MPS Board

Milwaukee Public Schools students whose schools shut down due to COVID cases will spend less time in virtual learning, following a school board decision Thursday night.

Milwaukee Public Schools students will have at least one more week of virtual learning due to an “extreme” amount of COVID-19 transmission in the community.

As Milwaukee Public Schools employees navigate a year plagued by staff shortages and COVID quarantines, they’re poised to get a one-time “appreciation” bonus.

The MPS Board is set to vote next week on a spending plan for $504 million in federal stimulus funding. To put that number in context, it’s more than a third of MPS’s annual budget of $1.3 billion.

Aisha Carr and Jilly Gokalgandhi won competitive races in MPS Districts 4 and 5.

In his first months as superintendent of Milwaukee Public Schools, Keith Posley announced an ambitious goal: that MPS math, reading and writing scores would surpass the state average within five years.

The new, union-backed Milwaukee School Board was responsive to employee concerns as it adjusted and approved the district’s $1.2 billion budget for the upcoming school year. In a marathon meeting Thursday night, the board shifted dollars to provide increases for things like mental health staff, restorative practice leaders, and bilingual education.

Milwaukee Public Schools will conduct an internal investigation into its former partnership with a troubled charter school company. The decision comes about a month after federal prosecutors announced bribery charges against former MPS Board President Michael Bonds, who left the board last year. Bonds was accused of accepting at least $6,000 in bribes from Philadelphia-based Universal Companies.

The Milwaukee Public School District is beginning another difficult budget process. New Superintendent Keith Posley is proposing a $1.2 billion spending plan for the 2019-2020 school year. It includes a modest boost in classroom funding, including 62 new teacher positions and 22 educational assistants.

The Milwaukee School Board is about to see a lot of turnover. Five of nine seats are on the ballot in the April 2 election. All the races are contested and only one incumbent is running, which means there will be at least four new faces on the board that governs Wisconsin’s largest school district.