A Bucky Badger who marched in the No Kings protest in Madison said he didn't mind missing the football game for such and important event. | Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner

Tens of thousands of Wisconsinites participated in No Kings marches and rallies Saturday, with turnout exceeding the June No Kings rallies in Madison, Milwaukee, Green Bay and even in smaller towns including Hayward. 

An estimated 20,000 marchers descend on the Capitol in Madison

Protesters, many wearing inflatable animal costumes and carrying signs, gathered in McPike Park in downtown Madison and marched one mile up East Washington Avenue to the Capitol, shutting down intersections and blocking the major thoroughfare for blocks, following the Forward Marching Band.

Marchers chanted “Show me what democracy looks like! This is what democracy looks like!” and “We are unstoppable! A better world is possible!”

The march started a little before the UW-Madison football team was scheduled to kick off against Ohio State. A Bucky the Badger who came to the march said he wasn’t upset about missing the game for the protest. “The People’s Bucky believes in democracy… Without democracy, there would be no games,” he said.

Candy Neumeier, a former teacher who drove down from outside of Oshkosh for the rally, said she was attending to “stand up for our rights,” which are “being trampled on by this wannabe dictator and his crew.” She wore a trash bag with Jeffrey Epstein’s face and President Donald Trump’s hand drawn on it. “I really believe that we need to release the Epstein files.”

From a stage set up on the Capitol steps, Ali Muldrow, a Madison school board member and activist who emceed the rally, said there are about 20,000 people at the protest in Wisconsin’s capital city.

Dane County Circuit Court Judge Everett Mitchell told the crowd,“Yes, judges are out here, too. I might get in trouble on Monday, but I’m here right now.” 

“You’re living in the redefinition of our democracy right now. Our legal systems are being retooled, reconfigured, and realigned to incentivize ultimate power… The war for civil rights is being waged all over again,” Mitchell added.

Ben Wikler, former Democratic Party of Wisconsin chair, tied the protests and pushback against Trump to the crucial state level elections that will take place in Wisconsin in 2026, including the spring state Supreme Court election, the race for an open gubernatorial seat and races that will determine control of the state Senate and Assembly in the fall.

“The only way to break democracy in America is to break it in the states,” Wikler said. “If Trump wants to be king, he’s going to need people in offices like the governorship who certified elections in the state of Wisconsin and offices, like our state Supreme Court, who will be in his back pocket. Wisconsin, are we going to be in Trump’s back pocket next year?”

The crowd shouted, “No!”  

“Are we gonna be on the streets instead and talk to people who maybe never voted before, but are ready to vote now because they understand what is at stake?” Wikler asked to the sound of cheers. “Are we gonna get out of the boat, and are we gonna win elections and are we going to defend democracy?” 

“Let’s fight! No kings! Forward!” Wikler shouted. 

— Baylor Spears

Milwaukee tops 18,000

More than 18,000 protesters filled downtown Milwaukee as part of the No Kings day events taking place across Wisconsin and the country Saturday to protest the administration of President Donald Trump.

A large number of people at the protest said they were motivated to come Saturday as a direct response to what they see as heavy handed actions by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. In recent weeks, ICE has increased its presence in Wisconsin, conducting raids of migrant workers in communities including Madison and Manitowoc.

The protest attendance topped the 16,000 that attended the No Kings protest in the city in June — despite sister events taking place in the Milwaukee County suburbs of Cudahy, Greenfield and Shorewood, and additional events in nearby Waukesha County.

The crowd gathered at Cathedral Square Park, just blocks from city hall, before marching on a 1.8 mile course through downtown.

Mirroring protesters that have gained attention for wearing inflatable costumes during confrontations with federal agents in cities such as Chicago and Portland, Ore., attendees in Milwaukee were dressed as dinosaurs, aliens and unicorns.

At the park, Jim Baran, a Brown Deer resident, sported a banana costume and flew an upside down U.S. flag — a maritime code for distress. Baran said he wanted to attend the protest to show he’s “not going to stand for shenanigans” from the Trump administration.

“He’s selling America, he doesn’t care about Americans,” Baran said.

