Oh, boom.
Plus, the fence was fully let it.
Education talk.
Educated educators.
Talking education.
It's Monday home room already.
My goodness, yes, wake up people that alarm is ringing, yes, busted pencils dropped.
You had your notifications on.
What is that dropping on my phone?
It's a busted pencils home room morning, Dr. Johnny Lupinacci, you know, he's got other
responsibilities, but Jacob, producer, me and you, man, you think we can handle home room
without Johnny picking on us?
Tim, I also had other responsibilities, but guess what?
I'm irresponsible.
So here I am.
And I'm ready for another week of educated educators talking education, well, educated
educators talking education.
And hey, first thing though Monday morning, appreciate this, Wisconsin actually last Thursday
or Wednesday, Dr. Jill underly delivered her fifth state of education address to the
entire state of Wisconsin.
Jacob, you happen to be in that state civic media has its roots in Wisconsin, fully Wisconsin,
although now expanding out to truly be a Midwest phenomenon.
But you know, Dr. Jill underly, we've had her on the show before.
So I thought, hey, start off the week, wonder what Dr. underly had to say about the state
of education in Wisconsin and Jacob, it's not Tim's choice, but ask you, what do you
think?
Dr. underly said about the state of education in Wisconsin.
That could go in many different ways too, because I know that some people are mad that
the budget that was passed was not good enough, but I know that other people are saying from
the Democratic Party.
Of course, we're narrowing it down because that's where she comes from.
Other Democrats are saying that we did a good enough job, making the budget as good as
we could get it, given that we couldn't do it on our own, you know, it's a collaborative
effort.
And it was okay.
So I'm actually wondering from you, Tim, I mean, where did she come down?
Was she talking more about the good things that they've been able to do or was she talking
more about the drawbacks where they haven't been able to get what they need?
Yeah.
Or maybe a little bit of both, a little bit of everything.
You know, I mean, she kind of put it out there that, you know, we were thankful for, you
know, the increase in the, and as we had representative crews on here, who would probably
debate the whole idea of an increase in funding for special education.
But, you know, that's their, you know, she did push a little bit on the federal government,
being not a partner in the process of education in the state of Wisconsin.
And you know, people say, well, I mean, the federal government shouldn't be because education
is a state, right?
And I mean, we've had that conversation so many times on busted pencils.
And she though was, I think pointing out and saying, but, you know, there are funds that
come from the federal government that were specifically put forth through the federal
government for some of our most struggling kids, particularly, you know, kids in poverty.
And kids who need a little extra and so that money is not coming forward, you know, she's
pointing, pointing that out, you know, she though would like to, I think kind of though
really, you know, she's a champion for public schools.
But the state of education, Jacob, I would say this though too, I don't know that civic
media listeners Wisconsinites needed to listen to that to get a sense of what they think
and feel the state of education in Wisconsin is.
It has been, you know, pretty in nonstop of has been defended since 2010, you know, and
it continues.
And so it makes it hard to do.
She's a champion of public schools, appreciate that in her message, that, you know, and encourage
everybody.
Find it on YouTube.
You can see it.
You can see what she actually said.
But when it comes to the state of education, you know, politicians have to point that out.
And what, what I, you know, of course, guess what, Jacob, she got criticized by people
who disagree with her because she was asking for money that according to the people who
disagree with her has already come forward and has been so poorly spent and that we have
incredible achievement problems.
And it's interesting because though Dr. Underlead pointed out that actually the achievement
gap in Wisconsin is striking.
So I'm not exactly sure where she was trying to say that there wasn't an academic issue.
Maybe it was though that she pointed out that the achievement gap, particularly with black
and brown students, continues to be a serious problem in Wisconsin.
And I think in her remarks, potentially, whether she said, you know, people heard her pointing
that out is saying, this is my, my kind of understanding of the rebuttling feedback.
She's just asking for more money again to throw at education.
And I think by pointing out the achievement gap is just a stark reality that we need
to continue to hear and start recognizing what it is that actually is causing that achievement
gap.
And people say you can't throw money at that.
I will be the first to agree.
You cannot throw money at the achievement gap by buying curriculum, by buying tests,
by doing those things that continue to point out the achievement gap.
Paying for new scales and expecting to get a different weight because no, no, no, no, no.
You want to change that?
We need to quote, invest in our communities and socioeconomics, sorry, but when we put
money towards programs such that provide food, provide medical care, provide housing
and shelter, achievement gaps go away.
