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• Twelve years after the Kewaunee Power Station shuttered, wounding the local economy, owner EnergySolutions is seeking government approval to build a new nuclear plant at the site — and is trying to buy hundreds of acres of farmland around it. 

• EnergySolutions and gas and electric utility WEC Energy Group say they’re eyeing the station for a new build because they expect data centers, artificial intelligence and industrial growth to increase electricity demand in the coming decades.

• While local residents hope a new plant could bring economic growth, unanswered questions about use of the additional land are making some uneasy.

On a soupy September morning in northeast Wisconsin, a blue semi-truck arrives at Tisch Mills Farm Center in the tiny town of Carlton. Under the hopper of a massive grain bin, roughly 50,000 pounds of ground corn slide down a chute and into the truck’s open back. Within minutes, the driver pulls back onto the road to haul the feed to an Algoma dairy farm, where livestock will eat it. 

This process repeats roughly a dozen times each day, with some trucks transporting grain or fertilizer to customers in Illinois and Minnesota. Business is booming, but President Chris Kohnle worries the 80-year-old, family-run establishment could soon take a blow. 

The reason? The nuclear power plant a few miles up the road, which has sat lifeless for over a decade. 

Twelve years after the Kewaunee Power Station shuttered, wounding the local economy, owner EnergySolutions is seeking government approval to build a new nuclear plant at the site — and is trying to buy hundreds of acres of farmland around it. While local residents hope a new plant could bring economic growth, unanswered questions about use of the additional land are making some uneasy. 

“We’ll be losing land that people grow grain on, that people have fertilized, so that will be a detriment to us,” Kohnle said. 

EnergySolutions and gas and electric utility WEC Energy Group say they’re eyeing the station in the small Kewaunee County town for a new build because they expect data centers, artificial intelligence and industrial growth to increase electricity demand in the coming decades. The plans are in the early stages, and construction likely wouldn’t start until the early 2030s if approved.  

Though they’re attempting to purchase hundreds of acres from locals, the companies haven’t confirmed they intend to construct anything at the site beyond a nuclear plant. But residents are demanding reassurance that the land won’t be used for controversial projects dividing other communities, such as data centers. Officials haven’t ruled out the possibility. 

Town of Carlton Chairman David Hardtke says town officials have heard from data center companies interested in the site, which is making people nervous.

 “The people in Carlton don’t want anything to do with that,” he said.

Despite the nerves, many residents are eager for the economic boost a new nuclear plant could bring to the region. Nuclear energy experts in Wisconsin say communities often enjoy hosting a plant because it creates stable jobs and increases local tax revenues. The project would likely bring thousands of jobs across different sectors, according to WEC.

“The nuclear waste is sitting there anyway, so they can’t do anything else with the property,” Hardtke said. “I’d like to see it rebuilt. They never should have shut it down. … Just rebuild it and start producing power again and we can lower our taxes again.”

A bitter history 

Though the industrial 900-acre facility clashes with its picturesque Lake Michigan backdrop and the surrounding farmland, it once lived in harmony with Kewaunee County and the 1,000-person town of Carlton.

Opened in 1974, the plant was Carlton’s economic engine. The roughly $400,000 it paid in utility taxes funded most of the town’s budget. The station provided hundreds of jobs and employed hundreds of visiting workers who regularly traveled to the area and fueled the local hospitality industry.

But that symbiotic relationship turned sour in 2012 when Dominion, the plant’s then-owner, abruptly announced it would close the facility for economic reasons. 

“I was plowing my field over there on the corner, and channel two, channel five, channel 11, channel 26 — they’re all sitting down there at the end of the field waiting for me,” said Hardtke, gesturing to the land that stretches beyond his yellow house. “They wanted a sob story. That’s what they wanted. And, me, I said, ‘The sun’s gonna come up tomorrow morning, and life goes on.’”

Though the town official was nonchalant about the news, it wasn’t so easy. In the years that followed, the region’s economy took repeated hits. 

Residents recall a mass exodus of plant workers, whose sizable salaries once circulated through the county. Scores of employees put their houses on the market at once, causing prices to drop and sales to slow. Absent the tax revenue from the plant, Carlton officials were forced to raise taxes to close the roughly $400,000 hole in their budget. Kewaunee County introduced a sales tax that continues today. 

Finally, a legal battle between Carlton and Dominion ensnared several parties for years. 

In 2015, Carlton officials hired appraisers who assessed the shuttered plant’s property at $457 million. Dominion sued the town, claiming it was worth about $1.3 million. After years of clashing, they settled outside of court in 2017, agreeing to set the property’s value at $15 million and for the county, the school district and the technical college to repay the nearly $12 million in property taxes Dominion paid during the battle.

“They were big business. They didn’t care about Kewaunee, or the town of Carlton, or anything. All they wanted was dollar signs,” Hardtke said. 

Dominion sold the plant to Utah-based EnergySolutions in 2022. Since then, a smaller number of workers have chipped away at decommissioning the plant — a decades-long process of cleaning up nuclear waste.

But absent the big industry, the area has become “stagnant,” observes Kewaunee resident Dan Giannotti. He said there’s a major lack of development and no real economic draw for people to stay in the area.

“A lot of people drive on (state Highway) 29 into Green Bay for decent-paying jobs. Every day, back and forth. That’s a 30-mile trip, basically. … These poor kids that graduate high school,” Giannotti said, “they’re gonna have to leave to find good-paying jobs.”

Data center rumors spook Carlton

Several months ago, Carlton resident Glenn Mueller received unexpected mail: an offer from EnergySolutions to buy the 60 acres of land he owns neighboring the nuclear plant at $20,000 per acre. 

When several residents received such offers, rumors about the company’s intentions quickly swirled. 

Frustrated by EnergySolutions “buying up land behind our backs” and eager for answers, Hardtke organized a town hall meeting. Over 100 residents attended and demanded transparency about what the land would be used for. 

The next week, EnergySolutions announced it is seeking the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s approval to build a new nuclear facility at the site. 

“We are excited to partner with WEC Energy Group to explore the next generation of nuclear power,” EnergySolutions CEO Ken Robuck said in a press release. “With rising energy demand driven by data centers, artificial intelligence and industrial growth, the need for reliable, carbon-free power has never been greater.”

Nuclear energy has garnered increased support from state lawmakers in recent years, especially as data centers are planned to sprout up around the state. A bipartisan bill passed in July made it easier to construct nuclear power plants. 

“If you look around the country, different legislators and different legislative bodies and policymakers in general are trying to figure out how to position their states to benefit from that growth and not be left behind,” said Paul Wilson, chair of University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Department of Nuclear Engineering & Engineering Physics. 

“I think our state policymakers are keen to make sure Wisconsin doesn’t miss out on this,” Wilson said.

Kewaunee is an attractive location because it has hosted a nuclear reactor before, Wilson said. Plus, some infrastructure like transmission lines is still in place. If the site was to be pursued for a data center, the location’s proximity to fresh water is also ideal — data centers need cooling methods to prevent overheating, and Lake Michigan is a good source if used responsibly, Wilson said. 

