Republicans leave Wisconsin's Hollowed Out Education Carcass on Roadside.

Scott Walker policy decisions are finally coming home to roost as we predicted. 

Republicans Hate getting a College Education: Republicans are obsessed with defunding state colleges, the supposed hotbed of liberal indoctrination, because every great mind and innovation that made the U.S. the world power it still is today...well, that just wasn't good enough. It's onto job training and tech schools folks.

After 7 years of Scott Walker, the collapse of our state colleges has now begun:

Chancellor Bernie Patterson said UWSP is facing a “perfect storm” caused by declining enrollment, 15 years of state budget cuts, and the state imposed tuition freeze.

University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point students held a sit-in in front of the chancellor's office on to protest the planned elimination of academic majors in the humanities (like) American studies, art, English, French, German, Spanish, philosophy, political science, history, geography, geoscience, music literature and sociology. The cuts come as the school faces a $4.5 million structural deficit.

Colleges turn into Tech Schools: 

UWSP officials are also planning to add or expand majors in 13 mostly technical fields. Andy Felt, a professor of mathematical sciences, said “an entire swath of majors will not be available."  

Democratic Party candidate for governor Mike McCabe said, "To shrink the mission of a university and to say that it really is just about getting people ready for the workplace is a huge mistake, and what's happening at UW-Stevens Point, I think, is like the canary in a coal mine. It's a sign that there's something toxic.”

Message to Betsy DeVos: No, parents aren't "forcing" their kids into college!

Speaking only about the states that refuse to treat our schools with respect, only trying to improve them, Betsy DeVos may be unaware of the school/business relationships developing nationwide to prepare kids for specialized jobs that are currently experiencing shortages. The collaboration is something businesses should have been pushing for decades after they gave up their own apprenticeship programs. They stopped waiting around for the government to come in and spend taxpayer money instead.

  

DeVos, behind the curve, as usual, is now jumping on board. EdWeek: 

DeVos has broadened her message, talking about issues like apprenticeships and alternatives to traditional four-year college.

Brilliant. We’re already doing that and expanding on the idea, try and keep up DeVos.

But worse, DeVos continues to push the idiotic idea that we’re somehow “forcing kids into believing” college is the solution. As a parent, I’m pushing, but I know that the final decision will be up to my own kid, college or tech school, or nothing. We don’t “push” or “force” our kids into…whatever. It’s a myth, a villain DeVos:

"We need to stop forcing kids into believing a traditional four-year degree is the only pathway to success," she said this month at the first meeting of the White House Task Force on Apprenticeship Expansion … help set up some incentives through the pending reauthorization of the Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education Act.

Job training in high school doesn’t, in my opinion, give my kid broader options, later on, to retrain or more easily continue with his education, after 4 years of college. DeVos unconsciously made my case for me:

DeVos told a roomful of CEOs in Washington this month that many students aren't mastering the skills they need to be prepared for the careers of the future. She argued that 65 percent of today's kindergartners will end up in jobs that haven't even been conceived yet. Businesspeople, she said, have told her that students need to be able to think critically, know how to collaborate, communicate clearly, and be creative. "My observation is a lot of students today are not having their needs met to be prepared in those areas," DeVos said

School choice always sounds “empowering,” but really, it just plays to the fears of parents that they’re not doing enough.

And since choice and vouchers have a more spotty record than public schools, is it any wonder states don’t go full choice?

But she said no state has ever gone truly big with choice, offering it to every single student.  "We haven't had a state that tried it with everyone."

The College Envy, Resentment and Anti-Education Agenda.

1. Please, please stop the bullshit!!! Who really says this, and what "establishment?"

“The establishment has created this thing that if you don’t go to college, you’re somehow not equal to someone else who did,” says Frank Antenori, a former GOP Arizona state legislator and 2016 Trump delegate to the Republican National Convention.

No one on, especially on the "liberal left" has ever said that. Another manufactured villain Republicans have created to make their draconian plan look better, and to scare their voters.

