Columbia.
There is no plan, but MMSD is aware of the issue. The problem will need to be addressed on an individual school level, Dr. Gothard said.
“What might be a real concern for one school, for groups of students at a school might not be present in another school, and that’s where district support and school-level support,” Dr. Gothard said. “Obviously, we want to support our schools, but we also want to allow our schools to be autonomous and make sure that they’re addressing the needs in front of them every day.”
Concerns for student safety after the recent vehicular death on the South Side
Concerns have gained increased attention for high speeds and student safety. Alexander Rosen, a 17-year-old Madison West High School student, was fatally struck by a vehicle on South Park Street on Feb. 5.
Communities have previously raised issues with high speed in areas frequented by students. On the Northside, community members and parents of Sherman Middle School and Malcolm Shabazz City High School asked MMSD if speeding would be addressed during construction of its new facilities.
The district affirms that it will work with cities to examine how it can help students make it to school safely.