At an August meeting, Hardtke said the town board heard from data center companies interested in the site. He feels EnergySolutions is “playing with a lot of people’s lives” by not being more transparent. 

“I’m dead set against (building a data center). I was born a farmer, and I’m always proud to be one,” Hardtke said. “I don’t like to see land wasted for that.”

EnergySolutions did not respond to multiple calls and emails from Wisconsin Watch. Asked if there are hopes to build a data processing center at the site, Brendan Conway, the WEC spokesperson, said, “We work regularly with companies across all industries looking to expand their operations. I do not have any specific information about any new developments but we expect electricity demand in Wisconsin to grow significantly and steadily in the coming decades.”

The nonanswers have left Mueller torn about whether to sell his acreage, which borders the nuclear site. He currently leases some of the land to a local family business that uses it to grow hay, and Mueller lets people hunt in the wooded areas. He’s always figured he’d pass it on to his kids. Now, he’s not so sure. 

To make an informed decision, Mueller wants to know what EnergySolutions would use the land for, but nobody has given him those answers. He’s spent hundreds of dollars to have a lawyer review the offer and has debated making a counteroffer. 

“There’d be a lot of people pissed off if I do sell it,” Mueller said. But he’s “not that young anymore,” he said, and the sale could allow him to fully retire and help his children financially.  

“I think everybody in the town is agreeable, happy that nuclear was here,” he said. “I don’t think anybody is upset that it would come back in, but we’re just all upset, as far as we don’t get any answers.”

Eager for an economic boost 

While nuclear power’s potential return to the county has sparked many questions, locals are still largely optimistic about the economic boost it would bring. 

“Jobs, economics, taxes — I think it’d be a great thing,” said Milt Swagel, a county board member who has lived on his Kewaunee farm since 1987. “We have lots of power. I don’t want to be like California or other places with brownouts or blackouts. No, I like my lights.”

Giannotti attends a weekly coffee group with eight other Kewaunee residents, and the nuclear plant has been a popular topic of discussion, including speculation about what will be built at the site. He’s eager to see if nuclear power’s return would help Kewaunee County grow. 

“If you bring in an employer like that who is paying, you’re going to see development,” Giannotti said. “You’re going to see new homes being built and more businesses move in. Because right now, we’re just stagnant. Nothing’s happening to speak of.”

“If that power plant gets going, I think that could ignite.”

WEC Energy Group estimated the project would employ thousands of workers in the region. This includes electrical, civil, chemical and mechanical engineering workers to design and operate the new reactor, plus skilled trades workers such as electricians, welders, pipefitters and construction workers to build it. 

“What you typically find is that communities that have hosted nuclear reactors quite like having them there, because it’s good jobs, it’s tax dollars,” said Ben Lindley, assistant professor at UW-Madison’s Department of Nuclear Engineering & Engineering Physics. 

The addition could also keep more young nuclear engineers in Wisconsin. The state only has one plant, located in Two Rivers, so nuclear engineering graduates often have to look for jobs in other states to break into the field, Lindley said. 

He added that the plant would likely require bringing in nonlocal workers for construction. Even then, the workers would spend several years in the region and “inject money into the local economy.” 

Andy DiMezza, who lives in nearby Denmark, said he would be eager to work at the nuclear plant. DiMezza studied nuclear chemistry in college, and his wife, Sarah, interned at Kewaunee Power Station when it was operating. She also worked on the Two Rivers plant’s emergency response plan — government-mandated preparation for radiological emergencies — and would want to contribute to Kewaunee’s. 

There are still “numerous steps to get through” to determine if the site is suitable for a new plant, Conway said, including the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s “rigorous” permitting process. It could take up to two years for the project to move forward. 

If a permit is granted, Conway estimated construction on the plant could begin in the early 2030s, and the plant could come online in 2038 or 2039.

Before that day comes, residents hope they can make their voices and concerns heard. 

“I’m trying to make as much noise as possible,” Hardtke said. 

“People in Carlton want to be informed,” he said. “They, I think, have a love for the town, just like I do.”

Miranda Dunlap reports on pathways to success in northeast Wisconsin, working in partnership with Open Campus.

Nuclear power could return to Kewaunee County. Some locals have reservations. is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

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• Wisconsin Watch asked two professors in the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Department of Nuclear Engineering & Engineering Physics how a new nuclear plant in Kewaunee County would impact the local workforce and economy.

• They believe there is a ready pipeline of qualified workers in the state to keep up with that added demand.

• Electrical, civil, chemical and mechanical engineering workers will be needed to design and operate the new reactor. The project will also require many people in the skilled trades, such as electricians, welders, pipefitters and other construction workers.

• Many institutions could play a role in preparing workers for jobs at a nuclear power plant, including UW-Madison and Lakeshore Technical College.

In a small farming community off the shore of Lake Michigan, Kewaunee County’s nuclear power plant has sat lifeless for over a decade. But increased demand for power driven by artificial intelligence and data centers could change that. 

Plant owner EnergySolutions and WEC Energy Group are asking the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission for approval to build a new nuclear facility at the site. If it is granted, officials expect construction could begin in the early 2030s and the plant could come online by 2040. The process would likely require labor from thousands of workers, WEC spokesperson Brendan Conway said.

Wisconsin Watch asked two professors in the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Department of Nuclear Engineering & Engineering Physics how this might impact the local workforce and economy. 

Here’s what to know. 

Does Wisconsin have enough nuclear engineers for a new plant?

Bringing a new power station online means Wisconsin would need more nuclear engineers to design and operate the plant.

Department Chair Paul Wilson and Assistant Professor Ben Lindley believe there is a ready pipeline of qualified workers in the state to keep up with that added demand. 

UW-Madison “pumps out” nuclear engineers, but Wisconsin has only one nuclear plant located in Two Rivers, Lindley said. This leaves some graduates to look for employment in other states. 

“A lot of them want to stay in the state, and so having more job opportunities would certainly help,” Lindley said. 

While there is increased interest in nuclear engineering professions today, Lindley said, the industry does have a gap that is harder to fill: workers in their 40s. 

Many people who flocked to nuclear engineering in the 1970s and 1980s are now retiring, leaving a gap between aging workers and those entering the workforce. The profession has the challenge of training up these younger workers while trying to hang onto older employees for as long as possible.

“When we stopped doing nuclear in the U.S. and elsewhere in the West, there’s that gap in skills of people who weren’t really trained up in the ’90s,” Lindley said. “That’s a trickier one to fill. And the whole sector has that problem.”

There were 78 nuclear engineers employed in Wisconsin in 2022, the most recently available state data shows, and the workforce was projected to shrink by seven jobs by 2032. Those in the occupation made a median salary of $106,740 in 2024. Nuclear engineers typically need a bachelor’s degree in nuclear engineering or a related field at minimum.

