News and Updates

WILL filed a lawsuit in federal court challenging the unconstitutional race discrimination in the American Rescue Plan’s provision to offer loan forgiveness based on racial categories. WILL filed the lawsuit last week in the Eastern District of Wisconsin on behalf of five plaintiffs from Wisconsin, Minnesota, South Dakota, and Ohio. Each plaintiff would be eligible for the federal loan forgiveness program, but for their race.

Read more about the lawsuit here.

WILL President and General Counsel, Rick Esenberg, will participate in Wisconsin Supreme Court oral arguments in St. Augustine v. Taylor, a lawsuit first filed by WILL in 2016. The state Supreme Court will decide how Wisconsin’s Department of Public Instruction (DPI) determines whether two or more schools are “private schools affiliated with the same religious denomination.” In the case before the court, DPI is determining the availability of a government benefit – transportation aid – based on the state agency’s definition of “Catholic.”

Read more about the lawsuit here.

Tune in to Wisconsin Supreme Court oral arguments at 9:45 am, Tuesday, on WisconsinEye.

Research Director, Will Flanders, dives into the latest controversy in Milwaukee over charter schools. MPS and the political environment are, once again, making the wrong choices for children.

Read more here.

For National Charter School Week 2021, WILL is hosting a conversation about public charter schools in Wisconsin. Director of Education Policy, Libby Sobic, will discuss the past, present and future of public charter schools with Vanessa Moran, the Director of the Office of Educational Opportunity with the UW System.

Register here for the Zoom webinar on May 11 at 10:00 am.

Director of Education Policy, Libby Sobic, argues that Congress must prioritize funding for the federal Charter Schools Program. Despite overwhelming evidence that charter schools continue to provide quality education options to millions of families, ideological opponents are threatening to cut funding.

Read Libby's piece at the Thomas B. Fordham Institute here.

WILL President and General Counsel, Rick Esenberg, and Dan Lennington, Deputy Counsel, write in the Cap Times how race-based scholarships, like the one WILL is challenging in court, amount to a new form of state-sponsored race discrimination.

Read more here.

Read more about WILL's lawsuit here.

WILL is hiring an Administrative Assistant to provide administrative support to the attorneys and directors at WILL.

Learn more about the Administrative Assistant position here.
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