#SMWay Podcast

Today we’re talking about one of the newest student activities in South Milwaukee – First LegoLeague. If you’re not aware of what it is, it’s more than bricks and Lego figures, though those are certainly part of it. At the suggestion of a parent who wanted his daughter to be involved in some sort of robotics club, South Milwaukee Middle School started up two FirstLego League teams as an after-scho...

Welcome to the SMWay Podcast and the first episode of 2024. I’m your host, Daniel Bader. In our last episode, we heard about music students giving back to the community by using their talents to carol out in South Milwaukee. Today we’ll hear a little bit about South Milwaukee Middle School’s Cold Winter Warm Hearts initiative last year and how they’re building on that effort this year. While the p...

Apollo Jazz - an extra-curricular choral group - spent a day recently out in the community caroling. In this episode, we’ll hear from students why they joined the Apollo Jazz Choir, what it is, and hear some of their music. We’ll hear from the teacher-leader of the group, Aimiee Swanson, a little bit about how South Milwaukee High School’s two-person Music Department is growing and getting student...

Today on the podcast we’re talking to members of the school board about some serious topics. In one way or another, since the spring, the idea of a referendum has been mentioned as a way to close the gap between the district’s revenue and its expenses. But it’s one thing to mention going to a referendum, it’s another thing to really consider what that would mean. The School Board is out listening...

Today, we’re talking about student report cards – specifically Elementary school report cards, because they’re changing. How and why would a report card change? Good question. We associate report cards, as a rule, with letter grades - A, A minus, B etcetera. Get an A or B, and you’re doing well. B- or C there might be some issues, Ds and Fs indicate problems. Pretty clear markers, but not very inf...

Report cards are as a part of school as pencils and chalkboards. The goal of the report card is to give parents an idea of where their students are in their studies and an early warning sign that they might be struggling in a subject and need some help. Schools and school districts have report cards too – for many of the same reasons. In this episode, we’re going to hear from some of the people wh...

There’s no mystery in the benefit of having a theater program, and South Milwaukee has a pretty killer one. Hear about the energy and commitment that is poured into the theater program that makes it the high-quality educational experience that it is.

In this episode we’re learning about a new system to address bullying in South Milwaukee schools. Instances of student bullying and conflict have been managed from building to building. This year schools have access to new Department of Public Instruction resources to implement a District-wide system – one that’s being piloted in the Middle School.

Today we’re talking about attendance and why it matters. For some time, South Milwaukee has had an attendance problem, and over the last two years the District has worked to improve those rates – after all, you can’t improve reading or math skills, prepare for high school or pass a class to get credits to graduate if you’re not in school learning. School is compulsory for students ages 6 to 18 in...

The benefits of early childhood education are real and measurable. All Day 4K has been available at each of our elementary schools since 2018. In addition to the benefits to children, there’s a benefit to their families, too. According to census data, the average income for a family in South Milwaukee is about $50,000 a year. Now consider the cost of daycare. Online childcare finder Tootris estima...

It’s a new school year and an exciting time for our students and teachers. For a group of teachers in South Milwaukee, it’s REALLY a New Year, because it’s their first year. For some it's their first year as a teacher, for others, it's the first in our little city on the lake. Today we’ll hear from two of them and learn what led them to teach in the first place, and how they got here. Then we'll h...

The first day of school is a cherished and honored ritual across our entire country. It’s unique in that it’s not a holiday like Thanksgiving or the Fourth of July, it doesn’t surround a food item or drink like the Shamrock shake or Girl Scout Cookies. But it is one that is unique to our culture and we all have memories of it, good and bad. We hear from the unsung heroes of that American ritual of...

Today we’re introducing South Milwaukee’s new superintendent, Deidre Roemer. We’ll hear a little bit about her family, her career, where she’s been and what led to South Milwaukee. I’ll ask her about first impressions of the District and the city, about what we should celebrate, and what we need to work on. Spoiler alert, she’s hit the ground running. I’ll also ask her about the state’s education...

There has been some remarkably fast movement on the school funding front at the state level – action that we expected to happen in July or later, and the news for South Milwaukee, and many other financially strapped districts is not good. While it was always a long shot to sway legislatures to district requests, the deal reached recently between the legislature and the governor - a former educator...

The last Tiny Office Concert was not recording in a tiny office, but in the birthplace of the SMWay Podcast - a tiny practice room in the music wing of the high school. The students crammed a piano and four people into the room!

Tiny Office Concert 3 - Gian Arica and Shelby Brooks cover Fillmore County by Vansire.

In this episode, we meet track coaches Stan Druckrey and Mark Hoffman. Between the two of them, they have 80 years of experience with this city and its children. Coach Druckrey started here in the 1970s, and Hoffman in the late 1980s. These two are being honored with the planned dedication of our new track. Both of them teach or have taught in our classrooms in addition to running a storied track...

Music teacher Aimee Swanson and her fifth grader, Gloria, recreate the student-written song sung during the Speak Up for Public Schools events on April 19. Students created the lyrics to the tune of Woody Guthrie's This Land is Your Land. Gloria plays guitar and harmonizes to her mom, Aimee. Learn more about supporting Wisconsin Public School funding here.

The story of how one Blakewood teacher, the late Judy Canfora, and her love of nature, made a lifelong impact on two of her colleagues, Colleen Bartlein, the middle school administrative secretary, and Chris Bosetti a middle school science teacher (both of whom are retiring themselves this year) and their children. To honor Judy’s life, Colleen and Chris organized a group of Judy’s former colleagu...

Today we’re celebrating excellence here on the podcast - specifically in our language education program. Recently three of our students did exceptionally well at the 2023 Wisconsin Spanish State Pronunciation Contest. For the second year in a row two students earned a first-place award, and this year another student won a second-place award. Today we’ll hear from these three talented middle school...

Mason Cooley, an American thinker and writer, once said What lies behind “appearance is usually another appearance.” That can be taken a number of ways, but when I think of it from the perspective of the District’s efforts to rejuvenate our athletic fields, I think of the depth and breadth of what that project will do for South Milwaukee - for our students, for our residents, and for our appearanc...

Our music students not only work pieces for school, but they also have their own interests and passion for the art. What I have for you today is what I'm calling – until NPR tells me not to – a Tiny Office Concert. It’s a performance, really, not a concert, of a song or piece of music that a student is working on themselves – not as a part of an assignment.

We tend to put ourselves in boxes - sports kids, art kids, theater kids. In this episode, we throw that notion out as we explore all the aspects of what goes into a big production like a spring musical. At least at South Milwaukee, the spring musical is a near-total community effort. Career and Tech students build the sets and run the sound, art students paint the sets, and the cast is made up of...

Music teachers are exceptionally hard-working, talented, and energetic people in schools full of dedicated hard-working, and talented teachers. Today on the podcast I’m excited to share some rehearsal music from our schools and introduce just two of South Milwaukee’s own seriously talented music teachers to explain how we teach music and the varied and valuable benefits of a good education in musi...

History in our country is a pendulum, swinging back and forth, directing where we pour our energy. The 1990s and early 2000s saw a push toward a college education and attendance for all of our students because a high school diploma was no longer adequate for the job market. That pendulum has swung again, maybe to somewhere in the middle and we’re finding rewarding, well-paid careers are not only f...