What other workers will be needed?

In the grand scheme, nuclear engineers are likely the minority of workers who will be needed if a new plant opens, Lindley said. The construction and the operation of the plant are distinct phases that will require a healthy mix of blue- and white-collar workers. 

While Kewaunee Power Station is still standing, EnergySolutions has been decommissioning it — cleaning up nuclear waste and radioactive materials to dismantle the plant — since 2022, meaning the old reactor will not be brought back online, Conway said. It would be a new facility, requiring the construction of a nuclear reactor. 

The companies will need electrical, civil, chemical and mechanical engineering workers to design and operate the new reactor. They’ll also need many people in the skilled trades, such as electricians, welders, pipefitters, and other construction workers to carry out the project. 

“What you’ve seen in other plants like this is, it’s a blend of training local people, sourcing from firms that are already in the state, including construction firms, and then also they’d probably need people coming in from outside in the building phase, as well,” Lindley said. “That’s just because of the amount of people you need, and it’s also the skills that you need. Ideally, you want construction firms involved who have been involved in other nuclear construction projects.”

This is where Wisconsin’s skilled labor shortages may be felt the most. The state has struggled to meet the demand for labor in such professions.

“You need a lot of people in the skilled trades,” Wilson said. “This is a national concern – of whether we can keep up the pipeline of workers.”

That’s why employers have sought to push more prospective workers into apprenticeships, or programs that combine paid, on-the-job training with employer-sponsored classroom learning at a technical college. Apprenticeship participation hit an all-time high in 2024, with construction apprenticeships topping the list. However, Wisconsin still lags neighboring states in apprenticeship participation.

The Wisconsin Department of Workforce Development includes construction workers, welders and electricians on its  “hot jobs” list — which names well-paying, high-growth jobs. It estimates the occupations have a combined 6,000 jobs open annually. 

Who trains people for this work? 

Many institutions could play a role in preparing workers for the roles needed at a nuclear power plant. 

Roughly 30 students graduate annually from UW-Madison’s nuclear engineering program.

Lakeshore Technical College in Cleveland has been training workers who have hands-on experience at the Kewaunee Power Station, despite it being nonoperational. The college partners with EnergySolutions to supply workers for the decommissioning process. Company officials have said the partnership allows people to work at the plant for several years and then take their skills to other nuclear facilities. 

Beyond this, there’s been a “chicken and egg” problem when it comes to expanding nuclear energy job training, Wilson said. Without a growing industry in the state, it’s been difficult to justify having more programs at higher education institutions. But that could change once Kewaunee Power Station’s future becomes clear. 

“If we were to have signals that these things would be growing, then I think we could do a lot of work,” Wilson said. “We would be eager to engage, from the University of Wisconsin here to some of those technical colleges to help them stand up and set up programs to make sure those people are prepared.”

Some skilled trades workers would also likely undergo further on-the-job training, Wilson said, because there are usually nuclear- and site-specific requirements beyond the typical union-based training to work at a power plant.

Here’s what the return of nuclear power to Kewaunee County means for Wisconsin’s workforce is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

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• Northeast Wisconsin’s fastest-growing jobs span a variety of industries, including health care and logistics.  

• Jobs in the region with the most openings tend to have low barriers to entry and tend to pay relatively low wages. 

• While the paper industry has a strong foothold in the northeast, paper goods machine operators are expected to lose the most positions.

What are the roughly 450,000 workers in northeast Wisconsin doing for a living? And how will that change in the next decade? We pored over state workforce data to find out. 

Below are six charts you can use to make sense of which jobs are growing and shrinking across the region. 

Wisconsin Watch also published a version with data that encompasses jobs across the entire state.

This article is solely focused on job trends in northeast Wisconsin. As we continue to build our new northeast Wisconsin bureau, you can expect us to provide more stories tailored to the region. 

Wisconsin’s Department of Workforce Development — the state agency from which we sourced this data — defines the “Bay Area” as Brown, Door, Florence, Kewaunee, Manitowoc, Marinette, Menominee, Oconto, Outagamie, Shawano and Sheboygan counties. 

To learn more about any of these jobs, including what the work entails, how much it pays and how to get trained, visit a website like careeronestop.org, onetonline.org or skillexplorer.wisconsin.gov.

Jobs growing rapidly

Home health and personal care aides are the fastest-growing occupation in the region, expected to add nearly 1,200 jobs by 2032. Wisconsin will need more workers to assist older adults as the state’s population continues to age significantly, with the number of residents over the age of 74 expected to increase 41% between 2020 and 2030.

Several of the occupations on this list are already some of the most popular in the region, so the hundreds to thousands of jobs they’re expected to add represent a smaller share of the area’s overall workforce. When looking at growth by percentage, some other occupations are expected to add a smaller number of jobs, but they will constitute a larger share of the workforce.

The occupations expected to grow most percentage-wise include:

• Nurse practitioners, projected to grow 62% by adding 450 jobs.
• Data scientists, projected to grow 47% by adding 148 jobs. 
• Physician assistants, projected to grow 41% by adding 128 jobs.
• Actuaries, projected to grow 41% by adding 49 jobs.
• Information security analysts, projected to grow 41% by adding 115 jobs.

Jobs with the most openings

Some occupations have lots of openings each year — not necessarily because the industry is growing but because there are more people leaving their roles.

Many of the jobs projected to have the most future openings have low barriers to entry, meaning they don’t require formal education or certification to obtain. They also pay relatively low wages — for example, topping the list is fast food counter workers, who made an average salary of $27,890 in the region in 2024. 

Most common jobs

Many of the jobs that have the most openings each year are also the most common jobs for northeast Wisconsinites to hold. 

The 10 most common occupations in the region span largely essential jobs, including the workers who treat you at the hospital, those keeping the region’s restaurant industry alive and the people who make sure your packages are safely packed and delivered. 

The most rapidly shrinking jobs

While the paper industry has a strong foothold in the northeast, paper goods machine operators top the list for anticipated job loss. This includes workers who tend paper goods machines that convert, saw, corrugate or seal paper or paperboard sheets into products.

Other industries are expected to lose fewer jobs, but those losses will make a larger dent in the profession. Some of the occupations expected to lose the most percentage-wise are:

• Broadcast technicians, expected to lose 35 jobs, a 60% decrease. 
• Word processors and typists, expected to lose 10 jobs, a 37% decrease. 
• Nuclear engineers, expected to lose eight jobs, a 23% decrease. 
• Pressers, textile, garment, and related materials, expected to lose 18 jobs for a 20% decrease.
• Data entry keyers, expected to lose 72 jobs, a 19% decrease. 

Most of these occupations — telemarketers, typists and data entry keyers — are based on outdated technologies or practices, so the fact that they’re shrinking quickly may not be surprising. 

Northeast Wisconsin’s ‘Hot Jobs’

Wisconsin’s Department of Workforce Development keeps a list of the “Hot Jobs” in every region of the state. To be classified as such, the occupation must pay above the state’s median salary, have an above-average growth rate and top the list of projected job openings.

