Milwaukee
Overview
Milwaukee is known as “great city on a great lake” for good reason. As our corps members are discovering, it is also a city eager for new allies as we confront our greatest challenges in education.
In education, we face an undeniable reality: there is a persistent lack of opportunity for the state’s poorest students. Wisconsin is home to the nation’s largest race-based achievement gap. Whether measured by graduation rates or reading scores – no state has a larger chasm between the education afforded to white students and to students of color.
Life
Milwaukee corps members will discover a city with a rich cultural history known for festivals, food, and neighborhoods. The city is recognized for its tight-knit community, as well as its rich ethnic heritage. Made up of immigrants from around the world, Milwaukee celebrates its identity as a cultural melting pot throughout the year with a vast array of ethnic festivals and excellent restaurants. The city also offers many outstanding recreational and cultural activities to its residents and visitors. Whether corps members want to explore attractions like the world-renowned Milwaukee Art Museum, Discovery World, or the Harley Davidson Museum, take in a film festival or concert at one-of-a-kind venues like the Pabst or Oriental theatres, or hit up one of this old brewing center’s multiple brewery tours, all discover quickly that this city truly has something for everyone.
Milwaukee is very also affordable, and many corps members will be able to save during their two years or even pay off student loans while still finding time for an active social life in a vibrant city. Milwaukee's big-city advantages are enhanced by a friendly small-town spirit and Old World charm. Corps members will have an opportunity to live in one of Milwaukee’s many vibrant neighborhoods where architectural and cultural reminders of Milwaukee’s Old-World heritage loom large.
Corps Culture
Milwaukee corps members will be welcomed into a close-knit corps with a strong sense of community. The Milwaukee charter corps – currently 37 strong – is playing a significant role in the development of regional programming and a welcoming culture. The corps takes deep pride in the high level of support that they provide to one another.
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Most corps members live with or near other corps members
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They often spend evenings and weekends together, and frequent the Teach For America office to visit and check out materials from the corps member resource room
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Corps member are active in organizing a wide variety of all-corps socials – with events including movie nights, Milwaukee Brewers games, corps and staff kickball, happy hours, and restaurant outings
Corps members will also be welcomed by a historically active community of educators who have long sought answers to closing the achievement gap for students in the city. These educators are now looking to Teach For America as a key lever in helping eliminate educational inequity and providing quality education to the city’s students.
Teaching
There is enormous opportunity for corps members to impact underserved Milwaukee public and charter school students, with the district and broader community demonstrating their ongoing support of Teach For America’s presence in the region.
Today, fewer than 40 percent of Milwaukee 10th graders are proficient in reading and fewer than one third are proficient in math. Achievement rates are particularly alarming for Wisconsin’s African-American and Latino students. Recent national studies reveal that no state in the nation currently has lower reading scores for African-American students than Wisconsin. While 87 percent of Caucasian students graduate from high school, only 41 percent of the state’s African-American students and 54 percent of its Latino students graduate. Perhaps most startling, of the 20 percent of students from Milwaukee who enroll in any form of post-secondary education, 80 percent enroll in a remedial curriculum.
While these statistics are daunting, they further our belief that the need for change in Milwaukee has never been more urgent. Community leaders agree that our ability or inability to tackle these endemic levels of inequity within the next ten years will truly set the stage for the future of our city.
View a map of our placement areas.
Certification and Testing
In order to meet the requirements to teach in Wisconsin, corps members will have to take and pass one or more exams depending on their teaching assignment. The Praxis exams are required in Wisconsin and corps members will take a specific Praxis exam depending on their placement area.
In order to teach without traditional certification, corps members would take coursework while teaching. Teach For America • Milwaukee has university partnerships with Marquette University and Cardinal Stritch University through which corps members will take courses and receive certification. By completing all coursework requirements, corps members could become certified and possibly obtain a master’s degree within their first two years of teaching.
Placements
| Elementary |
46% |
| Secondary |
54% |
Living and Education Expenses
Salary and Taxes
| Salary |
$35,000 |
| Taxes |
20.62% - 20.87% |
Cost of Living
| Housing Single |
$550 - $950 |
| Housing Shared |
$300 - $600 |
| Health Insurance |
$40 - $80 |
| Utilities |
$60 |
| Daycare |
$700 - $800 / month |
| Monthly Tranist Pass |
$60 |
| Car Insurance |
$70 |
| Car Required |
Access to car is essential |
Start-up Costs
| Testing Costs |
$150 - $180 |
| Up-front Certification Costs |
$100 |
| How do you pay start-up costs? |
Out-of-pocket |
Ongoing Costs through the Two-year Commitment
| Ongoing Certification Costs |
$0 |
| Use AmeriCorps award for testing/certification costs? |
No |
| How is teaching certification structured in this state/region? |
1 year - Through university |
| Is it possible to complete a master's degree at the end of two years? |
Yes |
| Is the completion of a master's degree required as part of the two-year commitment? |
No |
| Extra Master's Degree Costs |
$1,000 - $2,000 |
| Partner Universities |
Marquette University or Cardinal Stritch University |
Notes and Clarifications
- Beginning teacher salary: If you have a master's degree in education, are placed in a bilingual classroom, or in a math/science classroom you may receive additional compensation.
- Avg. health insurance: In some placement districts, health insurance premiums are pre-tax deductions.
- Total tax rate: Federal + state + city. Only applies to starting salaries.
- Up-front certification: Expenses that must be paid before your first day of teaching.
- Paying start-up costs: Can you pay for testing and up-front certification costs with transitional grants and loans or do you have to pay out-of-pocket?
- Ongoing certification: Total certification costs over two-year teaching commitment.
- AmeriCorps award for certification: Can you use your AmeriCorps award to pay testing/certification costs?
- Master's in two years: Is it possible to complete a master's degree at the end of two years?
- Master's required: Is the completion of a master's degree required as part of the two-year commitment?
- Extra master's degree costs: Additional total cost to obtain a master's degree (on top of ongoing certification costs); does not include AmeriCorps award.
- Partner university(ies): These universities partner with Teach For America for ongoing certification requirements, and in some cases, the fulfillment of a master's degree in education.
