- Podcasts
Podcasts - Videos
Videos - Policy Issues
Policy Issues - About
About
Audit Issued Over State Learning Standards
Wisconsin’s legislature is now officially investigating how the state’s learning standards were changed.
The Joint Legislative Audit Committee on Tuesday approved an audit to “investigate the origins and implementation of DPI’s new school testing standards,” which were ordered by state Superintendent Jill Underly last fall.
"No matter how Superintendent Underly or her DPI try to spin it, lowering standards instead of addressing Wisconsin’s literacy crisis is wrong, and parents are entitled to transparency," Sen. Eric Wimberger, R-Oconto, and Rep. Bob Wittke, R-Caledonia, said in a statement.
Underly ordered the standards changed without talking to lawmakers, or oven Gov. Evers first.
She claimed the new standards better reflect what school kids in Wisconsin actually have learned.
Her standards, and the test results they provided, show about half of Wisconsin school kids are reading, writing, and doing math at grade level.
The Nation’s Report Card, which also every other state uses to measure learning, shows just under a third of Wisconsin students are reading, writing, and doing math as they should.
“This audit will help us understand how and why DPI decided to lower its standards, rather than addressing the fact that two-thirds of our students cannot read at grade level,” Wimberger and Wittke added.
Underly was invited to Tuesday’s Audit Committee hearing, but Wimberger and Wittke said she was a no-show.
“Superintendent Underly refused to appear before our committee to defend exactly why she lowered statewide testing standards. Our schools and our children deserve better than testing standards that exist solely to paper over DPI’s failures,” they said.
No one is saying how long the learning standards investigation will take, or what kind of cooperation auditors are expecting from Underly or the DPI.
The Audit Committee also approved an audit to look into how Gov. Evers spent billions of dollars in federal grants. That audit will go back to the COVID-era.
Interested in the content of this Article?
Reach out to the MacIver Institute to aquire more information