Use the table to explore what education and training northeast Wisconsin’s “Hot Jobs” provide, what they pay and how they’re expected to grow. 

Note: This data may be slightly skewed by the COVID-19 pandemic. The department says it accounts for pandemic impacts “as accurately as possible.” Some occupations that regularly have large growth rates didn’t make the cut if they didn’t show a significant decline in 2020 followed by a notable recovery, the department notes.

See how any job is expected to change

Is there a job you’re curious about that didn’t make one of our charts? Use this searchable database of hundreds of occupations to see how each is expected to change in the northeast region by 2032. 

We’re planning follow-up coverage related to Wisconsin’s fastest-growing fields. Which jobs would you like to learn more about? Fill out this short Google form to let us know.

Miranda Dunlap reports on pathways to success in northeast Wisconsin, working in partnership with Open Campus. Connect with her on X, Instagram or Bluesky. Email her at mdunlap@wisconsinwatch.org.

Natalie Yahr reports on pathways to success in Wisconsin, working in partnership with Open Campus. Email her at nyahr@wisconsinwatch.org.

Job hunting in northeast Wisconsin? Check out these charts is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

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• Pay raises and other efforts have done little to ease the 911 dispatcher shortage in Brown County: The county is short more than one in three of its needed dispatchers. 

• Boosting pay isn’t enough to attract and retain dispatchers, experts say – departments must boost morale, get creative with hiring and training and address the mental health toll the job takes. 

• Waukesha County officials made changes that show promise: The county’s 911 center went from over half-vacant to almost fully staffed in two years. 

• Furthermore, advocates support federal legislation that would reclassify all 911 dispatchers as first responders, which would allow dispatchers to access benefits like additional mental health resources.

For years, Brown County has struggled to hire people to answer 911 calls and coordinate responses to emergencies. Its emergency dispatch center was among many that grappled with worsened staffing shortages after the COVID-19 pandemic. 

But as the crisis eases nationwide, major shortages still beset Brown County’s 911 center. Despite past pay raises and other efforts, the county is missing more than one in three of its needed dispatchers. Industry experts say boosting pay isn’t enough to attract dispatchers nowadays. Departments must also boost morale, get creative with hiring and training and address the mental health toll the job takes. 

Waukesha County’s 911 center offers an example of how such measures can help alleviate shortages. It placed a laser focus on employee mental well-being and went from over half-vacant to almost fully staffed in two years.

The Brown County vacancies haven’t impacted how quickly dispatchers pick up the phone when residents dial 911 — employees still answer faster than the national standard recommends. But some county leaders are worried that mistakes will be made if the issue continues.

Only one of the five elected supervisors who helm a committee overseeing the county’s public safety operations answered calls and emails for this story. Supervisor Michael LaBouve, who represents most of the east side of De Pere, told Wisconsin Watch the county is following a plan to address the shortage and solving it is “going to take time.”

“I think we’re all seeing progress, so that’s all I have to communicate about that,” LaBouve said. “I feel good about what’s happening.”

But at 19 employees short, the center tallies more vacancies today than it did several years ago when the county first prioritized the crisis, and some are losing their patience. 

During a public meeting in late May, supervisors aired their frustration at the lack of progress. Dispatchers worked a combined 8,600 hours of overtime so far this year, the department said, and they’ve routinely taken to local government meetings to voice their experiences with stress and burnout. 

“Looking at us to go 60, 70, potentially 80 hours and being called in on the days off and 24/7 is just — it’s mind-boggling,” dispatcher Kirk Parker said during a May meeting. 

Money not the answer?

Staffing shortages have plagued the public safety communications industry for years, but the issue peaked during the COVID-19 pandemic. Between 2019 and 2023, about one in four dispatch jobs across the country were vacant, research by the International Academies of Emergency Dispatch suggested. 

There are still “alarming strains” on the industry, but there are recent signs of progress, said April Heinze, chief of 911 operations for the National Emergency Number Association, a national nonprofit of dispatch industry professionals. Research by NENA shows 74% of centers reported having vacant positions in 2025, improved from 82% in 2024. 

However, those improvements aren’t reflected locally. Brown County was short 19 staffers in early August, according to officials, leaving about 35% of the center vacant. 

“Like playing a game of Whack-a-Mole: as quickly as one issue can be addressed, another issue pops up,” Chancy Huntzinger, Brown County’s director of public safety communications, said in a statement to Wisconsin Watch. 

In 2023, in one of its first major efforts to attract and retain staff, Brown County’s Board of Supervisors voted to allocate over $400,000 for raises, retention bonuses and a starting pay boost. Pay now starts at $24.60 per hour, according to the department. 

But the raises haven’t attracted more staff the way county leaders hoped. The center is currently short more employees than when the pay bumps were approved.

“Obviously, pay is not always the most important thing,” Heinze said. Data from the study NENA completed in May showed the largest affliction for dispatchers across the country is burnout. 

Plus, the pay boost didn’t do much to make Brown County stand out to job seekers. The department’s minimum pay is middle-of-the-pack compared to other northeast Wisconsin counties.

Waukesha’s methods show promise

Roughly two hours south, Waukesha County’s 911 agency has made outsized progress in solving its dispatcher shortage. 

When COVID-19 prompted the “Great Resignation,” dozens of dispatchers left Waukesha County Communications Center for higher-paying, lower-stress jobs in public safety technology startups, utility company call centers and other nearby 911 centers.

By October 2023, the center was over half empty. Down over 20 dispatchers, senior staff were forced to pick up call-taking shifts. Staff worked during their time off. Employees regularly picked up back-to-back 12-hour shifts.

“People were starting to feel burnt out, and really it became a snowball effect,” said Gail Goodchild, the county’s emergency preparedness director. “We saw bad attitudes. People didn’t want to come into work. The culture was waning.”

Department leaders realized they needed “all hands on deck” to turn things around, Goodchild said — which they did. According to NENA, they had only two vacancies in July. 

The department did raise pay, bringing the starting hourly wage to $29.44 from roughly $27. This helped, but “wasn’t the leading thing that really turned us around,” Goodchild said. Department leaders also parted with staff they felt “didn’t contribute to a positive culture.” They revamped their hiring and training processes and eased the job requirements. And they introduced an intense focus on dispatchers’ mental health.

Waukesha’s hiring process once heavily relied on CritiCall, a software commonly used in 911 centers that tests potential dispatchers’ skills at multitasking, decision-making, map reading and more. It was determined the test was “weeding people out that would have probably been a really good fit,” said Chris Becker, Waukesha’s communications operations manager. 

“We looked at our numbers in that and determined that there was no correlation between our successful trainees and their CritiCall scores being high,” Becker said. “So we tossed that out.” 

Now, the hiring committee strictly focuses on if a candidate will fit the department’s culture. To ensure people learn the hard skills the exam measures, the department has refined and revamped its training. (Brown County candidates must pass the CritiCall exam to be hired, and the county has not considered changing that, Huntzinger said.)