2. Please, please stop the bullshit!!! Does this sound anything like college today?

Donald Trump Jr. recently excoriated universities in Texas, for which he was paid $100,000: "Hate speech is anything that says America is a good country. That our founders were great people. That we need borders. Hate speech is anything faithful to the moral teachings of the Bible.”

"(Many universities) take $200,000 of your money; in exchange, we’ll train your children to hate our country. . . . We’ll make them unemployable by teaching them courses in zombie studies, underwater basket weaving and, my personal favorite, tree climbing.”

3. Republicans Hate College: So is it any wonder most Republican voters sneer at being educated:

In July, a Pew Research Center study found that 58 percent of Republicans and GOP-leaning independents believe colleges and universities have a negative effect “on the way things are going in the country,” up from 37 percent two years ago. Democrats...72 percent said they have a positive impact. Other studies show overwhelming numbers of white working-class men do not believe a college degree is worth the cost.

4. Not worth the Cost? Republicans don't believe spending $30 billion a year on Pell grants is worth it since half of these students drop out.

More than 44 million Americans are paying off student loans ... average student loan debt of a 2016 college graduate was $37,000. At $1.4 trillion, U.S. student loan debt is now larger than credit card debt.

Getting back to Frank Antenori, the former GOP Arizona state legislator, he thinks taxpayers "should help pay only for degrees, such as those in engineering, medicine or law, that lead directly to jobs ... 

"...(not a) junky” (degree in) “diversity studies or culture studies. You want to create someone who’s going to be a contributor, not a moocher. Go out and generate revenue; that’s what it’s all about.”

There's a liberal take on college education; Steve Farley, a Democratic state senator who is running for governor who used to spar regularly with Antenori: 

“That is a basic ethical and moral flaw in this whole argument, that everything’s got to have financial payback so we can reduce taxes for the Koch brothers. This whole idea that government should be run more like a business is so profoundly morally flawed. Government should be run like a family. We should not be manufacturing them (students) to be products to be consumed."

Noting the growing amount of money on campuses from conservative donors ... "We choose to give our money away in corporate tax cuts and corporate sales tax loopholes. It’s my crusade to get rid of those loopholes and fund our public education system at every level. The whole liberal bastion idea is just absurd.” 

So while Republicans are creating villains to make their bad policies more acceptable, they're missing out on what's really happening, as businesses step forward to help non-college bound students succeed:

Minnesota StarTribune: Companies invest in high schools across state to boost vocational, engineering, other high-demand work: A looming labor shortage, along with a growing urgency to address Minnesota's unyielding racial achievement gap, is prompting sweeping changes in the way businesses participate in hands-on learning.

The focus is no longer just on students who might be better suited to community college and the trades. Across the state, corporations are donating thousands of dollars as well as their employees’ time to teach students how to do such things as draw architect’s plans, make replacement parts with 3-D printers, write computer code, create marketing campaigns and learn basic nursing skills.

Companies such as Polaris, Medtronic and Ergotron are helping to develop curricula at Wayzata High School and are working side-by-side with juniors and seniors through the school’s Compass program. Students take an online skills assessment and can select one of four career fields — business management and entrepreneurship; arts and global communications; health sciences; and design, engineering and manufacturing technologies. More than just subject matter, the courses promote teamwork, interpersonal communication and other problem-solving skills needed to be successful in the business world.

Republicans haven't progressed any further than the mid 20th century when untrained high school graduates or dropouts could make a decent living and raise a family. Not true anymore. Even some Republicans are pushing early training in high schools and tech colleges, which means, "if you don’t go to college, you’re somehow not equal to someone else who did” is absolute bullshit and they know it. Can't have it both ways.

Note: The flawed Republican plan for public school is getting rid of most everything else for job training. That's not a long-term strategy for students who will end up having 2, 3, or 4 different professions in their lifetime.