Stephanie Jacks, a New Berlin resident, said she came to the Milwaukee protest so residents of the city know people in the surrounding communities support it.

“There’s no due process,” she said. “There’s no checks and balances.”

A Milwaukee resident who only gave their name as J. and said they were a first generation Mexican-American, was dressed in an inflatable alien costume in an effort to make Trump claims of violent protesters seem silly and “take the wind out of their sails.”

“This alien is anti-ICE,” they said.

Kelly, a Milwaukee resident who declined to give a last name, said she’s a former deputy sheriff who is “appalled” by the actions of ICE agents. “I can’t believe what they’re doing,” she said. “The level of incompetence, no training, no supervision, no rules. It’s just insane.”

— Henry Redman

Green Bay rebuffs ICE

On Green Bay protestors’ march downtown, one of their chants was “No KKK, no fascist USA, no ICE.”

By the Brown County Courthouse in downtown Green Bay, protestors sang advice for interacting with law enforcement, including “Ask if you’re free to go, ask for a lawyer, protect yourself and neighbors and record, record, record.”

A speaker called for the crowd to go to their sheriffs about sheriffs’ partnerships with ICE, report possible ICE activity to the advocacy group Voces de la Frontera “so we can protect the immigrants who are amongst us,” tell legislators to pass a bill allowing drivers’ licenses for immigrants without legal status and support families they know who have been separated. 

Other speeches included concerns related to public education, trans rights, Israel and Palestine and free speech. 

Rick Crosson, candidate for northeast Wisconsin’s 8th Congressional District, came to the protest. He told the Examiner that “for us, it’s about getting back what the Constitution had intended. And that is, have the people run the show. No kings, no dictators, no autocrats.”

Green Bay’s Neville Public Museum is looking for donations that reflect people’s experiences with “No Kings.” In a Facebook post, the museum provided a list of items it is specifically looking for, which includes protest or counter-protest signs, photographs, journal entries and digital recordings. 

“It is our responsibility to collect the stories of today to help create understanding in the future,” the museum explained in a statement. 

— Andrew Kennard

Hayward sees record crowd

 

A protest in Hayward, Wisconsin, hometown of Sean Duffy,  Secretary of Transportation topped 1,200 participants, the largest protest ever in the small northern Wisconsin city with a population of about 2,500. 

Joan Ackerman of Hayward said the protesters are not “un-American,” as some Republican politicians have claimed, but just want to exercise their freedom of speech about things happening in the country that concern them.

Kay, a woman  from Barnes, Wisconsin, who carried a sign that said “fight truth decay,” said she came to the protest in Hayward “because of the current political environment.” She added, “We have become so divisive because of misleading and alternative facts. We need objective news that is non-partisan.”

Natalie of Hayward, who carried a sign that said, “Health care is a right,” said she was at the protest because she doesn’t  like the direction the country is headed. “We need to make it safe for our kids,” she said.

Steve, another Hayward resident who is an Air Force veteran of the Vietnam War, explained that he feels the country is moving away from the core principles of democracy he fought to defend.

 

Gary Quaderer, Sr., a Vietnam Army vet and spiritual leader of the Lac Courte Oreilles Tribe said this is the first protest he has ever participated in. “I thought it was very important,” he said. “I don’t like where the country is headed. … I just wanted to come out with all these other good people here just to protest what was going on.”

Paul DeMain, editor of the national News from Indian Country newspaper based in Hayward said the gathering was historic, the largest protest Hayward had ever seen.

 

— Frank Zufall

‘Love of country’ in Janesville

In a downtown park in Janesville, Wisconsin, organizers estimated 1,000 or more people turned out on a warm, sunny Saturday morning. 

In addition to packing the sidewalks at the intersection of Court and Main streets at the corner of Courthouse Park, rally goers milled through the park space. Many sat in the well surrounding the stage, where a handful of speakers made brief remarks.

“There are 93 rallies in Wisconsin,” said U.S. Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Black Earth). Pocan recalled the words of the Republican U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson a few days ago.

“They’re trying to falsely call this a Hate America rally,” Pocan said. “People who are here today are the ones who love their country. This rally is really showing that love of country over everything else.”