Waukesha also removed its two-year work experience requirement from the job description to yield more candidates, a move it may soon reverse because it’s seen that having “some of that life experience” is good, Becker said. 

Finally, the county ramped up mental health support to dispatchers. In addition to regular benefits offered in the county’s employee assistance program, it contracted a local mental health provider specializing in first responders. Dispatchers now regularly attend mandatory, confidential 90-minute meetings with the providers, who help employees work through vicarious trauma, a type of trauma common among first responders that compounds when hearing, reading or witnessing distressing events. The grant-funded initiative costs roughly $16,000 for 18 months, Becker said. 

“In case our staff ever gets to a point where they need them, they feel more comfortable to reach out for that help, rather than living with it and burying it and then getting to that point of burnout again,” Becker said.

Brown County has not explored increased mental health support as a method of retention. Staff are encouraged to visit the Public Safety Communications director’s office if they have concerns, and they can receive counseling benefits through the county’s employee assistance program, Huntzinger said. 

“We’re listening to people’s worst days, right? We hang up the phone when the first responders get there, and then it’s left to our imagination to fill in the blanks,” Becker said. “But some of those traumatic calls just don’t go away, and they’ll pop up at random times, or a call three years later will remind you of a call that you took, and you’re right back to that place again. … It’s super important for our staff to have that outlet.”

Looking ahead

After bumping pay, Brown County’s Board of Supervisors requested an independent review of the dispatch center in 2024. The report, delivered in January 2025, made 65 recommendations on how the center could improve operations and its staffing. 

The department has made mixed progress on implementing the recommendations, which vary in complexity, and gives monthly progress updates to the board’s Public Safety Committee.

Per the advice of the consultants, the department introduced employee referral bonuses and now has candidates visit the call center before they interview, rather than after.

The department will also hire “traveling dispatchers” — temporary contractors who will work at the center for six months to cover some shifts, Huntzinger said. She did not answer a question from Wisconsin Watch about how much this will cost the county. 

Next year, the center will introduce a new shift schedule to help it operate more effectively with less staff, Huntzinger said. Though consultants recommended the county’s “unnecessarily complex” schedule be changed immediately, it was delayed following employee pushback. 

The report also suggested the county “substantially expand” partnerships with local education institutions to create a pipeline of candidates. Northeast Wisconsin Technical College, which offers workforce training in emergency dispatch, said it has not been formally assigned  recruitment efforts but it aims to support the region’s workforce needs. 

In the last four years, 84 students have completed programs that certify them in emergency dispatch. Twenty-seven of those included a tour of the Brown County Dispatch Center.

“One of the biggest barriers is awareness,” Jeff Steeber, the college’s associate dean of public safety, said of the struggle to get students into the field. “Many students enter our programs without knowing that emergency dispatch is a viable and rewarding career option.”

Industry leaders have spent years advocating for legislation they believe would change this. 

The federal 911 Saves Act, championed by both NENA and Waukesha leaders, would reclassify all 911 dispatchers as first responders for the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, which currently lists them as clerical or secretarial employees, alongside office clerks and taxi dispatchers.

This would allow dispatchers to access a slate of benefits, such as increased mental health resources, and it would reinforce the cruciality of the job, Heinze said.

“You hear little kids say, ‘I want to be a firefighter. I want to be a police officer,’” Goodchild said. “They don’t look at a 911 telecommunicator dispatcher as a career path. That hurts the industry, too.”

Eighteen states have passed their own laws reclassifying telecommunicators, but Wisconsin is not one of them.

“We’re hopeful this year that it is going to (pass), and it would help us, I think, very, very, very much,” Heinze said. 

Miranda Dunlap reports on pathways to success in northeast Wisconsin, working in partnership with Open Campus.

Brown County’s 911 dispatcher shortage is relentless. What will it take to fix it? is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

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Click here to read highlights from the story

• Northeast Wisconsin Technical College is part of a growing trend of technical colleges moving to shorter courses, and it’s among few to offer classes almost exclusively in an eight-week semester model.

• Administrators and instructors say the intensive pace helps students perform better and prevents them from dropping out when they face hardships outside of school.

• NWTC’s retention and graduation rates have improved since the college began offering shorter courses.

Halfway through his Monday morning class at Northeast Wisconsin Technical College’s Green Bay campus last month, Patrick Parise instructed his Introduction to Ethics students to hold up their fingers: one if they’re confused about the lesson, 10 if they’ve mastered it. When met with a sea of “jazz hands,” he moves on to review the next chapter.  

The students will take their final exam several days later, after absorbing major ethical theories and key philosophers’ views in just eight weeks — half the length of the traditional 16-week college course. 

That’s because NWTC leaders have overhauled nearly every course in recent years, accelerating them to move twice as quickly. Administrators and instructors say the intensive pace helps students perform better and prevents them from dropping out when they face hardships outside of school.

NWTC is part of a growing national trend of colleges moving to shorter courses, but it’s one of fewer to offer eight-week classes almost exclusively. Many others have recently flirted with the idea by piloting a smaller share of shortened course options. 

“Everybody wants shortened learning. Nobody wants to be in a class for 16 weeks anymore. That’s not the pace of learning,” said Kathryn Rogalski, the college’s vice president of academic affairs and workforce development. “That faster pace, that more intensive time together, I think, is making the difference.”

The schedule at NWTC splits the traditional semester in half — for example, rather than taking four classes over the course of 16 weeks, a student would complete two speedier classes in the first eight weeks, then complete two more in the latter half of the semester. 

Proponents of the approach say juggling fewer classes allows students to focus better while some worry the brisk pace makes it easier to fall behind. 

The transition required a heavy lift, which came with challenges. Some students say the swift pace required a learning curve, and administrators acknowledge that starting a new slate of courses every eight weeks can be intense. 

But data suggests the switch has brought positive change to the 23,000-student college. Retention rates are up, meaning fewer students are dropping out. Students are earning higher grades on average. More are graduating on time. 

Parise, who has taught at NWTC since 2007, says his students engage more in shorter courses. In the 16-week model, he would have taught the ethics students once a week. Now he sees them twice weekly, which reduces the material students forget between classes and strengthens relationships, he said. 

“I find classes develop a far better sense of a learning community,” Parise said. “That’s huge … in the classes that I teach, creating an environment where students feel safe and comfortable and share ideas and ask questions — I don’t know that you can teach somebody ethics without having an environment like that.”

Shortening courses to limit ‘stopping out’

In 2018, NWTC leaders contemplated how they could reduce the number of students who were “stopping out,” or withdrawing from their studies with the intention of returning later, at the six-week mark. 

At least one in three NWTC students rely on federal financial assistance to afford college costs, and many have jobs and families — meaning nonacademic challenges can easily derail the semester.

College leaders wanted these students to be able to “take a break when they needed to, but then not have to be gone a whole semester or a whole year before they could start back,” Rogalski said.

