DPI’s Internal Priorities Favor Radical Philosophies Over Children’s Wellbeing

The Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction (DPI) claims that it does not have the resources to protect children in the public school system from their teachers’ sexual depravity. A Capitol Times’ investigation learned that about there were about 200 cases of sexual misconduct involving public school children and their teachers just over a five-year period.

DPI only has 1.5 full time positions dedicated to conducting investigations.

According to the article, Chris Bucher, DPI’s spokesman, “blamed state lawmakers for underfunding the department rather than pointing to Underly or other agency leaders, who oversee how state funding is used internally.”

What Bucher did not mention is that DPI never requested any funds specifically for its misconduct investigation office. In fact, that office doesn’t even appear in the state budget at all, because it simply falls under general operations. That means it is entirely up to DPI to allocate resources to that office based on the state superintendent’s priorities. Obviously, investigating sexual misconduct among its teachers is low on that list. However, here are some things that DPI has determined are top priorities over the years that MacIver has documented.

Woke Professional Development

Over the years, DPI has contracted with countless consultants and speakers to provide professional development to teachers and other school officials.

DPI brought in Dr. Decoteau Irby in 2018 to give the keynote address at the Annual State Superintendent’s Conference. The basic premise of his speech: if you’re white you lack the “capacity” to understand how racist you truly are.

A couple of years ago, Dr. Bettina Love went even further. Her professional development workshops centered around “white supremacy culture.” She claimed that white people have hijacked every aspect of society and culture to advance their racist ideals. She was joined by three other speakers who all shared the same worldview.

Around that same time, MacIver discovered that DPI was using federal funds meant to support disabled student programming on radical ideological professional development. We highlighted a seminar that addressed “Black Linguistic Justice.”

Special Councils

In 2016, when Tony Evers was the state superintendent, he created the Wisconsin Equity in ESSA (Every Student Succeeds Act) Stakeholder Council. It was a major project with 35 members who met 8 times over just one year. It wasn’t just a one-and-done initiative. In 2017, Evers rebranded it as the Wisconsin State Superintendent’s Equity Stakeholder Council. It remained active through 2021 under his successor, Carolyn Stanford Taylor.