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March 29th 1999
Good evening Mr. Weber,
Thank you for once again requesting more information regarding our Outreach to Teach Project.
We were aware that several students will be transferring from EKW to the Norwalk-Ontario school thanks to school choice laws. The superintendent of Norwalk-Ontario has pointed this out to us.
The school that we will be working on requires less work than did the Wilton Elementary School and we have 107 college students volunteering for our project on April 10 and 11. We are starting to wonder if our volunteers alone will have enough to keep busy with for eight hours. Because of that, we are not accepting any more volunteers from our organization.
The school is sending a message in their newsletter regarding students participating. We do not want to turn away volunteers, and, as I'm sure you can understand, coordinating the 120+ people who will be there now will be a task in and of itself. Therefore, we are no longer soliciting additional help.
We will be putting our agenda online tonight or tomorrow, and if you would like to put a link on your site to ours, that would be wonderful!!!
Thank you once again for your continued support for our project.
Sincerely, Caryn Peters
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Throughout the state and county people are talking about the quality of public education. As future educators, the members of Student WEA have a vested interest in the success of our schools. We realize that Wisconsin's Public School system is among the best in the country, however, we also realize that there are many things that we can do to assist in making them better.
Knowing this, we've decided to help make a difference. We want to stand up to help schools by letting the public know that schools and communities know we care. And we'd like your help too!
On April 10 and 11, 1999, Student WEA members, along with a cadre of others, will come together at the Norwalk-Ontario Elementary & High School (a K-12 building). We will stencil and decorate walls, paint cupboards, help maintain a nature trail and yard work, help to create education materials for the students, and any other tasks the teachers and administrators ask for our help with.
Working with teachers and administrators from the Norwalk-Ontario School District we've begun planning this extensive community volunteer outreach project. Teachers, students and the community are excited about our efforts, and will come forward to help with this magicificant project.
We have set our sights on raising $17,000 to carry out this project. And we believe we can do it. Wisconsin citizens know that our public schools are worth the effort. They know that Wisconsin's Public Schools are working. Student WEA along with its affiliates and friends will show that while our schools are succeeding, there are always ways to help.
I hope that you will join us in our effort. Spread the word... make a donation... volunteer your time. Whatever you can do to help will improve the quality education the Norwalk-Ontario School District provides its students.
You can call Principle, Bill Tourdot, 608-337-4401 for Information
For WEA Students Itinerary go to:
Links at bottom of page and Click on WEA Brookwood
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Some 65-70 people gathered at the Wilton School Gym last nite March 25th to discuss the 3 site configuration, tabled by the EKW School board at their March 22nd meeting. After over two hours of discussion this reporter is still searching to find some thread that I can base a positive report on. As I said in earlier articles, I too hold strong opinions regarding what I feel would be the best way for the district to proceed. See my article "Who's Side are You Promoting? now located on Page 6 of this WEB Site. But one of the purposes of this WEB Site was to create a forum where we could share our thoughts and ideas on how to bring all of us together to rethink how we could make this school district one of the best educational districts in the state and nation.
The following e-mail came early this morning when I made a plea for help at midnite.
TONY KIEL WRITES: After listening and not speaking ( a hard thing for me to do ) I have reached this conclusion. We will have quality education for the Wilton area students. The present school board, the current board candidates, and all the EKW voters want that! The referendum that lost last year to consolidate in Elroy would have done that for around 8.5 mil. Today that referendum would cost considerably more. That referendum would also close schools in two communities. We also would have seen a loss of revenue via school choice. The current referendum will cost 10.5 million plus have additional cost every year thereafter to operate three school locations. By keeping a school in all three communities we would not lose revenue through school choice, maybe even gain.
Both ideas have good education!! We need to vote on the package that will keep
the district together or school choice will solve the detachment issue for all three
communities.
The question is do I now want to pay 2.5 mil difference to keep EKW together or
let school choice eventually close the Wilton school and increase the Brookwood
complex ( N.O.W.) ?