Breaking the semester up into smaller pieces could help, they realized. National research and data from a few short courses they already offered suggested students persist better in accelerated courses. Meanwhile, the eight-week course model was beginning to gain momentum at community colleges in Texas, showing promising results. 

“If (students) are in week six of eight, they can figure out those last two weeks of, ‘How do I figure out that child care? How do I find some transportation?’ And they can finish the courses that they started,” Rogalski said. “If they’re in week six of 16 weeks, it’s really hard for 10 more weeks to figure out how to make it through.”

So NWTC leaders went all in. By 2020, they shifted roughly half of classes to the model. By 2021, 93%. The college exempted select courses, such as clinical rotations in hospitals for nursing students, but otherwise asked all instructors to get on board. 

That sweeping overhaul across nearly every program is vital to seeing results, but it’s a feat few colleges have accomplished, said Josh Wyner, vice president of education nonprofit The Aspen Institute.

“That’s really one of the things that we’ve appreciated about Northeast Wisconsin for years, is that they went to scale when they found something that worked,” Wyner said. “If the data show that students will benefit, they ask themselves the question … ‘Why would we continue to offer things in other formats?’”

Overhauling courses isn’t easy

Accelerating college courses comes with speed bumps. 

A sick student absent for a week misses double the instruction. Financial aid payment schedules must be retooled. Some high schoolers taking dual enrollment classes must manage the condensed schedule. Instructors must revamp their courses. 

Many colleges make the mistake of “simply trying to take 16 weeks of coursework and squeeze it into eight weeks,” Wyner said. 

“It can’t be the same class when it was in 16 weeks as it is in eight weeks. It has to look different,” Rogalski said. “I don’t think any college could be successful at this if they just shrunk their curriculum and just did exactly what they were doing, but did it twice as fast.”

When Nick Bengry transferred to NWTC from Lawrence University in Appleton to save money on tuition, it came with a learning curve. The university used a lengthier semester schedule, so he worried about the transition to more rigorous courses at the technical college. In the last year he’s found “some (classes) that are a little bit rougher” than others in the eight-week format, but feels like the workload ultimately “ends up being similar.” 

“Some classes like, the medical terminology class, were really fast-paced because of the way they were designed,” said Bengry, who plans to transfer to the University of Wisconsin-Madison next year and eventually become an emergency room doctor like his father.

He also finds it easier to schedule the requirements he needs for his biomedical engineering major while juggling a job at Bellin Health. 

“It makes it easier to fit the courses you need into your semester,” Bengry said. “Each course being only half the length means that if I need to fit a course into this semester, there’s more spots — it could be the first half or the second half.”

When students do struggle with their coursework, college staff has half the time to get them back on track before their class ends.

For example, in Kristin Sericati’s developmental reading and writing class, which helps students with lower literacy skills, “resource navigators” visit the classroom during the first week to meet one-on-one with every student and advertise services like tutoring or financial assistance. The college also has an “early alert” system that enables staff to intervene with helpful resources immediately if a student isn’t showing up to class or scores poorly on an assignment.

“A student is not waiting two weeks to have some sort of support that they need, which is now a quarter of their learning experience in that class,” Matt Petersen, NWTC’s associate vice president for ​​institutional research and strategic analytics, said. “We just can’t afford that. Our students can’t afford that.”

As they’ve worked out the kinks, NWTC leaders have returned some classes to 16 weeks. One microbiology class changed back when eight weeks wasn’t enough time to grow the bacteria needed for the students’ research. Now, about 86% of courses are accelerated, fewer than the share in 2022, and administrators say they’ll continue evaluating what works best. 

Boosting retention and graduation 

Seven years after leaders conceived the overhaul, data shows it’s paying off. 

Retention for full-time students, or the share of students who stay enrolled or finish their program from one year to the next, has shot up by 19 percentage points since 2018, when the college introduced eight-week courses. Now, 77% of full-time NWTC students continue in their studies, federal data shows. Nationwide, full-time community college students had an average retention rate of 63% in 2023, according to the National Student Clearinghouse. 

Retention rates for part-time students have shown smaller growth, rising from 56% to 59%. Part-time students regularly have lower retention rates than full-time.

In addition, the share of NWTC students who graduate within three years of enrolling has risen 3% to 46% since 2018. That’s well above the national average of 35% — and a tough data point to budge, according to The Aspen Institute.

Petersen said the change also correlates with an improvement in students’ grades, with hundreds more students now receiving a “C” or above in their courses. 

Plus, students who do have to temporarily withdraw are having an easier time getting back to their studies, said Sericati, the developmental writing instructor. 

“Before, if a student is in five classes and they come up against a life issue in week six and drop out of all of their classes, they now are on (academic) warning. They failed all of these credits,” Sericati said. “Now, if a student comes up against a life issue, they likely can complete those two courses that they’re in and not have that issue when they rejoin us again in another eight-week session.” 

As colleges like NWTC share their success with shorter classes, the model is building momentum, said Karen Stout, CEO of Achieving the Dream, a nonprofit focused on community college success. For example, Western Technical College in La Crosse began transitioning to seven-week courses in the summer of 2024. 

“It is such a relief, actually, to see that this made a positive difference,” Rogalski said. “Students who probably never imagined that they could be successful in college …  They haven’t aspired to complete a degree or go on to a university, and now we’re seeing that these students have this hope that they didn’t have before. And within eight weeks, they’re seeing that they have been successful.”

Miranda Dunlap reports on pathways to success in northeast Wisconsin, working in partnership with Open Campus.

This college’s strategy for preventing dropouts? Classes half as long is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

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The Trump administration is releasing billions of dollars in withheld grants for schools, the Education Department said Friday, ending weeks of uncertainty for educators around the country who rely on the money for English language instruction, adult literacy and other programs.

President Donald Trump’s administration had suspended more than $6 billion in funding on July 1, as part of a review to ensure spending aligned with the White House’s priorities.

While the majority of funding on hold was for K-12 education, federal dollars make up a greater share of the adult education budgets.

The withheld funding included $715 million nationwide for adult education and literacy programs, which help adults complete high school, learn English and improve their literacy skills, among other services. In Wisconsin, adult education providers and technical college leaders lamented the funding freeze earlier this month in interviews with Wisconsin Watch. In a state where 340,000 adults lack a high school diploma, they said the nearly $7 million in adult education funds promised to Wisconsin were crucial in efforts to bolster a thin workforce, and they warned canceled funding would prompt layoffs and program scale-backs.

The Wisconsin Technical College System applauded the Trump administration’s announcement on Friday.

“The system is glad the administration has decided to release the funds previously approved by Congress to fund adult education in Wisconsin,” Director of Strategic Advancement Katy Pettersen said in a statement. “The system and our colleges remain committed to providing education for all students, including those who are seeking adult education to help them find family supporting careers.”

