Apparently Mr. Bryce has not seen the 15th Comparative Analysis which clearly shows that revenues have been continually trending up, even with Act 10. The major loss of funding came from the fedeal government, and yet with Act 10, the funding still went up.

Thank you, Heather, for covering this race. It's been very helpful - I know who I'm voting for now. :) Just curious - will there be more questions and will the Patch publish similar articles about the village board elections?

@Heather, I believe we have more coming tomorrow.

I could care less what happens with RUSD because I used the law that permits me to send my children to Union Grove HS and Yorkville Elementary. Both schools demonstrate their success via SDPR, an engaging teaching staff, great admin and atmosphere that fosters a quality experience.

For the candidate that believes it necessary to take a taxpayer trip to Maryland with teachers and principals, in tow, to examine best practices, why don't you get in your car and drive west of I94 and stop at both schools and learn something that's already happening right here, right now.

Anguiano- See what C. Sanders wrote.

Betker- Sounds good, but where's the funding for expansion?

Brown- Advocates feeding greedy teachers more money. Also, perhaps you should take an english comprehension class. It is not "then we possible risk losing" , it is "then we possibly...".

Bryce- Exactly, be responsible to the students and taxpayers.

Eperjesy- The school board can't do anything about poverty. Try focusing on your job and find a way to improve the educational experience.

Formolo- Sane commentary, but no exit survey is necessary. Taxpayers are not getting value for their money.

Frontier- Spend more money

McKenna- Spend more money

Pfost- Spend more money

Wittke- The key is fiscal management.Use Act 10 to divert funds from WEAC trust to the student's needs.

An Exit Survey should be standard "Business" practice within Racine Unified and it doesn't need to cost a lot of money. Here are the numbers that Racine Unified posted on their website. In 2012 they lost 1053 students through Open Enrollment. They only gained 24 students through Open Enrollment! So the question that Racine Unified needs to address is, "WHY". I have been volunteering in my children's RUSD schools since 2003. Behavior problems are killing our district and there isn't enough room at Walden or the Real School. So the only option for many of these parents, is to leave the district. When these families leave, we not only lose millions of dollars, but we are losing good students and actively involved parents. Racine Unified doesn't have 3 more years to "Talk" about this issue. If they don't start addressing the behavior problems in our schools Racine Unified will continue to lose students through Open Enrollment and School Choice Vouchers.

@ C. Sanders - I have suggested over and over to Dr. Shaw (when he was here) and other RUSD employees and Board Members that they need to visit the neighboring schools outside of Racine. One of the reasons that I decided to run, is because our present school board isn't listening. They need to pick up the phone, hop in their car and visit schools like, Paris, Yorkville, Union Grove, Oak Creek and Prairie. We already know that Walden and the Real School have programs that work. We need to expand their policies to other schools in this district.

@ Kristie: With no offense intended, Dr. Shaw was over his head and out of his element to lead RUSD to a better place. Sadly, his replacement was cut from the same fabric and had neither the vision nor ability to take RUSD any further than her predecessor.

In fact, the hemorrhage of students leaving the district was not addressed by Laing. So now we look to go to the outside and look to possibly recruit a replacement from one of the worst performing school systems in America and bring her to one of the worst performing districts in the State. What can you possibly think the outcome will be??????

Many of us witness the continued decay of RUSD, and it's like watch the melting of Antarctica at high speed. The RUSD board and Adimistration lumbers around like they have another 500 years before the floodwaters arrive, so they kick the can down the road decade after decade, while oblivious to over a thousand students that have already gotten in their boats and floated away from RUSD to dry shores and decidely better school systems.

I use to volunteer at Schulte when my kids were there. Nothing but bad teachers, bad principal and students who run-a-muck with no consequences. Sounds typical of every other Racine school. We decided to do open enrollment and the kids were accepted into Paris. The difference is night and day. The teachers communicate about EVERYTHING!!! Bad behavior is NOT accepted. The kids are treated with respect and they are taught that learning and being smart is cool. Paris received the Blue Ribbon Award last year and they earned it. No more suprise report cards from RUSD I get emails now from the teachers and this communication is critical to successful students. Way to go Paris and all other successful schools who are doing what counts....THE REAL WORK. Kristie Formolo gets my vote.She understands the changes that are needed at RUSD.

By the way the principal at Paris tolerates nothing less than his staff communicating with parents. He tells them he does not want one suprised parent when report cards come home. That is what is expected of them. The teachers have no options. RUSD teacher still say they have 30 kids and don't have the time and a million other excuses why they can't do their jobs. Ultimately the principal is not doing their job by making parent teacher communication MANDATORY. You can close a learning gap in hours, days, or weeks. Intervention must be immediate not AFTER the report card comes home. And the teachers that say they have no time....care?
Ugh.....they are clueless. Hopefully the new superintendent will start axing bad teachers. Please start with the 4th grade teachers at Schulte and the rest of the stupid teachers out there who think they have medical degrees and suggest to every parent their kids have ADD. The kids don't have ADD they just don't want to be in the loud classrooms that the teachers have no control of. They don't focus on you because you are not interesting and fail to motivate them. So bottom line is if you want to be better....THAN DO BETTER!!!!!

My kids do awesome at their school in RUSD, and so do our neighbor's kids. Yes, some parents are disengaged and many kids act up. It is definitely a tougher atmosphere than Union Grove and such.
The teachers we have dealt with have been great, and easy to contact. Although I acknowledge it is a big district, and others experience different things.
Someone mentioned how bad our high schools are. I know Case has an IB program and the other two have Advanced Placement classed. There are opportunities along with the disruptive kids and negative influences.
I do not want radical changes that jeopardize the successes our children experiences. We need to isolate the problem children and work with them: positively or negatively.
All these candidates will be in for a humbling experience when they get on the board. So will the new superintendent. There are no bumper sticker solutions.