THANKS TONY FOR YOUR INPUT
This is what I like about this WEB Site. When you are wondering where to turn or what to say someone comes to your aid. I think perhaps Tony did add a sense of direction of what was occurring at last nites meeting. Here we had some 70 people who took the time to come to this meeting because they wanted the best for their children. But like Tony said, the one campus or the three site configuration, "Both ideas have good education!!" and I think perhaps therein lies the positive aspect that I was looking for out of the meeting.
Lee Wyttenbach, from Kendall, called the meeting to order shortly after eight o'clock. Asking the question, " Does everyone here know what is going on with our school district?"
There was some response from the audience which led , Mr. Wyttenbach to say, "I will try and explain it the best I can: As most of you know the school board voted about two weeks ago to go to referendum on a 10.5 million dollar project that would include a 7-12 highschool in Kendall and K-6 elementary schools in Elroy & Wilton. The other nite at the March 22 meeting the vote was rescinded so the board could get more information from teachers, superintendents and other builders besides TCI.
So actually the main purpose of this meeting tonite is to lend our support to those three board candidates, Doug Path, Kari Benish and Patrick Dwyer, we have with us tonite a large contingent from Elroy and I regret that it seems that each side wants to beat up on the other side. It is unfortunate that it has to come to this and I think down the road we will come to some compromise but until that happens some people from the other end of this school district will beat upon people on this end of the district and people from this end of the district will beat upon people from the other end of the district.. We need to have people on the board who will support the views of those of us on this end of the district for as we know they are doing the same at the other end of the district.
Mr. Wyttenbach then turned the meeting over to, Donna Welsch, a Wilton resident and wife of Tim Welch one of the present nine member EKW School board. They have two children one which recently graduated from EKW and one still going there. In her own words Donna say, "I came from the Tomah area and must say that the bad feelings in this district has been here over many years. We must learn to understand each other, I know how the people from Elroy must feel when they think that their school is going to be taken away and it is hoped that they understand how we feel when we want to keep schools in our district also. I want everyone to have a chance to have their say, I think we should bring this to referendum if it is going to pass it will if does not it should not have, but the people should have this chance express themselves..
Donna, said that she had strong opinions on detachment, that she did not think it a wise move if the people of the area wanted to keep their school here in Wilton, that actually she did not think there were that many who really wanted to detach and that the talk that people from the other end of the district were saying , "let Wilton detach if they want to" was just that "talk" as they know that they need the tax base from this area in order to keep the whole district operating. She then went on to praise the three candidates present and how she felt they would add much to the board if elected.
Lee then took charge again saying that "Personally at this time I would not support anything that would not support a school in Wilton. I think that again the next proposal from the people in Elroy will be for everything in Elroy. If that is not possible then they might settle for everything in Elroy except K-6 in Kendall, but that the Elroy K-6 would remain in Elroy as their will claim will be they already have the new Elementary school there." He said that he had challenged a party from Wilton the other nite by asking them, "How long do you think people like me or the school board are going to continue to support a school in Wilton if people keep leaving or threatening to leave? Wyttenbach went on to say that we should have a combined group of "Citizens for Education First" and Citizens for Geography First"
(EDITORS INPUT = The more I look at that suggestion the more I think that Lee might have hit on something . As noted in the report below, the "Citizens for Education First" are well organized and have a strong agenda, at present I don't know how well organized the "Citizens for Geography First" or even if there is any interest but if there is it might be that those two groups could get together and work out an acceptable configuration for the whole district. Let all give it some thought.)