The funding freeze had been challenged by several lawsuits as educators, Congress members from both parties and others called for the administration to release the money. Congress had appropriated the money in a bill signed this year by Trump.

Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul, a Democrat, was among leaders in 24 states suing the Trump administration over the frozen funds. 

Last week, the Education Department said it would release $1.3 billion of the money for after-school and summer programming. Without the money, school districts and nonprofits such as the YMCA and Boys and Girls Club of America had said they would have to close or scale back educational offerings this fall.

The Office of Management and Budget had completed its review of the programs and will begin sending the money to states next week, the Education Department said.

A group of 10 Republican senators on July 16 sent a letter imploring the administration to allow the frozen education money to be sent to states, saying the withheld money supported programs and services that are critical to local communities.

“The programs are ones that enjoy long-standing, bipartisan support,” U.S. Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., said Friday. She pointed to after-school and summer programs that allow parents to work while their children learn and classes that help adults gain new skills — contributing to local economies.

In withholding the funds, the Office of Management and Budget had said some of the programs supported a “radical leftwing agenda.”

“We share your concern,” the GOP senators had written. “However, we do not believe that is happening with these funds.”

School superintendents had warned they would have to eliminate academic services without the money. On Friday, AASA, an association of superintendents, thanked members of Congress for pressing to release the money.

The uncertainty around the funding was an unnecessary distraction for schools, said U.S. Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash.

“Instead of spending the last many weeks figuring out how to improve after-school options and get our kids’ reading and math scores up, because of President Trump, communities across the country have been forced to spend their time cutting back on tutoring options and sorting out how many teachers they will have to lay off,” Murray said.

The grants that were under review included $2 billion in grants for teachers’ professional development and efforts to reduce class size; $1.3 billion for after-school and summer learning programs; $1 billion for academic enrichment grants, often used for science and math education and accelerated learning; $890 million for students who are learning English; $376 million to educate the children of migrant workers; and $715 million to teach adults how to read.

Miranda Dunlap of Wisconsin Watch reports on pathways to success in northeast Wisconsin, working in partnership with Open Campus.

Wisconsin Watch is a nonprofit and nonpartisan newsroom. Subscribe to our newsletters to get our investigative stories and Friday news roundup. This story is published in partnership with The Associated Press.

Trump’s Education Department says it will unfreeze billions in grant money for schools is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

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Click here to read highlights from the story

• The Trump administration has frozen $715 million in previously appropriated adult education funds nationwide, including $7 million in Wisconsin. 

• That’s left program staff scrambling to figure out how they’ll continue providing free services that prepare people for the workforce, such as helping people learn English and educating people in prisons and jails. 

• Education leaders say the cuts could kneecap efforts to grow Wisconsin’s thin workforce.

• Attorney General Josh Kaul has joined a coalition that is suing the federal government over a freeze he calls “unconstitutional, unlawful, and arbitrary.”

On a recent Wednesday evening, a handful of adults sat around a table in a classroom at Madison College’s Goodman South Campus. They chatted about the week, their plans for the weekend and, finally, the day’s discussion question: Are human rights universal? 

The Literacy Network’s “Transitions” class is designed as a final step for immigrants with advanced English skills, preparing them for college or careers. Students spend a year learning to set goals, write resumes and interview for jobs. On this day, the lesson was about finding reliable sources for their next big assignment: a college-style oral presentation on a historical human rights struggle.

The Madison-based adult education nonprofit has surpassed many of its goals in recent years, with particularly high enrollment in Transitions. It scored a $72,000 annual federal grant to grow the program from 100 to 150 students.

But in June, the organization learned the money wasn’t coming.  

On June 30, the Trump administration said it was withholding the nearly $7 million Wisconsin was previously set to receive for adult education — threatening programs that help adults complete high school, learn English and improve their literacy skills, among other services. 

If the funding isn’t distributed, the shortfall could shrink remedial programs in a state where around 340,000 adults don’t have a high school diploma, Wisconsin providers warn.

“Reducing funding from programs that have been proven to be effective — and impact not just individuals but whole communities — is really short-sighted,” said Literacy Network executive director Robin Ryan.

The administration has frozen $715 million in adult education funds nationwide, its largest blow to community college program funding to date. It’s part of $6.8 billion in total federal education funding frozen while the administration ensures “taxpayer resources are spent in accordance with the President’s priorities,” a U.S. Department of Education memo said. 

While the majority of funding on hold is for K-12 education, federal dollars make up a greater share of the adult education budgets. That’s left staff scrambling to figure out how they’ll continue to provide their free services, which range from helping people learn English to educating those incarcerated in prisons and jails. 

Sixteen technical colleges and seven community organizations in Wisconsin have received federal funding through a competitive process for adult education and literacy programs. More than 17,000 people attended these institutions for services during the 2023-24 school year, many of whom are people of color or are from low-income backgrounds.

“To me, that’s something that we should be doubling down on and tripling down on, not cutting funding,” said Wisconsin Technical College System President Layla Merrifield.

Wisconsin leaders are fighting to get the promised funds. On Monday, Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul, a Democrat, joined 23 other states in suing the Trump administration, calling the freeze “unconstitutional, unlawful, and arbitrary.” 

“The Wisconsin Technical College System Board has already begun canceling professional development activities, and staff layoffs may soon follow, further disrupting services,” Kaul said in a statement. “This sudden funding loss leaves Wisconsin’s technical colleges facing budget shortfalls that threaten the stability of these essential programs.” 

Trump officials allege ‘dismal’ results

Funding fears began swirling in the adult education community months ago. In early May, President Donald Trump sent Congress a fiscal year 2026 budget outline that called for the elimination of grants under the Adult Education Family Literacy Act, asserting the funding produces “dismal” results. Organizations braced for the possibility of not receiving federal funding beyond the next year. 

“K-12 outcomes will improve as education returns to the states, which would make remedial education for adults less necessary,” the administration’s discretionary funding request read. “The budget redirects resources to programs that more directly prepare students for meaningful careers.”

The shock came two months later, when Trump’s administration withheld the money adult education providers had budgeted for the upcoming year — funding already approved under the Biden administration. 

Ryan of the Literacy Network felt déjà vu when she heard the news.

The Trump administration in April informed her it was canceling a different previously approved grant: $74,000 to help prepare students with green cards to take the U.S. citizenship test. 

“It used to be you would always fight for the next budget, the next grant, but once you got a grant, you knew you had it,” Ryan said. “Since this administration started …we’re in a new climate.”

Monday’s lawsuit argues Trump officials are violating the law in refusing to spend the money. The administration has not indicated whether it will eventually release the frozen funds. 

Ryan isn’t holding her breath, and she’s preparing for the worst. 

Adult education departments at technical colleges receive most of the adult education dollars allocated to Wisconsin. They are being  “extra tight” with their budgets, said Peter Snyder, associate dean of adult education at Moraine Park Technical College. Snyder expects community organizations — like Literacy Network — to feel the impacts of cuts even more because more of their work centers on adult education. 

