UW System President Jay Rothman is celebrating the funding increase the system will get in the next state budget as part of a bipartisan agreement announced Tuesday morning.
Gov. Tony Evers and Republican legislative leaders reached an agreement Tuesday to a $256 million increase for the University of Wisconsin System — the largest funding increase in about two decades.
This would be a major turnaround for the UW System in the budget after Republican lawmakers threatened an $87 million cut just two weeks ago. The UW Board of Regents and Evers originally proposed a record-high $856 million increase for the system, a total that would bring the state’s public higher education funding in line with the national median.
Democrats on the committee criticized the overall outcome, saying it doesn’t go far enough. They called for another half billion for the UW system and nearly $750 million for the Department of Children and Families including $200 million for childcare providers.
The University of Wisconsin System had braced for a state budget cut. Instead, UW institutions are poised to get more money than they have in recent years — but the cash comes with some strings.
The budget deal includes $14 million in municipal service payments — payments from the state for police, fire and waste removal services provided to state facilities by local governments — a significant chunk of which will go to the City of Madison. It also includes $194 million for projects at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, which is in Roys’ district.
Biologists interested in reconstructing the family trees of spiders and their relatives have long sought a complete sea spider genome, said Prashant Sharma of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, who is an author of the new paper. Because sea spiders are members of a group that are siblings of arachnids on land, characteristics they share with modern land spiders could be traced to a common ancestor.
District projections from the state Applied Population Lab at the University of Wisconsin-Madison suggest enrollment will continue falling to 8,700 students by 2034.
He graduated from Wauwatosa East High School in 1979 and earned a Bachelor of Science in Finance, Investments and Banking from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1983. He earned his Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) designation in 1989.
In the final weeks of Walter’s life, he and his family established a focused strategy to advance pancreatic immunology research at the UW Carbone Cancer Center. In lieu of flowers, the family invites memorial gifts to support this initiative.
The wave of defaults may also inflict costs on taxpayers. Sending debts to collection comes with administrative costs, says Nicholas Hillman, a professor of education at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “There are inefficiencies in the loan repayment system and the collections system,” says Hillman. “So it’s expensive.” Hillman stressed, however, that the alternative to collections—allowing borrowers to forgo debt payments, effectively canceling the loans—would be far more costly for taxpayers.
The plan to close the prison was not part of a negotiated deal with Democratic Gov. Tony Evers, which included tax cuts, increased Medicaid funding and a boost for the University of Wisconsin System. Because the prison plan is not a part of the deal, Evers could veto the plan once the full budget reaches his desk.
But most notably, he cited the impacts. The funding cuts have marred efforts to train 24 school psychology graduates at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, who were set to work in high-need schools after graduation. Although 19 students were on track to graduate, the university projects a loss of more than $2.8 million. That funding loss, the institution warned, means some students may not be able to finish their degrees or afford to work in the schools once they graduate.
On the last weekend in June, artist and recent University of Wisconsin-Madison graduate Ava Albelo organized “Cog in the Machine” at Next Wave Studios, a multimedia production space on Madison’s east side.
Albelo said she funded the project with a grant from the UW-Madison Art Department. She hoped younger people would come to the show “and be interested in the artwork and ask questions and enjoy the music.”
Planned Parenthood had posited that the 176-year-old law conflicts with the provisions in the state constitution establishing a right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness as well as equal protection. So, the constitutional question goes unresolved, according to Bryna Godar, a staff attorney with the State Democracy Research Initiative at the University of Wisconsin Law School.
“And so, I think there will be continued conversations about what constitutional protections we have in Wisconsin,” says Godar. She says that could be future court cases or constitutional amendment ballot questions.
During a recent training session for crops and soils specialists, plant pathologist Damon Smith with the University of Wisconsin says growers are experiencing weather that is ideal for corn tar spot infection.
“It’s too early to see symptoms now,” he told them, “but it is likely that infections are occurring and that growers need to be vigilant in their scouting of susceptible fields in coming weeks.”
Dr. Patrick Shahan, trauma and acute care surgeon at UW Health, said last year’s uptick in injuries was also felt in Wisconsin.
“It can be something as small as a hand burn from a sparkler up to really substantial, life-threatening injuries from explosions,” he said. “Things like really severely injured and disfigured hands, especially from people who are holding fireworks when they’re lighting them.”
“A new party is going to benefit most from Musk if they can draw on his resources but keep him in the background,” said Barry Burden, director of the University of Wisconsin’s Elections Research Center. “And if he can portray himself as an innovator and a tech entrepreneur — and somebody who is really contributing to the American economy and funding this new operation without being its front person — I think that’s probably going to lead to the most success.”