Norman Anderson, from Wilton, the next speaker asks, "Does this district want to be united, I think that we can be, there are a lot potential jobs coming into the area, Walmart will soon have a labor force of over 400 new workers, some no doubt will move into the EKW district especially on this end. Wilton has a fire department and ambulance service 2nd to none, best little hardware store in the area, a swimming pool, a very beautiful park In fact it was not too long ago I was talking with a couple who was thinking of moving in this area because they like what I have just described but when they found out that the high school was 16 miles away that sort of changed their minds In my opinion I believe that this is our last "hurrah!" I do support the 3 site referendum now being proposed. If we let this opportunity pass it will not come this way again. I don't know that even if the referendum does pass whether that will unite us but we should give it our best shot." Mr. Wyttenbach, said there are a couple of other proposals out there. One is a brand new 6-12 in Kendall and another proposal would be a brand new 6-12 at the Woolver Site about two miles south of Kendall. I don't know how possible they are but I would support either of them. The present configuration now on the table with an add on Highschool in Kendall but my heart was not in that one. But I have to hand it to Doug McCracken for stepping forward and proposing this present 3 site configuration. For "just doing it" It seems to me that the people on this end want to do something and those on the other end want to stall There is a proposal out that will work. Everyone here remembers the election we defeated that election 3-1 but you will be surpassed to know that the vote tally from the Monroe County line to the west end of the EKW district was 450 votes more than on the other side so mathematically we could win this referendum but we have to unite like we did a year ago."
Three of the candidates, Kari Benish, Pat Dwyer and Doug Path now seeking election to
the school board were introduced and each said a few words but due to my location in the
gym and the acoustics I was unable to get their comments. (See their Updated Profiles on
Page 2)
The meeting was then opened to comments from the floor. This is where I ran into a bit
of difficulty as the questions soon lacked direction to the chair and soon became mostly
personal conversations between members of the audience.
p>
Q. Asked of Donna Welch- How do you feel about the present configuration?
A. Well let me tell you, when I first went to the Elroy (okay I meant Royall) high school
bathrooms a few years ago I was shocked they were atrocious. There was not water to
even wash you hands. Then I went to one of the English class rooms and it was up a
narrow flight of stairs and seemed very small and overcrowded, maybe it was just me as I
have a bit of claustrophobia.
Q. Where is the Levy Referendum and are they going to tie that to the Configuration
referendum so that it helps it pass or fail? It should be on the ballot for the Spring
election.
(This seemed like more of a statement than a question since there were no
takers.)
Dave Armstrong-History Teacher from the Royall Highschool spoke up and said, we held our "Citizens for Education First" meeting the other nite in Elroy we said our piece and I came here to hear the other side because quite honestly I do not think at this time we could get in the same place and hear both sides. I think you will understand better what Mr. Amstrong is coming from by going to the "Citizens for Education First" article that follows this article. (editor)
Q. To Paul Schulz - 8th Grade Teacher at Royall: What does Elroy really want out of this?
A. Mr. Schulz said, "first I want to clarify a point some one made that most people in
Elroy are interested only in Wiltons, tax dollars. Frankly I have never heard anyone say
that.
As for school choice to Brookwood, If those people in Wilton feel that such a decision
will enhance the quality of their lives - God Bless You. I have even heard Elroy people
say they would be willing to send their kids to Grade School in Kendall it would make for
a better district.
But quite frankly though the talk is that they don't know how we
can keep the district going with three schools with the financial situation where it is and the
future looking pretty bleak.
Mr. Schulz went on to say that there is two schools of thought, the Education School and
there is the Geography School.
On the education side, perhaps you have heard of the
13 programs they have at the Hillsboro school that are not offered at Royall. A lot of
people are concerned that if you keep these multiple sites open the money to operate them
has to come from some where and it is going to come out of that education pot.
The geographical concern is that if you shut these small town schools down they will suffer
dramatically because of that. How do you put those two things together. Now I am an
educator so you know what I am going to say, I am not going to take money out of education
to fund buildings if we can find a way to consolidate and free up money
that could be used for Education.
But people living in small towns are more interested in keeping those towns more viable
and that is where part of the problem is.
Kari Benish, "we are losing programs because we are losing students. This year we lost nearly $44,000 on the students that transferred to Bookwood. That amount would have financed one good program in EKW"
There were another fifteen or so minutes on the tape which picked it up better than I was able to hear it, still it was hard for me to follow the conversation determine who said what and beside if you read this far you could probably care less.
Thanks for Hanging in There.