“With our Technical College System colleges, we’re doing a lot of other work, so for us, it’s more of a matter of managing what we have,” Snyder said. “My heart goes out to those other programs that are doing really great work that are solely reliant on that funding.”

Milwaukee Area Technical College runs the state’s largest adult education program, serving more than 12,000 students between the 2020 and 2022 school years. It’s currently missing $800,000 in promised grant dollars, plus around $500,000 in other funds that were contingent on the federal money.  

“The loss of (this) funding would result in a significant negative impact for supplying the region’s talent pipeline and would negatively affect our students’ economic mobility and career success,” MATC spokesperson Darryll Fortune said in an emailed statement. 

Worsening workforce woes

Education leaders say the cuts could kneecap efforts to grow Wisconsin’s thin workforce.

In the 2023-24 school year, the most recently available data, more than 2,700 Wisconsin adult education students earned a high school equivalency credential, and over 2,500 enrolled in college or workforce training, preparing them for jobs for which they may not have otherwise qualified. 

Literacy Network associate director Jennifer Peterson said programs like the Transitions class are a wise investment. 

Recipients of these federal dollars must test students throughout their studies and report how many achieved at least one of the benchmarks the federal government tracks, which include raising scores by approximately two grade levels, earning a high school equivalency or enrolling in postsecondary education. 

Of the 77 Transitions students tested over the past three years, 71% showed that type of improvement. 

The funding freeze unfolds as Wisconsin employers struggle to find workers qualified for jobs in many key industries. 

“This is definitely not a case of not aligning with the priorities, because the priority is labor, and that’s what this work is doing,” Peterson said. “Wisconsin needs more workers and will continue to need more workers.”

Anna Mykhailova, a cardiologist who fled Ukraine after the 2022 Russian invasion, landed a new job after taking the Transitions class. 

Licensing laws make it complicated for many foreign-trained medical professionals to practice in the United States, so Mykhailova took what she learned in the class and became a phlebotomist — someone trained to draw blood — at SSM Health St. Mary’s Hospital in Madison. 

She later moved up to a role as a cardiac sonographer, taking ultrasounds with the skills she’d used as a doctor in Ukraine. Literacy Network, where she still attends tutoring to improve her English, awarded her scholarships to cover the cost of her board certification exams.  

Mykhailova’s husband Sasha Druzhyna, who worked as an anesthesiologist in Ukraine, took the same class. In fall, he’ll start a graduate program at the Milwaukee School of Engineering to become a perfusionist, a specialist who operates a heart-lung machine during open-heart surgery. 

That class won’t expand without the frozen funds, and Literacy Network has already cut some classes. 

Message to public: Please help 

Trump’s move to withhold already-appropriated funding surprised even those who have seen priorities ebb and flow under previous presidents.  

“This has historically, for many decades, been very stable funding that has strong bipartisan support. It has been, up until now, pretty outside of political winds blowing,” Peterson said. “It’s a big change in our field.”

Staff at Neighborhood House of Milwaukee had already found a way to do without these funds before the news came down. The nonprofit offers ESL and citizenship classes for around 150 immigrants each year, many of them refugees from the Middle East, Southeast Asia and Latin America. 

The organization previously received a $75,000 annual federal adult education grant, but staff didn’t submit all the necessary paperwork when the latest applications were due, so it wasn’t expecting a fresh round of funding. The organization instead turned to private donors and other grants — a shift others who long depended on federal funding may soon need to make, too. 

Liliane McFarlane, who manages the organization’s International Education program, said the organization raised enough to replace the federal funding for a year. 

The Literacy Network is bracing for the possibility of additional federal cuts. It relies on three other federal grants, with about 15% of its $2.6 million budget coming from Washington.   

“We consider all of that to be endangered,” Ryan said.

For now, Ryan said, the goal is just to keep all programs afloat and hope so the organization can scale up during a future presidential administration.  

“We are hoping that this is a Trump administration duration of difficulty,” she said. “We are very much reaching out to the public and saying, ‘Please help us. These are important, effective programs that affect the whole community and help people thrive.’”

Natalie Yahr and Miranda Dunlap report on pathways to success in Wisconsin, working in partnership with Open Campus.

Trump funding freeze threatens programs that prepare thousands for jobs in Wisconsin is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

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If you live in northeast Wisconsin, I want to hear about your experience forging your path to meaningful, family-sustaining work.

But first, let me introduce myself. I’m Miranda Dunlap, and I’m Wisconsin Watch’s new reporter covering pathways to success in the region. That means I’ll write stories about how local people prepare themselves for their dream jobs and what roadblocks stand in the way. 

I’m a native Michigander, and I previously spent two years reporting on community colleges and K-12 education for Houston Landing in Texas. I’ve spent countless hours learning about the experiences of people pursuing affordable education and training to change the trajectory of their life. That was after community college opened doors in my own career. Completing a year’s worth of credits at my local institution helped me afford enrolling at a university and shaved thousands of dollars off my total student debt. 

I’m Wisconsin Watch’s second pathways to success reporter but the first journalist hired specifically to serve northeast Wisconsin. My colleague Natalie Yahr covers pathways from a statewide perspective, and I’m focused on reporting for Brown, Calumet, Door, Kewaunee, Manitowoc, Marinette, Oconto, Outagamie, Shawano and Winnebago counties. Based in Green Bay, I hope people will see me as more than a trusted source of information, but also their neighbor — someone who will ensure Wisconsin Watch’s work reflects the perspectives of local residents.

My goal is to produce journalism that confronts your challenges, highlights resources and opportunities for economic mobility and answers your burning questions.

You can expect my stories to explore barriers that prevent them from finding sustainable employment, and I’ll examine whether leaders and higher education institutions are investing in solutions and tools to overcome these obstacles. I’ll do it all with an eye toward the unique identities of northeast Wisconsin communities. 

As I dig into this beat, I’m particularly interested in hearing from people with nontraditional routes to the workforce — or those who face added barriers to success. That might include incarcerated or formerly incarcerated people, those from low-income families, folks living in rural, under-resourced communities or workers returning to education to switch careers. 

I hope you’ll point me in the right direction by answering some of my questions. 

What do you think I need to know about northeast Wisconsin to understand the challenges that people and communities here face when it comes to economic stability and mobility?

What are your career dreams — to fulfill your own professional goals and support your family? What, if anything, is standing in the way? 

Have you attended a community or technical college in the region, such as Northeast Wisconsin Technical College or Fox Valley Technical College? If so, what was your experience?

Are you a local employer struggling to find skilled workers to fill your jobs? What would help?

Do you know of an organization or institution successfully guiding people toward the skills and information they need to succeed? 

Your insights and experiences will shape my reporting. You can share them with me by filling out this form.

Miranda covers pathways to success in northeast Wisconsin in partnership with Open Campus. Reach her via email at mdunlap@wisconsinwatch.org.

Help us report on local workforce challenges and opportunities in northeast Wisconsin is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.