Milwaukee's Messmer St. Rose School Completes Four-Year $6.5 Million Renovation Project

The Messmer St. Rose Elementary School in Milwaukee’s Merrill Park neighborhood got a pretty special 125th birthday gift, as construction wraps up late this summer on a four-year, $6.5 million renovation project.

Messmer staff say they view the project as a fulfillment of the mission the school system assumed when it agreed to take over St. Rose and St. Leo Schools, then known as the Catholic Urban Academies, from the Archdiocese of Milwaukee in 2007. Messmer now serves more than 400 students in grades K4-8 at its St. Rose Campus on North 31st Street, in addition to 400 students at Messmer St. Mary in Riverwest and nearly 700 students at Messmer High School on Capitol Drive.

Acknowledging that the Merrill Park neighborhood faces challenges in terms of poverty and violence, Messmer vice president for advancement Mike Brauer said that it is imperative that Messmer St. Rose students are able to learn in a building that is safe, clean and up-to-date.

continue at MkeCH

I didn't realise Messmer was an independent school system.

Related:

Messmer Saint Rose School undertakes $6.5 million renovation

JS: Catholic schools pressure MPS for bus money

Two Catholic schools are pressuring Milwaukee Public Schools to fund more of their transportation costs, raising new questions about the extent to which districts must provide busing to private-school students under state law.

Messmer Catholic Schools leaders are asking the MPS administration to change the way it treats the network under that law, which calls for districts to bus local private-school students under certain circumstances. Messmer leaders say the change would bring it approximately $40,000 in additional busing funds this year for elementary students.

St. Joan Antida High School is going a step further and threatening a lawsuit if MPS doesn't treat it like a public, citywide high school — and pay for busing for 70 of its girls. That costs $108,000 currently, according to St. Joan Antida leaders.

Both cases are being watched by other private schools, especially those looking for ways to maximize available public funding streams.

continue at JS

Messmer Catholic schools to raise teacher pay, narrowing pay gap with public schools

Messmer Catholic Schools will spend $500,000 to boost teacher salaries by 10% to 30% over the next two years in a move intended both to sustain recent academic gains and uphold the church's teachings on social justice, its president said.

"If we're going to exhibit Catholic values of justice, that means appropriate compensation and fulfilling our mission," said Jim Piatt, whose system employs about 100 teachers on three campuses.

"Teachers should not be paid at a level that qualifies them for assistance or free and reduced lunch," he said.

The move by Messmer is an attempt to raise its teacher salaries to about 90% of their public school counterparts in and around Milwaukee, said Emily Koczela, its newly hired chief financial officer, who like Piatt had worked in the Brown Deer School District before joining Messmer.

continue at JS

Without religious orders to leverage, this is the reality for Catholic education.

Messmer Catholic Schools to honor longtime leader, school-choice advocate

Last fall, the longtime leader of Messmer Catholic Schools, Brother Bob Smith, suddenly stepped down from his post because of health concerns.

Despite his retirement, his legacy as a champion of the city's voucher system and his leadership in re-shaping and integrating the north side Catholic school system has not been forgotten, and an event next week aims to honor his contributions to the city's education landscape.

Messmer will feature Smith at its annual Portraits of Leadership event Monday headlined by former Gov. Tommy G. Thompson at the Pfister Hotel. The event honors educators whose leadership goes above the norm.

Smith played a pivotal role in the school choice movement, in which he advocated for parents' rights to choose a school — private or public — that was in the best interest of their child, regardless of their family's economic standing.

The city's urban school voucher program began in 1990 and continues to be subject to controversy because it allows taxpayer dollars to support private, mostly religious schools. But Smith saw the expansion of the choice program as vital to pulling children and families out of poverty.

Read more from Journal Sentinel: http://www.jsonline.com/news/education/messmer-to-honor-longtime-leader-school-choice-advocate-b99139914z1-231684321.html#ixzz2kaLYOOuW
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Capuchin Brother, President of Messmer Catholic Schools, speaks on Walker protests

A great article. Fascinating. Kudos to Brother Bob for standing his ground and not being intimidated. Imagine if pro-lifers tried to pull this stunt [photo, left, of police officers preventing protesters from crossing onto Messmer property, which is private property].

Milwaukee Catholic Herald:

Messmer Preparatory Catholic School at 3027 N. Fratney St. was vandalized Thursday, Aug. 25, and parents were threatened by protesters surrounding the school Friday morning, Aug. 26, before Gov. Scott Walker’s scheduled visit, according to a press release from the school.

The release said school officials were informed Thursday night that the building alarms were set off, and discovered Friday morning that nine locks on exterior doors, including a parking gate, doors to the building and a church building door, were sealed with glue. Capuchin Br. Bob Smith, president and CEO of Messmer Catholic Schools, which include Messmer High School and the K4-8 St. Rose and St. Leo School, told your Catholic Herald Monday that opening the doors, whose locks that were filled with superglue, wood glue and wood, required staff from all three campuses.

People that surrounded the entire block of the school Friday held signs in protest and grew angrier as the police presence grew, said Br. Bob, who walked up and down Fratney Street asking protesters to stay off the school property and to remove signs and blankets they were hanging on the school’s fences.

“It was a certain segment of Milwaukee at its worst,” he said. “There were people telling me that they didn’t want to see me in the neighborhood again, and I said to them, ‘I didn’t ask you when I came here, and I’m not asking you for permission to come back. This neighborhood doesn’t belong to you.”

“I said to people that I spoke with then and I said earlier today that I’ve lived in Detroit, I’ve lived in Chicago, Atlanta, here, and I don’t run from bullies and thugs or threats,” said Br. Bob, who hopes someone will turn in the person or people responsible for the vandalism so that he, she or they can pay to replace the school’s key and fob systems that were destroyed. “And you’re going to have to go through me to get to the kids and the faculty and staff, and you better bet that if you cross that line, we will prosecute you to the fullest extent of the law.”

Read the rest here.

A number of unions participated in the Messmer protest, including the SEIU.

Also in this week's Milwaukee Catholic Herald was a tribute to the value of unions in society by John Huebscher of the Wisconsin Catholic Conference (the Milwaukee Catholic Herald's title on the article was, "Credit unions for much of what you enjoy," but it's only online at the GB Compass). A tad ironic, no?