Another speaker was state Sen. Mark Spreitzer (D-Beloit), whose district includes Janesville. 

“We are here to peacefully demonstrate — as the First Amendment gives us the right to do — and to call on our government to do better, to respect our rights, to respect the Constitution, and to do right by the American people,” Spreitzer told the crowd. 

“We’re also here to say that we are a welcoming community, that immigrants make our community stronger, that LGBT people make our community stronger, that people of color make our community stronger, that people with disabilities make our community stronger.,” Spreitzer said. “We are here to stand up for everybody’s right to coexist as part of our community and to get ahead in life.”

Spreitzer acknowledged that for opponents of the president, Saturday’s rally was but one step in a much longer struggle.  

“This is not going to be the last time we’re going to have to keep getting together and doing this,” he said. “I know it is going to be a long fight, but we’re going to win that fight. We’re going to take our country back.”

Virtually every speaker made a point of emphasizing the peaceful intentions and means of participants in the protest. 

State Rep. Ann Roe (D-Janesville), offered her mother’s advice for people who may be confronted by supporters of the president. 

“You know what my mom used to say? Kill them with kindness,” Roe said. “Nothing makes them madder.”

In a brief interview, Roe said that as she wandered through the crowd, she encountered a variety of people she has known from various aspects of her life, all taking part.

“I have seen neighbors here. I have seen people I’ve worked with and we’ve never discussed politics,” Roe said.

“It sounds corny, but that’s what gives me hope. We’re back to the old ways — one-on-one conversations. By remaining kind and open as a long-term strategy, That’s what keeps us from devolving into chaos.”

— Erik Gunn

In Kenosha, resistance through building community

Across the state in the city of Kenosha, a crowd of about 2,500 people filled the sidewalks on both sides of Sheridan Road, Downtown Kenosha’s primary north-south thoroughfare, along a four-block stretch.

Signs, the vast majority of them home-made, filled the air. So did the steady honking of passing cars as drivers sounded their horns in support of the demonstrators throughout the three-hour gathering. The sign-waving crowd cheered back in response.

Organizers had envisioned a dance party theme for their afternoon No Kings protest. A Michael Jackson impersonator lip-synched to recordings of Jackson’s biggest hits while effortlessly mimicking Jackson’s trademark dance steps on the concrete walkway of Civic Center Park. 

“We couldn’t drag people away from their chanting and cheering,” said Sheila Rawn, one of the principal organizers for Hands Off Kenosha, which put together the local version of the No Kings demonstration.

“We chose to not even try to have speakers because people don’t want to come and hear speeches,” she added. “They want to stand on the street.” 

Rawn and a co-organizer, Jennifer Weinstein, were both dressed in lion costumes. People were invited to “dress as your favorite king or queen that would do better than the wannabe king that we have in the White House,” Rawn explained. “Yeah, so, no kings — but if we did have a king, you know, like a lion king would make a better king. King Kong would make a better king. A monarch butterfly would make a better king.”

It’s part of the group’s philosophy of “tactical frivolity,” Weinstein said. 

“For the record, We were planning costumes before all the Portland stuff,” Rawn said, referring to the national attention that a Portland protester in a frog suit got recently.

Hands Off Kenosha launched in the spring, an outgrowth of the April 5 Hands Off rally. Having gone to Chicago and Milwaukee for large protest events during Trump’s first administration, “it was important to me to be like, ‘No, we’re doing it here,’” Rawn said. “Kenosha is the fourth largest city in Wisconsin. We are big enough to have our own protests.”

Memories of the unrest Kenosha experienced in 2020, when self-styled militia members clashed with protesters and teenager Kyle Rittenhouse shot three men, two of them fatally, an act for which he was later acquitted, have lingered, she acknowledged. 

“I have definitely had conversations with lots of people who have said they’re nervous about coming because the community is still grappling with what happened in 2020,” Rawn said. “And so there are some people who are afraid that violence could happen, but we’ve got over a six-month track record of being peaceful and playful and joyful. And we have been really intentional.”

