Education groups try to ensure Milwaukee students aren’t left behind

A new effort by the Milwaukee Public Schools Foundation has been launched to address one of the glaring side effects of the coronavirus pandemic: inequity in student access to the internet.

When schools ended in-person classes in March, some districts — especially in suburbs — pivoted quickly to online learning. At MPS, where more than eight in 10 students are low-income, that wasn't possible. The district ultimately had to secure internet access for 9,200 families.

Now the foundation is looking to raise $1 million in the first phase of a campaign it calls #ConnectMilwaukee to help secure internet connectivity for students across the district for more than 12 months. That would match the investment already made by MPS.

Wendell Willis, executive director of the MPS Foundation, said the hope is to see the funds raised within 90 days.

"The sooner we can get it out, they can be prepared," he said.  

Students without reliable internet access risk falling behind in classes that have moved online, potentially widening existing racial and socioeconomic achievement gaps. In Milwaukee, 9.2% of children live in households with no computer, including devices like iPads and smartphones, according to the state Department of Public Instruction.

Additionally, the pandemic has forced entire families to work and learn under one roof, putting more strain on whatever technological resources they may have.

The first phase of #ConnectMilwaukee will focus on the more than 5,000 homeless students that essentially have no internet access. The second phase will consist of working with MPS and individual schools to identify what they need to transition to more online learning — everything from technology to training to support.

While the school year is winding down, summer learning and enrichment courses are gearing up. 

Tina Chang, CEO and chairman of SysLogic and a member of the MPS Foundation board, said there was an urgent need for students to have connectivity as they shelter in place, and there needs to be short term and long term resources for students.

"All great solutions, especially ones that are positioned for good, long-term sustainability, they are not cheap. Technology is not cheap," Chang said. 

She said this campaign is just the beginning to help serve students better and make sure they and their families are comfortable in the "digital transformation" of learning. 

Just as MPS and the MPS Foundation are launching their initiative, City Forward Collective, a Milwaukee-based nonprofit focused on education, was working in the same vein.

The organization, which was created with the merger of PAVE and Schools That Can Milwaukee, has spoken with hundreds of school leaders and teachers to identify their needs in order to provide quality distance learning. 

City Forward Collective established the COVID-19 Support Fund, which has already raised $750,000. It will accept applications for funding during three windows this summer.

"We saw in early, mid-March, when schools had to start making changes to address COVID-19 and keep students safe and learning and keep teachers safe and teaching, that there were some pretty big needs emerging," Isral Debruin, director of strategy and communication of City Forward Collective, said. 

Schools that were trying to move to online learning didn't have computers, internet access, software and learning management in place, Debruin said.

"We listened to experts in education and in public health, and it started to become clear to us that while I think a lot of us very early on had hoped that this closure would just be for a couple of weeks, and then we'd be back in something that looked a little bit like normal," he said. "We started realizing that that's not going to happen for a very, very long time."

Schools can't start soon enough in getting ready to accommodate that new normal, Debruin said. 

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