Hello, my name is John Jagler and I represent the 13th Senate District in South-Central Wisconsin. I am also chair of the Senate Committee on Education.
As many of you have seen, there’s been recent reports of allegations of sexual misconduct by teachers in our school, and disturbing flaws in how these cases have been handled by the State Department of Public Instruction.
No parent should ever have to wonder if their child is safe at school, and that is why the Senate Education Committee called State Superintendent Jill Underly to testify this week to explain how these cases are being handled, and what is being done to protect students. I’m glad Underly accepted our invitation, but as I told her at the hearing, her and DPI’s response to this article have been disappointing and disturbing — from first not commenting on the article, to demanding a retraction of the article, to then accusing us of playing politics when we ask questions about it. This isn’t about politics; it’s about trust. Parents deserve transparency, students deserve safety, we have to make sure no parent in Wisconsin has to wonder if the system (bureaucracy protecting bureaucracy), protected the wrong person at the expense of their child’s safety.
The hearing made one thing clear, there are still too many unanswered questions, too many loop holes, too little accountability; and until the story started to gain attention, too little urgency from the Department of Public Instruction to acknowledge a problem, let alone do something about it. My republican colleagues in the legislature and I have already begun to root out the shortcomings in the education establishment that raised these questions in the first place. And we are working on new safeguards to make sure misconduct can’t be hidden. They include clearer definitions of grooming, stronger reporting requirements and making sure a new code of conduct is enacted focusing on how teachers communicate with students.
This is the start of a very long process but we will see it though. Protecting kids is not optional, it is our duty. Superintendent Underly says she agrees and we are going to make sure her actions match those words.