On a table at one end of the park, bags and bags of personal hygiene products overflowed — a collection that the organizers made part of the event. They had a school supply drive at an August protest and have conducted food drives as well. 

“It’s important to us to include mutual aid,” Rawn said. “Building community is its own form of resistance.”

— Erik Gunn

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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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• Wisconsin Watch reporters joined more than 60 volunteers in Brown County’s summer point-in-time count last month — a one-night snapshot of the number of people experiencing homelessness in communities across the United States, including Wisconsin.

• Some volunteers had experienced homelessness themselves. 

• The volunteers officially counted 179 people experiencing homelessness. That’s seen as an undercount because volunteers do not count people who are sleeping or unable to respond to surveys. And some people don’t want to be found.

At  4:31 a.m. the first slivers of light peeked through dark clouds over Green Bay’s waters. 

Along the edge of Point Comfort in the town of Scott, a pair of volunteers surveyed the landscape for people experiencing homelessness as the summer “point-in-time” (PIT) count wound down in Brown County. 

One was Cody Oberhuber, a county economic support specialist. He has missed just one count since January 2022, initially working as part of his former job at the anti-poverty agency Newcap, Inc. His passion for talking to the people behind the numbers prompted him to return this year as a volunteer after switching jobs. 

“It gives you a fresh perspective of being boots on the ground talking to these individuals, you’re kind of looking at the humanity side of things,” Oberhuber said. “That’s what drives me, that’s my mission.”

Oberhuber joined 66 other volunteers between 11:30 p.m. to nearly 6 a.m. beginning on July 23, hitting spots where the group previously encountered people experiencing homelessness. 

The PIT count serves as a one-night snapshot of the number of people experiencing homelessness in communities across the United States, including Wisconsin. Wisconsin Watch in January followed the annual winter count in Jefferson County — examining why the data recorded in the process underestimate the true levels of homelessness in communities, especially rural ones. The  U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development mandates such winter counts. 

Wisconsin Balance of State Continuum of Care, which covers all 69 counties in Wisconsin besides Milwaukee, Dane and Racine, requires each county to also count during the summer, when the tally is typically far higher than winter, when freezing weather pushes more people to shelters.

The majority of Brown County volunteers most years work with direct housing providers or other housing-related programs, according to Meaghan Gleason, Newcap’s funder expert and the Brown County PIT count lead. 

But this year, almost half of volunteers had no association with housing providers, a record number of unaffiliated folks. Thirteen volunteers shared that they previously experienced homelessness in their life. That’s a point of pride for Gleason.

To address the problem of homelessness, she said, “we need to include the people who know what that experience is.”

The Brown County volunteers broke into groups to cover more ground. In the county’s northwest corner, a group searched for people sleeping in cars in the rural village of Pulaski. In the county’s urban center, volunteers counted people camping in Green Bay’s downtown parks. 

PIT counts often happen at night, when people settle into the places they sleep, Oberhuber said. This approach, he explained, prevents volunteers from simply assuming where someone stays. 

Volunteers usually see the most unsheltered people on downtown Green Bay’s east side, and that was the case this year. Several people sheltered in open spaces and under hooded structures, often surrounded by their belongings: bikes, coolers, wheelchairs, bags and blankets. Some slept on church steps or on park benches. Bugs swarmed in the humidity following recent rain.

A volunteer asked a man where he had gone earlier to stay dry. 

“Nowhere,” he replied. “I’m wet. I’m still wet.”

Others asked volunteers for food or dry tarps. Volunteers handed out gift cards and asked people to take a brief survey to shed light on what resources might help.

The surveys included questions such as: Have you served in the active duty or other armed forces of the U.S.? Are you fleeing or attempting to flee domestic violence, dating violence or stalking? Have you ever been in the foster care system? Is this the first time you’ve been homeless?

Some people answered questions they were comfortable with. Others thanked the volunteers and declined to participate.

“I’m going through enough as it is,” one person told the volunteers.

When people are found sleeping, decline to participate in the survey or are in locations volunteers can’t safely access, their presence is documented through observation forms. Although the official count tally excludes those observations, they paint a broader picture of the unhoused landscape. Outreach workers sometimes later follow up to verify their status and connect them with services. 

