As this controversy unfolds, it is important to know the law and practice of judicial recusal and impeachment in Wisconsin and beyond — a topic that we, as scholars of state courts and constitutions, have studied closely. In short, recusal is rare, and impeachment is even rarer.
Robert Yablon is an associate professor of law and co-director of the State Democracy Research Initiative at UW-Madison. Derek Clinger is a senior staff attorney for the initiative at UW-Madison.
Conservation must include more diverse voices from people of color to truly enact change.
Despite Evers’ partial-veto targeting DEI funding, Republicans continue to threaten UW System
Letter to the editor: Thank you to the State Journal for the coverage about the terrible noise at the recent Wisconsin Badgers football game. Sadly, we have experienced the same horrific noise levels for several years at the UW basketball games.
Listen again to the title track of Van Morrison’s groundbreaking 1968 album “Astral Weeks” and you will instantly be reminded of Richard Davis’s genius.
Dr. Tiffany Green, a professor at the school of medicine and public health at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, said she believes the effort to reduce maternal mortality should focus not only on care received in hospitals, but on the social and economic conditions faced in general by Black women. The United States should consider using federal civil rights law in cases where racial bias severely hurt the care a patient received. “If you think bias is a fundamental driver of these iniquities then you have to hold providers accountable,” Dr. Green said.
At a minimum, UW should implement such training. It isn’t costly, takes little time or resources and could help prevent such tragedies as witnessed here.
A bill before the Wisconsin Legislature, Senate Bill 401, will protect the public from the most significant hazards of research on potential pandemic pathogens — without having significant costs or adverse impacts. The bill is commonsense legislation that deserves broad-based support.
Virtually every policy that governs our higher education system is based on a
dangerous myth — that students do, and should, meticulously shop around for
colleges nationwide and pick the best fit.
Letter to the editor: The Wisconsin Badgers game day experience at UW-Madison took a big step backward off the field on Saturday.
Letter to the editor: I have been a Wisconsin football season ticket holder for over 30 years. I attended Saturday’s UW football game anticipating a great afternoon of college football. What I experienced was horrible.
For example, SHINE Technologies in Janesville is looking to use fusion to recycle fissile material from reactors, past and future. Company founder Greg Piefer said climate change can’t wait to be solved by fusion energy, but safe fission energy is possible now. The nuclear engineering programs at UW-Madison are also a part of that research mix.
Written by Jonathan Patz, MD, MPH, distinguished professor and John P. Holton Chair of Health and the Environment, University of Wisconsin-Madison, and Steven Running is professor emeritus of ecosystem and conservation sciences at the University of Montana.
Without any increase in state funding, the System is projected to reach a $60.1 million structural deficit by the end of 2023-24, according to System President Jay Rothman.
The promotion of civil discourse is one of the most urgent actions the La Follette School can take going forward.
Co-authored by Susan Webb Yackee is a professor of public affairs and director of the La Follette School of Public Affairs at UW-Madison. Curt S. Culver is the non-executive chairman of MGIC Investment Corp. and its principal subsidiary, Mortgage Guaranty Insurance Corporation (MGIC), the nation’s leading private mortgage insurer. He is a founding member of the La Follette School’s Board of Visitors.
When will UW-Madison Chancellor Jennifer Mnookin explain to the public, alumni, faculty, staff and students how the latest expansion of what was formerly known as the Big Ten Conference will further the educational mission of the UW-Madison campus?
The first member of the Menominee to graduate from the University of Wisconsin, the first woman to serve as tribal chair, the first Native American woman to run for statewide office in Wisconsin and the second Native American woman to bid for Congress, she would eventually become the first woman to head the federal Bureau of Indian Affairs — where she ushered in a new era of respect for tribal sovereignty.
Then there are the culture wars against public universities, especially UW-Madison. Even as the state’s financial contribution has dwindled, Republicans this summer pick picked a fight over meager budgets for diversity, equity and inclusion programs and blocked construction of a UW-Madison engineering building. Inventing and then enflaming such issues is most of what Republicans offer their base.
While this year’s team is off to a strong start, their future home is uncertain. A recent article indicates that the McClimon Complex may not be available for women’s and men’s soccer, as well as the track and field teams. The article also stated that, at least for soccer amenities, McClimon lags behind peer institutions.
The report suggests three factors that are driving the increase: exploding administrative staffs, a building boom and subsidies to athletic programs. Especially noteworthy was the finding that even as state governments slashed their support for their flagship universities, the schools continued to increase spending. They more than made up for the cuts with increases in tuition. For every one dollar in state support that was lost, these schools, on average, increased tuition and fees by $2.40.
