Milwaukee’s North Side is the epicenter for Wisconsin’s Black-white education gap, according to a study released Thursday, Feb. 26 from City Forward Collective.
The report, titled “Milwaukee’s North Side Education Crisis: A Generation of Failure Demands Action,” found that Black students in Wisconsin are performing under the level of their peers in every other state.
City Forward Collective advocates against educational inequality and for increased access to school choice.
Colleston Morgan Jr., executive director of City Forward Collective, said in an interview that urgent action to address this crisis is needed.
“This challenge is one that our state needs to confront,” Morgan said. “We are talking about a community that contains the outright majority of Black students in Wisconsin.”
According to the report, 57% of Black students in the state attend Milwaukee schools, and that most reside near or attend a school on the North Side.
City Forward Collective measured success by equally weighing achievement and growth scores from the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction state report card, alongside scores for target group outcomes and the percentage of students on track to graduate.
When Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction calculates a school’s overall score, it weighs growth heavier than achievement when a school has higher numbers of economically disadvantaged students. Morgan said this means schools in Milwaukee tend to be graded differently from the rest of the state.
“We simply don’t think [the state report card] delivers to parents, at least in the way it is summed up, all of the information that they need to make an informed choice,” Morgan said.
Using achievement, growth, target group outcomes, and rates of students on track to graduate, City Forward Collective gave schools one to five star ratings.
About 30,000 Black students in Wisconsin are enrolled in a low-performing school – rated one or two stars – and six out of 10 of those students attend a North Side Milwaukee school, the report found.
What it means
Achievement gaps between Black and white students are exacerbated by falling enrollment in Milwaukee Public Schools, the report said. Money goes toward maintaining facilities in half-empty buildings that could otherwise be invested in academic programs, student support services or teacher development, the report said.
Enrollment in many Milwaukee schools is down over 50%, which the report attributes to families losing faith and trust in their school system.
Morgan said a vast majority of the most underenrolled schools are at MPS. The report found that MPS North Side schools lost more than 4,500 students from the 2019-2020 to 2024-2025 school years.
Morgan said that while the school board plays a critical role in solving these issues, the state must also address systemic and structural problems through policy changes.
“Sending kids to schools that are . . . underenrolled and underperforming is leading to the crisis that we’re seeing that is impacting not just our city but our entire state,” Morgan said.
Solutions
Morgan said the biggest way Milwaukee can address the achievement gap is by consolidating underperforming or underenrolled schools.
Morgan said the proposed plan to consolidate five North Side schools – Auer Avenue School, Keefe Avenue School, Hopkins Lloyd Community School, Siefert School, Clarke Street School – is insufficient to the scale of the challenge the city is facing.
“We have looked at these problems for generations, and we just keep kicking the can down the road,” Morgan said. “The people who suffer most, they’re the students and the families who are ill-served by half empty buildings, half baked ideas and a culture of complacency.”
MPS is operating 25 more schools than it needs with current enrollment numbers, the report said.
The report also suggests taking action if a school is not meeting achievement standards, whether that means changing leadership or closing the school altogether.
Morgan said the city should adopt a similar review process that exists for charter schools, where achievement and other metrics are reviewed to determine whether the school can still operate.
Closing or consolidating schools is never an easy option, but Morgan said that the city should work to ensure that children are sent to a high quality school as a result, whether it’s a public, charter or private.
Morgan also suggests that each school type should be funded equally. Fifty-two percent of students on the North Side attend public charter and private schools, which receive $5,897 less per child in funding each year, according to the report.
“What would be ideal is a system that said, when a school closes . . . we’re going to ensure that kid gets to a better school, whatever that better school might be,” Morgan said. “Let’s put the students first and get as many students as we can into the strongest performing schools that we can.”
Alex Klaus is the education solutions reporter for the Milwaukee Neighborhood News Service and a corps member of Report for America, a national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on under-covered issues and communities. Report for America plays no role in editorial decisions in the NNS newsroom.
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