Brian and Randy, what is the big fuss?
Regardless of trends, various studies or forecasts we have to spend the money wisely. Are you not skeptical of 40 million dollars in utility efficiency upgrades? I also think the new central office was maybe an over-expenditure (although I hear the old one was a wreck).
I also remember one super leaving under odd terms a while back after spending money questionably too. The money needs to be watched closely. We need good teachers, clean and safe buildings and decent facilities for computers and such

Sorry, that should be Westridge...

Seems like my post didn't send from my phone.
I'm a proud Walden alumni. I loved the family environment of that school. Some kids were the opposite and exited Walden to go to a bigger public school where they did well. This is the beauty of RUSD. Families have options on what works best for the student. The issue is that these options are greatly limited. Should we expand these programs? Absolutely. The proof is in the waiting lists of Walden and the REAL school.

Brian is right about the $10 million Central Office. I never supported it, and I'm skeptical if we will ever see the savings that were promised to us. I knew the $80 million referendum wouldn't pass, because I sat in a couple of meetings and we were asked about it. Very few of the parents supported it, because it was too big and it came right after the Central Office move. Westridge is improving. If you get a chance to talk to the principal, you will understand why. Mitchell Middle school has an amazing band program, and many of these students carry over to Lighthouse Brigade. Also, Mr. Eben at Case H.S. is doing an amazing job! He is a very hands on kind of principal and the students respect that. I volunteered at the Case dance on Saturday night, and Mr. Eben was there along with quite a few teachers and staff. The Virtual School program at Case H.S. is flourishing which is opening doors for a lot of students. There are lots of really great things happening in our district, and I could go on and on about them. That being said, the complaints that I always here from parents, are the behavior problems, the lack of accountability, and the lack of communication. If we work on addressing these issues, I think we can slowly turn this district around. Also, and this is a must - We have to look into expanding or replicating the programs that are working.

I want to know specifics as to where all these candidates stand on Teacher accountability, School Choice, Vouchers, Act 10 and the recalls.

Which candidates are the PTA, REA and Voces de la Frontera endorsing?

Other than some of the comments this article is uninformative.

My son is a success story coming out of RUSD. But it was not a result of a excellent or cooperative educational system. It was a 13 year battle with teachers and administrators avoiding me and the issues I raised. I was lucky to have personal contact with school board members like Bernice Olson and John Haumersen.

Mau - I believe that education starts at home. Parents have to be involved if we are going to change Racine Unified. Since so many children in our district come from broken homes, we absolutely need our schools to be calm, safe and accountable. I'm including a link to Paris Elementary School's website. This is the direction, that I would like RUSD to head. We already have Walden and the Real school. We need to take what is working and expand it. We need more parents volunteering with reading programs in Kindergarten, 1st, 2nd and even 3rd grade. This is so easy and it doesn't cost money. I know this, because I organized a reading program for 1st graders at St. Sebastian years ago. All the parent volunteers had to do, is sit and listen to the children read a series of books and mark it off if the child read well. I just looked at one of my old charts - There were 27 students and the first series had 16 books. If the child did well, they could either read it again or move on to the next book. They usually wanted to read it again! If a child struggled, we would help them with the words and they would read it a few more times until they were ready to move on to the next book. The children loved it because they were reading one on one with volunteers 2 or 3 times a week. Here's a link to Paris's website. Look it over, and you will know where I stand. http://www.paris.k12.wi.us/administration/

Paris School has what they call "Brain Booster Intervention". When a child there is falling behind with reading fluency for example they are immediately put with another teacher or teachers aid to get caught up. The achievement gap can be closed within days or weeks. They do not wait until a parent gets the report card and then some type of intervention is done. When the children struggle you deal with it immediately. This way the gap does not grow. If a child falls too far behind they disengage because they feel like they are failing and good luck getting them to engage again. It can carry over for years to come. There is no reason that some of these idea that are successful at other schools can't be implemented. I spoke with the administrator at Paris and he said that not one person from RUSD has ever been there for a visit. NOT ONE. It is very sad that we are not learning from the education leaders right here in our community. Paris administrator Roger Gayhart is an excellent principal and the kids at Paris want to do well for him and his staff. This is the "atmosphere" they have created. We are failing the kids in Racine if we don't consider his success.

Iwouldbedreaming - I have suggested over and over, that our Administrators and Board Members visit Paris. I hate to say it, but it speaks volumes that RUSD hasn't done so. I am already on board with what is working at Paris. If I make it through on February 19th, I will be visiting Paris and every other school that I can think of.

Sorry your experience at Schulte wasn't good. Schulte used to be known as a "Hidden Gem" when Donna Sens was there. They had some amazing teachers and I know some of them are still out there.

@Michael frontier

You said: "We cannot afford to lose students. We must create exciting, engaging learning environments, that counter this tendency."

That sounds great, except you opened with a line of "vouchers pose a challenge." Are you against parental school choice? If so, do you believe the best way to avoid losing students is to penalize parents and forbid the lower and middle classes from being able to choose their child's education? Just looking for clarification.

Edward, the teachers at Paris do have 30 kids per class and intervention has nothing to do with the main teacher. The kids go with a different teacher for the brain booster sessions and the main teacher keeps teaching her regular class. How hard is that? It is actually easier because they are not teaching at different levels. Once the child gets caught up and returned to the class it is ultimately easier for the teacher. The brain boosters keep the kids working at the same level. This is what I would call "no child left behind"!!!