But that apparently did not happen at UW-Madison, where tuition was frozen for about a decade. The UW was not one of the six schools that the Journal highlighted in its story, but it probably was part of the database of 50 schools that fed into the report’s median numbers.
We each have a voice, and it’s our responsibility to use our voices to enact meaningful change. Gen Z could be the generation that champions nuclear energy and fights back against climate change. In fact, we have to. It’s time to seize this valuable opportunity to hold politicians accountable and take action to create reliable and zero-carbon energy.
-Grace Stanke is 2023’s Miss America and is studying nuclear engineering at the University of Wisconsin. Karly Matthews is the communications director for the American Conservation Coalition (ACC), a nonprofit organization that advocates for climate solutions such as nuclear energy.
Letter to the editor: I urge athletic director Chris McIntosh and head coach Luke Fickell to find a way to stop the continuation of the vulgar chant that fans shout back and forth at each other several times during the game.
Given current trends across the UW System, as well as other public and private colleges, UW-Oshkosh likely will not be alone in belt-tightening.
Letter to the editor: The state of Wisconsin could profit abundantly if the Legislature and the University of Wisconsin worked together instead of having State Street be paved with disrespectful and biased rhetoric.
The notion of planting miles of trees to hold back encroaching deserts is misguided and damaging; we should promote programs that secure livelihoods and respect dryland ecologies instead
Co-authored by nature-society geographers Matthew Turner of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Diana Davis of the University of California-Davis) and Emily Yeh of the University of Colorado Boulder.
DEI programs prepare UW students for the workforce. Cutting the UW System’s budget cripples Wisconsin’s economic engine.
UW-Madison announced it will offer “enhanced beverage choices” at the Kohl Center and Bahn Arena in Madison this fall.
What does it look like to me? People will get drunk before and after the games, so we need to cash in on this, too. College athletics at UW will offer alcohol on a campus widely known as one of the biggest party schools in the U.S.
McDonald retires this month after 35 years at the University of Wisconsin-Madison as one of the nation’s foremost scholars on Imperial Russia before the 1917 Russian Revolution.
The myriad crises we collectively face demand innovative and collaborative solutions. It is time for the expertise of teens and young adults to take center stage. Our future depends on it.
About the writer: Linnea Hjelm is a PhD Candidate at the University of Wisconsin School of Human Ecology. She has worked in violence prevention in high schools, colleges and nonprofit organizations with youth and adult leaders. This column was produced for Progressive Perspectives, a project of The Progressive magazine, and distributed by Tribune News Service.
Wisconsin sports fanatics are hearty and a little nuts. Moreover, UW-Madison is the only school in the country to draw more than 8,000 fans for three different women’s sports programs. That includes 16,833 people at the Kohl Center last fall for volleyball.
Maraniss will talk with Woodruff and Hunt in the ornate and intimate setting of Tripp Commons inside the University of Wisconsin-Madison Memorial Union, on Thursday evening, Sept. 21.
Letter to the editor: The quality of education and the standards for grading differ drastically from state to state and school to school forcing college admission offices to rely heavily on standardized tests like the ACT and the SAT. What most people fail to understand is that those popular measures are biased in favor of the majority American culture.
Written by Chris McCahill, managing director of the State Smart Transportation Initiative at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Letter to the editor: The football program understandably garners a large amount of attention and has had significant past success, of which UW fans can be proud, similar to men’s hockey. But when transitioning men’s teams overshadow equal or greater success by women’s team, as well as the individuals and coaches on those women’s teams, it seems like a missed opportunity.
The closure of Cardinal Stritch University and the headlines about UW-Platteville at Richland Center and UW-Milwaukee at Washington County are, unfortunately, just leading indicators of what’s to come for both public and private institutions.
We are delighted by these endorsements. And we look forward to the day when the Dads Caucus announces the Black Paternal Health Act and fellow members of Congress offer their endorsements for this much needed bill.
-Tova Walsh is an associate professor of social work at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Alvin Thomas is an assistant professor of human development and family studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the host of the Black Fatherhood Podcast. They are both members of the Scholars Strategy Network.
Allowing markets to operate on federal land would put different American values on more equal footing, thereby reducing conflict. This might harm some political and special interests in the short run, but the change will be a win-win for free markets and for the environment.
-Dominic P. Parker is an economist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, a senior fellow at the Property and Environment Research Center, and the Ilene and Morton Harris visiting fellow at Stanford’s Hoover Institutio
Letter to the editor: UW-Madison produces $27 for every dollar invested, according to research. By cutting funding for UW, Republicans are not making a fiscal decision (or they are really bad at fiscal decisions). Rather, they are seeking to limit the number of thoughtful, educated, contributing members of society who come from our institutions of higher education.