Brown County’s official tally this year: 179 people experiencing homelessness. That included 100 single individuals and 25 households with children. The official unsheltered count has increased each year since at least 2022, when 89 people were counted in July.

Northwest of Brown County, Newcap’s Northeast Coalition counts unsheltered people in mostly rural Florence, Marinette, Menominee, Oconto and Shawano counties. The summer count recorded 36 people. 

“That may not sound like much,” Gleason later wrote in an email. “But it is the highest count I have seen out of the last eight counts.”

In Brown County, volunteers tallied zero people in the rural areas Wisconsin Watch observed. But Oberhuber knows people are experiencing homelessness in communities like Pulaski, based on previous counts and conversations with police. Those people might not want to be found, Oberhuber said. They might intentionally set up camp outside of town or in the woods, where PIT count volunteers won’t look.

“That’s the difficulty with the rural count,” Oberhuber said. “There’s people out there, we just struggle to find them.”

Gleason said a “happy accident” prompted her to work in housing services after having volunteered at a shelter in college. She wouldn’t give up her position as the PIT count lead for Brown County even if someone told her to. 

She knows it’s impossible to count every person. But that’s what drives her to improve each count. Yes, homelessness is increasing, she said. 

“But if we can also increase our efficiency and our ability to capture that data and connect with those people, then that’s the best we can do in that moment.”

Homelessness is increasing in Brown County. These volunteers traded a night’s sleep to document the challenge 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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Change is hard, and exciting. 

That’s what I tell myself as my family and I prepare to move across the state. 

We currently live in Superior, but we’ll soon lay roots in Door County, where I grew up. I’m a little over a week into my role as Wisconsin Watch’s regional editor for northeast Wisconsin. 

The journey so far

I grew up in Egg Harbor and graduated from Sevastopol High School before attending the University of Wisconsin-Madison. There, I earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism and English. 

I’ve spent the majority of my career in Wisconsin: first as an education reporter in Watertown, then reporting and editing in the Fox Cities and Superior. 

My most recent role was managing editor for Project Optimist, a nonprofit news outlet that reports on greater Minnesota (everything outside of the Twin Cities metro area). 

When I saw Wisconsin Watch post this job, I knew I had to apply. Several friends and former colleagues worked as Wisconsin Watch interns. They spoke highly of their experiences, and they’re some of the most talented, hardworking journalists I know. 

Furthermore, I published Wisconsin Watch stories as an editor for the Superior Telegram. I know firsthand how vital the organization’s coverage is to news outlets throughout the state. 

What we’re up to

The NEW News Lab launched in 2022. Wisconsin Watch joined the collaboration along with five media organizations, Microsoft, the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay, the Greater Green Bay Area Community Foundation, and the Community Foundation for the Fox Valley Region. 

The effort puts in-depth local journalism front and center, and it gained traction. We’ve collaborated to explore solutions to a range of challenges that affect northeast Wisconsin families — from unaffordable housing and child care to dangerous conditions at nursing homes and the region’s labor crunch.  However, Wisconsin Watch hasn’t had staff in northeast Wisconsin until now. 

The northeast Wisconsin newsroom is our way of crystallizing our commitment to the region. We want to build on the partnerships forged through the NEW News Lab and strengthen them. I believe journalists serve communities best when we set competition aside and put readers first. 

Fellow Door County native Jessica Adams is our director of partnerships for the northeast region and has been helping us learn about what people want and need from local news. Over the past several months, she held listening sessions at public libraries and met with stakeholders. If you want to let Jessica know your thoughts, you can take her online survey here. 

Miranda Dunlap is our first reporter in Green Bay. She’s focused on pathways to success – a beat I’m thrilled to lead. Learn more about it from Miranda here. 

I’m excited to meet new faces, connect and see where Wisconsin Watch fits into the local media landscape.

Have a story idea? Email it to jzvandenhouten@wisconsinwatch.org.

Meet Jen Zettel-Vandenhouten, our new northeast Wisconsin regional editor 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 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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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.