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Last nite, along with over a hundred other interested
people from throughout the district, I attended the "Citizens For
Education First" meeting at the Elroy Legion Hall. A
very interesting program was presented and I will try
and post the details in segments through out this day.
A welcome was extended to all by Chairperson, Karen Sparling, 2nd Grade Teacher at the Elroy Elementary School, followed by an explanation of what were in the information packets left on each 100 or more chairs in the Legion Hall where the meeting was being held. Ms. Sparling then introduced four of the six candidates seeking election on the April 6th School Board. She wanted to make it clear that there were no invitations sent out to the candidates but since these four were here she invited them to say a few words.
Craig Hanson, incumbent candidate said, "I thought I would take a few minutes and tell everybody why I was running for the school board and, to be honest, it is the question I have asked myself many times in fact so many that if I got a dollar for each time it would proabably be enough to cover the cost of the new school. But it is mainly because I am concerned about the education of our children. One of the big issue now is the configuration issue. My opinion on the configuration is that there is no reason to build a new high school at this time.
Next incumbent candidate, Sue Schroeder said, "I don't believe we need a new school, we should be looking at what is the best education for our kids, by working with and listening to the teachers, we do need improvements to our buildings, which we have know for a long time, but I can't support building something new when we have good facilities now.
Louise Jensen, first time candidate, said, " I feel the priority is education not buildings. I support those things that will give the best education for our children. I ask your support.
Kari Benish, first time candidate also: "I am really unprepared, I told my husband when I left the house I was only going there to listen. It was about seven years ago when they were building the primary school that I got involved and since then I have missed very few board meetings. Big reason I decided to run now is that I am very concerned what is happening in the district. We do have some major problems with our building as they are not meeting state government codes. I have to say that I am not in favor of the referendum now being presented. I don't like the fact there are no plans and that the board should be more honest with the people and to come out and tell them what is going on, why they are doing what they are doing and have a reason for it. If we are going to spend 10 million dollars we should be looking at how it is going to be serving us 10 years from now. Thanks for letting me have this opportunity to speak to you."
Ms. Sparling then introduced, Jim Sartori, Mayor of Elroy, saying, "He would bring us some words of Wisdom"
Mr. Sartori, "I don't know whether I have words of Wisdom but I do have some facts to present. The city of Elroy is showing some very significant growth factors, some very good state of the city reports to night. We have a number of new residential building projects going on. This is in anticipation of about 800 new manufacturing jobs coming into the county in the next few years. Many of the people employed in the Elroy community do not live in Elroy because of the housing shortage. We are now working on that and have made significant strides in that area.
We have over 500 high level industrial job workers in Elroy" Mr. Sartori went on to say that there continues to be expansion in the industrial areas. He stated our equalized valuation has increased in the past four years to over 5 million dollars giving us a very significant tax base increase. Major Sartori, projected that within the next five years we will have 200-300 new residents living here. Tourism, is also going to be a growing event for the Elroy Area with the three bike trails all converging at Elroy. Major Sartori finished by saying, "With all these things happening in the Elroy area the future looks very bright indeed and I am proud to be a part of it"
The next speaker was Shirely Preuss, "both I and my husband were born and raised in Elroy and we raised our daughters here and are pleased with the type of education they received. But with cost controls in place and a declining enrollment we have reached a point where we are going to have to do more with less which means we have to spend our money wisely. In my work at WWTC. I learned that many schools have their own Youth Apprenticeship, we share our Youth Apprenticeship with six other schools because we do not have the money for a course of our own that would give students duel credits at state colleges or technical schools. It is things like this we would like to consider doing but we cannot do if we are going to be spending our money on busses. We should also be having Applied Technology courses. Perhaps the first thing we should do is "Just Vote to Consolidate" then let the discussion begin as to where. In fact I think that if they brought back that first referendum and voted only for consolidation or not, without location we might get a different result. We all know that we cannot live in three houses if we can only afford one. Neither can our school. So lets figure out how to make it work so we can bring everyone together on this issue."
