Scott Girard

Madison

K-12 Education Reporter at The Cap Times

Project Manager @school_percept. Former K-12 education reporter. 2013 @uwmadison graduate. Go Cubs. Bear Down. Come On You Spurs.

Articles

Retired teacher claims Madison school threw away $12K in materials

Dec 12, 2023 | captimes.com | Scott Girard

A retired Madison teacher claims district officials threw away more than $10,000 worth of classroom items she had purchased over her 35-year career and intended to share with her successor. Kathy Viner, who retired from teaching 4-year-old kindergarten at Franklin Elementary School after the 2022-23 school year, filed a notice of claim against the Madison Metropolitan School District in October seeking $11,922 to replace the items she bought with her own money throughout her career.
Madison Civics Club dissolves after 111 years as mission lives on

Dec 9, 2023 | captimes.com | Scott Girard

In 1973, Velma Hamilton asked Barbara Arnold to attend a Madison Civics Club meeting with her. For the next 50 years, Arnold would remain involved with the club “in one way or another,” including a year as its chair in 1992-93. “I’m not alone — there are many, many women who were in the Madison Civics Club for that length of time,” Arnold said.
Madison School Board incumbents will run for reelection

Dec 1, 2023 | captimes.com | Scott Girard

The 2024 Madison School Board election cycle begins today, and both incumbents will run for re-election. Incumbents Maia Pearson and Savion Castro announced their re-election bids in a joint statement Friday morning. Candidates for the board can begin circulating nomination papers and gathering the required signatures on Friday. Those papers, with signatures complete, are due by 5 p.m. on Jan. 2.
Wisconsin teacher pay has lagged inflation for 15 years, report says

Nov 30, 2023 | captimes.com | Scott Girard

Average Wisconsin teacher salaries have failed to keep pace with inflation over the past 15 years, according to a new report. “Wisconsin’s Teacher Pay Predicament,” published today by the nonpartisan Wisconsin Policy Forum, says it’s likely to get more challenging for districts to match the rising cost of living, even as many of the largest school systems gave out record wage increases ahead of the 2023-24 school year.
Madison music nonprofit says school rental fee could force final note

Nov 26, 2023 | captimes.com | Scott Girard

In 2011, Carol Carlson came to an understanding with the principal of Emerson Elementary School: If Carlson and a partner started a music nonprofit for students, they could use the school’s space for free each day. Twelve years later, Music con Brio has seen students who started as first graders move on to college. But the program’s future is in danger, Carlson said, because the district decided that this year, Music con Brio has to pay the district’s facility rental fee for classrooms.
How Madison and suburban schools fared on the new state report card

Nov 14, 2023 | captimes.com | Scott Girard

The Madison Metropolitan School District once again “met expectations” for student learning in 2022-23 and six of its schools received the highest possible rating, according to state report cards released Tuesday. Two MMSD schools failed to meet expectations, the lowest rating. The district’s score of 68.3 was a slight increase over last year’s 67.5, though it remains below the “exceeds expectations” designation MMSD reached in 2020-21.
Wisconsin's school funding system needs revisiting, report says

Nov 13, 2023 | captimes.com | Scott Girard

A new report questions if it’s time to revisit Wisconsin’s school funding formula after three decades of revenue limits. The report, “K-12 On The Ballot: Using Referenda To Fund Public Schools,” is from Forward Analytics, a nonpartisan research division of the Wisconsin Counties Association. It adds to a long list of research showing how school districts’ use of ballot questions to fund operations has risen over the past decade.
Madison schools want to transform food programs

Nov 11, 2023 | captimes.com | Scott Girard

Josh Perkins wants Madison’s school food to be a credit to the city. “This is a city that prioritizes food highly... and I think the food in the district ought to represent that, reflect that in very equal measure,” said Perkins, the district's food and nutrition director. “That’s what I intend to do with transforming the program, but that’s a big change from where we are now.
Madison school bus situation improved this week, district says

Nov 10, 2023 | captimes.com | Scott Girard

More Madison school buses were on time during the first week of new start and dismissal times than earlier in the year, though some remained as much as half an hour late. From Monday through Thursday, 95.7% of buses were on-time, including 94.2% of regular education buses and 97.3% of special education buses, according to data provided by First Student to the Madison Metropolitan School District and shared with the Cap Times.
Children's Dyslexia Center an 'invaluable' resource for families

Nov 5, 2023 | captimes.com | Scott Girard

Joan Ziegler was about an hour into a lesson on dyslexia in her college class when it hit her. “I said, ‘Oh my God, that’s me,’” she recalled. “All these years, I never knew what it was, so that was kind of an eye-opener.”Dyslexia is a learning disability that creates difficulties with language skills, including reading, writing, spelling and pronunciation.