Despite extensive cuts to education, including the elimination of the educational Wisconsin Covenant program, the 2011-13 biennial budget added funding for a reading task force called “Read to Lead.” The Read to Lead task force is budgeted for $1.2 million dollars over the next two fiscal years, with the aim of bolstering the reading skills of third graders.
Reading skills of Wisconsin students could use some bolstering. According to an editorial in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel by a member of the task force, Wisconsin’s rank among states in the share of fourth graders who are able to demonstrate age-appropriate reading ability has dropped from 3rd to 30th over the last decade, and the achievement gap between minority and white populations is larger in Wisconsin than in any other state. You can click on this map to see how Wisconsin compares to other states on other measures of reading skills. The task force will be made up of fourteen individuals, and chaired by Governor Walker. Other members of the taskforce include State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Evers, elected officials, and researchers and teachers throughout the state.
Governor Walker has pointed to a similar program in Florida as a model for Wisconsin’s Read to Lead program. Florida’s initiative included using third-grade reading results as a gateway to fourth-grade, hiring hundreds of reading coaches, developing a comprehensive school rating system, and creating a statewide reading center.
There are plenty of questions remaining regarding the task force. Is it going to be enough? Given the magnitude of the cuts to education, is it realistic to expect this relatively small effort to make a difference? Is a task force really the best way to reverse Wisconsin’s slide in reading skills compared to other states? We look forward to learning the answers to these questions and more.
Allan Goetsch
Tomorrow—Way #14: A One-Year Reprieve for the Transitional Jobs Program
About the series: “31 Ways in 31 Days” is a series of posts to the WCCF blog exploring the recently-passed biennial budget’s impact on children and families in Wisconsin. Each day in July, we are posting a description of one way the budget will affect kids and families, with an eye toward what should be done going forward to help improve outcomes and move us closer to the goal of making Wisconsin a place where every child has the opportunity to grow up, learn, and thrive in a safe, healthy, economically secure home and community.
