ASA Landscape Poll: What Voters Think

For me, the most interesting result of the poll taken at the beginning of the year is how much voters want radical change in MPS. For example, when forced to choose between two statements:

With the right leadership in place, MPS as it exists today can make solid progress on improving achievement over the next few years

or

MPS has so many problems that something drastic needs to change for Milwaukee to make any real progress on student achievement

62% of those who answered chose the latter. This dissatisfaction is reflected in several other of the responses, including low ratings for both MPS and the school board.

From a board member viewpoint, having served for the past two years on a very divided school board, the most striking response was the nearly 90% of the respondents who preferred that the school board should "put aside their ideological differences, and unite to provide real solutions" compared to those who agreed that members "should stick to their principles."

Another striking impression is how little most results varied by district or by race. In part, this may reflect that the populations in the three districts are more similar than different. For example, they were overwhelmingly Democratic or independent; there were few self-identified Republicans. Then president-elect Obama was by far the most popular of any of the public figures mentioned in the survey.