Letter to the editor: I took several trips to that campus to watch the 1985 Chicago Bears team practice at that facility. When watching their practice, you could basically stand near the sidelines and watch the 1985 Bears defense scrimmage against running back Walter Payton. The players and coaches were very accessible after the scrimmage.
At the end of every school year, the dumpsters outside the dorms are filled with many reusable items that end up in landfills. This waste harms the environment and represents a missed opportunity to help others in the community.
Column by Laura Albert, a professor of industrial and systems engineering at UW-Madison.
The governor protected the 188 positions within the University of Wisconsin System focused on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs, a point of emphasis for Vos. Evers eliminated a tax break for people in the top two income brackets, prompting a rebuke from the Assembly leader.
According to a University of Wisconsin analysis, the Madison Legislature’s plan would have boosted capital investment by 1.5% and economic output by 1.25%. This would certainly help the Badger State amid a manufacturing slowdown. The Institute for Supply Management reported this week that its manufacturing index dropped to the lowest level since May 2020.
Vos has also been a vocal opponent of diversity, equity and inclusion efforts, referring to such programs within the University of Wisconsin System as “indoctrination” despite a racist incident at the Madison campus making headlines in the spring. Although Wisconsin is operating with a projected $7 billion budget surplus, Vos and Republicans in the state Legislature voted to cut $32 million from the UW System’s budget unless it agrees to use the funds for workforce development rather than DEI efforts. The GOP plan also seeks to cut nearly 200 DEI jobs on UW campuses.
Supporters of race-based admissions, rather than admit these errors, will contrive to preserve them in a variety of barely concealed forms.—Anika Horowitz, University of Wisconsin-Madison, economics
Ross Freshwater has a PhD in education leadership and policy analysis from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, a masters degree in teaching and curriculum from Harvard University and a bachelor’s degree in political science from Ohio State University.
Wisconsin’s representatives should back Bowman’s legislation and join him in recognizing that, “All students deserve an equitable opportunity to gain admission to institutions of higher education, but students whose parents didn’t attend or donate to a university are often overlooked in the admissions process due to the historically classist and racist legacy and donor admissions practices at many schools across the country.”
Column by Jonathan Patz, the John P. Holton chair of Health and the Environment and professor in the Nelson Institute and Department of Population Health Sciences at the University of Wisconsin-Madison
Letter to the editor: Over the years, I worked with farm students who needed classes that started after the morning milking, bilingual Latino students who were the linguistic bridge for their families, returning adult students who supported aging parents, students with disabilities who needed accommodations, refugee students and veterans who had seen too much, LGBTQ students who struggled with families that disowned them, African American students who wanted to see themselves reflected in the curriculum, students who struggled with depression after family trauma, liberal and conservative students, well-to-do and homeless students, and students with many other unique backgrounds. DEI initiatives helped me understand who our students were, and that is a good thing.
Column by Russ Castronovo, director of the Center for the Humanities and the Tom Paine professor of English at UW-Madison.
Guest column: But perhaps the worst part of the proposal is the Republican plan to cut UW System funding using the pretext that campuses must eliminate Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion initiatives.
Letter to the editor: One who has already been indoctrinated wouldn’t see the indoctrination for what it is.
Letter to the editor: Since 1988, I have mentored many hundreds of students, had a great scientific and professional career and gotten to know many other Latino Ph.D. graduates in STEM. We know Albert(a) Einstein can be anywhere, if welcomed and given a chance, and diversity at UW is how valuable careers begin.
Letter to the editor: Now comes a decision by the Legislature to dismantle efforts to increase diversity, equity and inclusion on UW campuses. It seems strange, when they are concerned with greater freedom of expression and exposure to a wider range of views, that legislators have targeted DEI initiatives for cuts.
Letter to the editor: In this current budget cycle, Wisconsin has a very large surplus. But instead of using the surplus to support one of our great economic engines, the University of Wisconsin System, the Wisconsin GOP wants to cut millions of dollars from its budget.
Letter to the editor: The decision of the Republicans on the state Joint Finance Committee to withhold $32 million from the University of Wisconsin System for diversity, equity and inclusion could be a very good decision — if the funds are properly reallocated.
Letter to the editor: I’m sure many readers reacted with disbelief to the decision of UW-Madison’s Music School to axe the Choral Union, the 130-year-old partnership of students, alumni and community members, ostensibly to maximize “opportunities for UW students.”
Letter to the editor: It does matter to the minorities who are a part of the university. For them, removing these programs says, “You are not wanted here. If you want to be here, you will have to expect to be kept in your place. This is a white man’s campus. Deal with it.”
Why would anyone want to end what is a success story for the Wisconsin Idea? The school of music says that this decision is necessary to promote the interests of students, but its interests and the interests of community members are not mutually exclusive.