The next speaker was, Scott Tuttle graduate of Tomah High, Bachelor of Finance Degree from University of LaCrosse-Master Degree in Finance from Silver Lake College in NE Wisconsin. I owned an investment and advisory office here in Elroy for past two years prior to that I worked with an investment company in Madison.
In my opinion this existing referendum is a bad decision. Why? Three reasons. 1. Lack of concern for Education - 2. Lack of concern for Capital Money and 3. I don't think it has any vision whatsoever. Mr. Tuttle spoke about what he felt were the weak points in the present proposal as far as a three site configuration, the Board of Education had voted to approve a bonding referendum for 10.5 million dollars but left our a few door knob sized details, an architect, contractor and a contract that is going to guarantee the safety of our education for our children for the next 30 to 40 years. His last point STRATEGIC VISION, "It is quite obvious that the first step is to elect appropriate candidates that we feel will move this district toward that vision. Even if those candidates we are now supporting are elected we still do not have the necessary majority to get our proposal on the referendum. What are the alternatives, wait until April of 2,000 to get our majority or ask for a recall. When I was asked to come and talk this evening, I gave it significant thought and concluded that all I could do is simply provide some insight and hope to instill some vision for those who have taken the time to come out and hear my address. I hope it was beneficial and I appreciated the invitation.
The last speaker of the evening was, Dave Armstrong, 9th Grade English Teacher at Royall High. Has been an English teacher and Advisor Coach at Royall for ten years. I am in a fighting mood tonight, not here to fight for Elroy against Kendall or Wilton, not here to fight for or against bldgs, or gymnasiums or buss routes. I am here to fight for the education of my kids who are artist, musicians, actors, computer whizzes, and many other things to numerous to mention
You must understand that when I say my kids I am not just referring to my three children, but approximately 960 children, in other words I feel I am fighting for all the children in our school district. I have an opinion that might well shock many of you and therefore if it is to be quoted that it be quoted in its entirety. The biggest problem to me personally was brought on by Art Keenan, it stems from the fact that in getting to know the philosophy behind his administration I found myself dreaming rather than accepting, dreaming of the way things might be, rather than the way they are. I found myself envisioning programs that could be offered to all. Some of those dreams have been realized, some of them haven't. Those dreams however, my dreams, have temporary been put on hold. I now find myself fighting not to increase programs offered my kids but fighting just to save those we presently provide. While that fight may not encompass the magnitude of my dreams I feel my kids are worthy of such endeavor."
Mr. Armstrong then went on to discuss the postponed referendum proposal, saying, "These are cuts which I feel the present proposal would make to the High School. There is no area proposed for Guidance, Decreased areas for Special Needs Students, there is no specific Science Lab, there are two less English Rooms, space has been reduced for math, foreign language libraries, music etc. I feel concerned about what programs are going to be reduced. to fit into this reduced space.
I cannot envision saving programs where a building project is going to cost more and give you less educational space.
Have there been public meeting regarding this proposed referendum? Have you been told what you are really getting from this proposal.? I will not support any philosophy that states that the buss ride to school takes priority over the education the students get.
Mr. Armstrong then urged the audience to extend their thanks to Mr. Tim McGowen on the fine job he did in his presentation to the School Board Meeting the night before at Wilton - March 22. 1999
See School Board report below
Discussion from Audience
Q. Does the 10.5 million include the land at Kendall?
A. Craig Hanson, that is included in that tabled referendum proposal.
Another speaker said that if that land is coming out of the 10.5 million
building project than the building project itself is no longer 10.5 million
Q. Does 10.5 include furnishings.
A. Some but probably not many again making the proposal underbudget
Q. Budget shows declining enrollment yet with prison in the Mauston
New Lisbon area is that not going to help increase enrollment in the
Years to come.
A. Mayor Sartori, Earlier I did project an increase of 200-300 people
in this school district area which would approximate 40-50 more student
enrollment
Please contact me immeadiatly if there are errors
Phone 608-435-6790 - e-mail solar10a@centuryinter.net
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