Madison Reporter

A new law in Wisconsin, authored by Senator Julian Bradley and Representative Ken Skowronski, aims to improve the accuracy of school report cards. The legislation, known as Act 212 and formerly Senate Bill 235, was signed into law on Thursday and will be implemented for the 2022-23 school year.

Senator Bradley expressed confidence in the benefits of this policy change: "This policy change will ensure more accurate reporting of schools' performances across the state," he said. "I trust parents to decide how to educate their children, and when they make those choices, they ought to have the most reliable data available at their fingertips. This new law creates an important fix to the school report cards that will help accurately depict the performance of our school districts and teachers."

The new law addresses a specific issue with how student data from juvenile detention facilities or jails is reported. Previously, if students left these facilities before reenrolling in their primary residence schools, it was counted as a dropout for the district housing the facility. This affected school district scores negatively. The updated legislation ensures that such data does not unfairly impact school report cards if over half of a facility's population does not reside there for an entire school year.

Several Wisconsin school districts, including Franklin School District, are expected to benefit from this change. The Wisconsin Association of School Boards supported the bill throughout its legislative journey.