GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) – Three out of four of Green Bay’s traditional middle schools are failing to meet state expectations.
That’s according to the 2021-2022 State Report Cards from the Department of Public Instruction.
The Green Bay Area Public School District had five total schools that did not meet State Report Card Expectations.
Those are:
Howe Elementary
Tank Elementary
Edison Middle
Washington Middle
Franklin Middle
Interim Deputy Superintendent Judy Wiegand attributes this to several reasons.
“The middle years are always a challenging time in growth and development of children, so that’s one piece of it. But also coming out of the pandemic and dealing with the social and emotional issues, as well as skill gaps that are maybe are there yet coming out of the elementary years,” says Wiegand.
Weigand says one large factor could be attendance. The report defines chronic absenteeism as when a student missed more than 10% of days.
The state average chronic absenteeism score is 85.7, but at Washington, the score was 60.7; Franklin’s was 61.5; and Edison was 72. A lower score indicates lower attendance.
“I would certainly say that If you are not in school, obviously, it’s going to be really a struggle to learn, and there’s a variety of different reasons why students aren’t in school,” says Wiegand.
Parent Jenna Zeise has two kids at Washington Middle School and tells FOX 11 the school itself is not the problem.
“I love all of our teachers, and I think they are really great. It’s also kind of a low income school I would say, so I think that sometimes has a hindering on the grading because there’s just low income kids that don’t go to school.”
She says she believes parents should be more involved at Washington.
“Especially just going to my kids band and choir concerts — you know, there’s 90 kids on the stage, there should be 90 parents in the seats and there aren’t.”
FOX 11 talked to parents picking up their kids at Franklin middle school who would not go on camera but say they were not surprised to hear that Franklin made this list, and they agree that attendance is one of the main problems at the school.
Weigand is hoping to turn this around by connecting counselors, social workers and other staff and comparing themselves to other districts.
Fifteen Green Bay schools exceeded expectations, with McAuliffe Elementary significantly exceeding expectations.