So I, you know, outside of the bounds of Joe, Joe, under Lee and more kind of hearing
what Tim thinks there, Jacob.
I love hearing what Tim thinks.
That's why I accepted this position.
I wanted to hear more of what Tim thinks.
It sounds to me like what you're telling me is that the real solution to this problem
that we're facing educationally is not something narrowly confined to the role and job of
our state secretary of education.
It sounds like we're seeing a lot of knock on effects of other problems in our state.
What you're talking about with nutrition, with housing, with some of these other social
services.
And it sounds like the problem is a little bit more complex than just kids is our children
learning is is what I always like to bring it back to.
Yeah.
And see, this is where we, you know, have always been, been pointing this out in busted
pencils.
This is that, um, look, academic achievement and, and I've always said, like, look, I don't
care about anybody's test scores.
Um, that, that does mean, but if you care about them, actually, we know what brings up
test scores.
Well, there's two things cheating, which we don't want.
Investing in the causes of academic, what do you want to say, loss or inability?
You can't learn when you're hungry, Jacob.
You can't learn when you're sick.
You can't learn when you're cold.
You can't learn when you're worried about whether or not you have a home to go home to.
Okay.
Um, that's painful potentially to admit and see people say, well, you want me to solve
the problem of poverty, then yes, I do.
I do want you to solve the problem of poverty or I want you to stop pointing out the achievement
gap and trying to blame teachers, people like Jill, under Lee, people like the, you know,
the school counselors, the paraprofessionals, the, the lunch people, the custodian, stop
blaming them for the achievement gap, point out the reality of going, um, they're doing
the best that they can every day.
If we as a society, though, refuse to take care of the basic needs of our fellow people,
humans, little people, big people, um, the fact that, um, on a standard measure
of, you know, I always say the, the achievement gap is, is actually a better measure of
well-being.
And, um, when you look at where the scores are low, um, on standardized achievement tests,
most of those low scores are indicating not a failing teacher, not a failing kid, but
actually societal neglect, pointing out and therefore not taking care of, of, of our
fellow brothers, sisters, children, aunts, uncles, Jacob.
Well, Tim, I like that, uh, the, the comeback people have at you is, okay, jerk, what do you
want to do?
Stop kids from being hungry?
What are you against poverty?
Uh, yeah, I am against poverty.
I am against kids being hungry.
Yeah.
I, I would like to see these issues addressed.
I, I can see how it's bigger than just one person.
It's not just one secretary of state who can fix a problem.
It's an entire statewide effort that's required for it.
And I think that's one of the good things about Tony Evers is that some, as governor, he
cares about education and he does what he can to coordinate government wide statewide.
What can we do to help with education?
Um, listen, you can either say that the reason that our state is struggling, um,
with education is because of the need for funding, the need for better social services,
all these things that are causing, uh, issues with achievement, or you can say, drag, we
got unlucky.
All of our kids are dumb.
Some states get lucky.
Their kids are smart, uh, our teachers, uh, we got bad luck.
Our teachers turned out to be bad teachers.
Our students turned out to be bad students.
Our parents are bad parents, uh, I would tend to disagree.
I think that people are people and the systems around them are what dictate success or
not.
There's individual accountability, but on, on the scale of a society, people are people
and the systems we live in are what determine where we go.
That's, that's my point of view, Tim, and I'm going to say, but I've just granted you
an honorary one tonight, Jacob, for, for that you, you gave your dissertation, you passed
your dissertation right there, um, and so as a dissertation chair, though, I will ask
or point out one thing that I think it, you know, actually, I, kids, no, they do not have
to pull themselves up by their bootstraps.
They do not have to fend for themselves.
They do not have to learn how to tough it out and get through.
Um, those are things we say when we're admitting we're not willing to help out.
And that's where I said, yeah, you know what, adulthood, right, in some form of personal
responsibility and accountability, not for kids, it's, it's our responsibility to take
care of our kids.
So with that, Jacob, now it's time for your moment of Zen.
I started studying history with one view in mind to look for answers to the issues and problems
I saw in the world about me.
Just for listening to busted pencils, home room, hey, Wednesday classes in session, Friday,
Jacob, producers, choice show, a show out there and Saturday, yes, Saturday, one hour
of the broadcast across all civic media stations.
What do we say?
Three o'clock, well, three o'clock if you're actually on the radio across all those civic
media stations, one hour of your favorite blue collar scholars, Tim, Johnny, and Jacob.