Meet the candidates for state superintendent: Jeff Wright

MILWAUKEE (CBS 58) -- In a little less than one month, voters will decide which candidate advance in the race to become Wisconsin's state superintendent.

The incumbent, Jill Underly, is seeking a second term. She has two challengers, and in the Feb. 18 Spring Primary, the top two vote getters will face off in the April 1 Spring Election.

CBS 58 is profiling each of the three candidates and has requested sit-down interviews with each of them. Kinser, a Milwaukee-based reading consultant, outlined her priority of undoing changes the Department of Public Instruction (DPI) made last year, lowering the benchmarks that determine how students performed on annual exams.

Wright said he would also move to undo the changes made to the state testing scoring scale. If elected, Wright said he'd move to restore the previous benchmarks because that would provide the clearest window into how student performance has rebounded following a dip during the COVID-19 pandemic.

"Just when we get to that finish line, the state Department of Public Instruction changes the finish line," he said. "And so, that happening made it very difficult for schools to assess whether or not they had accounted for learning loss that happened during the pandemic and got students back on track."

The DPI is now facing scrutiny over how the agency has managed its finances. An internal memo sent to staff Friday announced a freeze on almost all hiring and a pause on out-of-state travel.

DPI officials have pointed to a $2.3 million reduction in state funding for the agency's administrative costs while noting the Legislature increased its own administrative funding. Wright said he believed the DPI's fiscal strain was a sign changes are needed at the top of the agency.

"Right now, we have a lot of leadership challenges at the department," he said. "There are hidden fiscal crisis issues at the department. There's a lack of vision for what the department is doing together."

Wright touted his endorsement from the Association of Wisconsin School Administrators. He contrasted that group's backing with conservative support coalescing behind Kinser while the state Democratic Party has endorsed Underly.

The state's largest teachers union, the Wisconsin Education Association Council (WEAC), has not issued an endorsement, although the union's political action committee has recommended the WEAC board back Wright.

"I don't have a political establishment with me, but I have a lot of the state's educators with me," Wright said. "And I hope that your viewers would ask, 'Who's most likely to know what's happening at the Department of Public Instruction' and the direction they want to see schools take."

Relationship with Milwaukee Public Schools

The DPI was in the spotlight last spring for its response to a fiscal crisis within the state's biggest school district. Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS) leaders did not disclose they were several months late on turning required financial date into the DPI.

The money reports it submitted the previous year ended up being inaccurate, leading to an overpayment that was later deducted from this year's MPS share of state funding. The whole episode threatened to delay when other Wisconsin school districts would learn their funding amounts.

Beyond the fiscal problems, MPS has ranked among the poorest-performing big city school districts in the U.S., and it has one of the highest rates of students living in poverty. Wright said he would direct the DPI to be more hands-on with MPS, and he would specifically draw on his past experiences as a school administrator in Chicago to emphasize a shift toward setting short-term goals for the district to pursue.

"Not trying to say, 'Three years from now, here's where we're going to be.' What is the work over the next three to six months, to take the next step in implementing this successfully?" he said. "And after we reach that point, let's evaluate our success, and then let's do that again in the next three months."

Approach to Trump's immigration, DEI orders

Over the next four years, the DPI will navigate federal policies enacted by the Trump administration. Two days into his second term, President Donald Trump has signed a stack of executive orders, including several seeking to hasten the deportation of illegal immigrants and eliminate 'diversity, equity and inclusion' programs in government, commonly known as DEI.

One of Mr. Trump's orders has given immigration officials the green light to search for undocumented people in "sensitive" places, like churches and schools, that former President Joe Biden has put off limits.

When asked what guidance he'd give schools if U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials sought to search their buildings for undocumented kids, Wright referred to the 1982 U.S. Supreme Court decision, Plyler v. Doe, which found public schools cannot deny children on the basis of their parents' immigration status.

"It is our Supreme Court-mandated responsibility to welcome children into our schools, no matter their immigration status," Wright said. "I cannot imagine having somebody having a child taken from their parents while they trusted that child to be in a kindergarten classroom."

Wright added he believed efforts to eliminate DEI initiatives from schools were misguided because those can also include programs aimed at children who learn differently than others because of their backgrounds.

"Regardless of your opinion about diversity, equity and inclusion measures, I think everybody wants for their child to make sure they're growing at least a year in school," he said. "But I think we want that for other people's children, too."

Relationship with the Legislature, implementing new reading law

Wright said he'd also improve the DPI's relationship with the Republican-controlled Legislature. He said he felt particularly qualified to build a rapport with both GOP leaders and Democratic Gov. Tony Evers because of his time spend in Sauk County, a bellwether that has flipped back and forth between Republican and Democratic candidates.

"We have to repair this relationship if we're ever gonna make progress," Wright said. "And I think that this another benefit of leading a district in Wisconsin's most purple county."

Another key task ahead of the DPI is overseeing how schools administer a new state law enforcing how students learn how to read. Act 20 requires schools to use the phonics-based 'science of reading' for kids. Wright said the agency hasn't been moving with enough urgency to get district administrators and principals prepared for the shift.

"The message that we're getting from the Department of Instruction at times is almost as if the implementation of this law is optional, that if you do this, we're not gonna tell," he said. "I think that's an unacceptable message for something that's state law."

DPI officials have said the Legislature has stonewalled their efforts to keep schools on track. They point to the GOP-led Joint Finance Committee's refusal to release nearly $50 million that was bookmarked for implementing the new law. In the meantime, districts that went ahead and adopted newly-approved curricula have had to borrow money as they wait for state aid to be released.

Evers has told reporters he's not endorsing a candidate in the state superintendent race until after the February primary.