Sunday, December 30, 2018

 

 

TOP NEWS STORIES OF 2018

 

The Mercer School report card score for the 2017-18 school year sank lower and was the lowest of all 422 Wisconsin school districts.

2017-18 Score                   2016-17 Score

55.9                                        61.9

Meets Few Expectations

The Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction School Report Card scores are in for all state school districts and the Mercer School is at the very bottom of the list of all 21 northern Wisconsin schools.  Also, the Mercer School District was lowest ranked of the state's 422 school districts.

In October, the DPI announced the 2017-18 ACT scores for all schools, and Mercer’s composite score of 18.36 placed it 14^th in the list of northern Wisconsin schools.  In 2016-17, Mercer was at the very bottom of that list with a 16.6 composite score. 
(11/13/18)

 

 

 

MERCER SCHOOL’S NEW ACT SCORES

The Mercer School’s newly announced ACT composite score for 2017-18 remained “pathetic” but moved up slightly from being at the very bottom of all 20 northern Wisconsin schools in 2016-17.  A 2017-18 composite score of 18.36 placed Mercer 14^th in the list of the 20 northern Wisconsin schools. Mercer’s composite score for 2016-17 was a dismal 16.6.

 

Any score reported for Mercer is questionable because the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction said it is investigating Mercer’s “test administration and scoring issues”.

 

According to the DPI, Mercer’s composite score of 18.36 places it between poor (16) and OK (20).  However, 18.36 would not get a student into any of the 22 state colleges listed by the DPI, which showed the lowest acceptable ACT score as 23.  A perfect score is 36. The ACT tests are administered in the spring to all high school juniors.  (10/6/18) 

 

 

IRREGULARITIES WITH STUDENT TESTING?

In the massive news media reporting of the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction findings that Mercer school district administrator Erik Torkelson misused $175,000 of taxpayer Fund 80 money, an interesting part of the reporting seemed to get lost.  Here is what just one media outlet, KBJR6 TV in Rhinelander, reported at the time:

“KBJR6 has learned there could be an issue with (Mercer) test scores.

 

A Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction spokesperson said they are looking into allegations of test administration and scoring issues.

This comes after the Wisconsin DPI found 12 instances of misappropriation of funds within the district, totaling $175,000.

DPI Spokespeople say the investigation into test scores is ongoing, and they won't be releasing any further information until the investigation is complete.”  (9/20/18)

 

The DPI Investigation

TORKELSON’S TAXPAYER RIPOFF DRAWS FIRE

The long-awaited Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction’s investigation of Mercer School Administrator Erik Torkelson’s illegal use of taxpayer Fund 80 money has resulted in damaging “findings” that could cost taxpayers additional money or cause a reduction of funding for the children’s educational programs.

The DPI issued 12 “findings”, 10 of which charged that Torkelson had misused Community Programs and Services Fund 80 to the extent of $175,247.92.   The other 2 “findings”, which the DPI said were eligible Fund 80 expenditures, were based on false information given to the DPI.

Mercer taxpayers and students will pay the price for Torkelson’s illegal use of Fund 80 money as the result of a state law-imposed revenue limit reduction penalty.  Such a reduction means that the district will have $175,247 less to spend in the 2018-19 school year or that Mercer taxpayers will need to approve another tax increase referendum to pay for Torkelson’s blunders. 

The DPI “findings” are for the school years 2015-16 and 2016-17.  The revenue limit reduction, or allowable tax levy, could climb even higher as the DPI investigates Fund 80 misspending for the 2017-18 school year and for earlier years.  (7/30/18)

 

Torkelson’s Attempt to Survive

MERCER SCHOOL BOARD’S DISGUSTING DEBACLE

Disgusting, un-American, bizarre, alarming, depressing, beyond belief.  These were just some of the terms used to describe Monday night’s Mercer School Board meeting by many of the more than 100 citizens who jammed the school’s library/meeting room expecting to hear how Administrator Erik Torkelson managed to misuse thousands of their school tax dollars.

Instead, they were dumb-founded by a well-rehearsed spectacle staged by Torkelson and his three stooge school board members -- Noel Brandt, Deanna Pierpont and Micki Pierce Holstrom.  Like well-trained puppies, the three followed every one of Torkelson’s pre-scripted commands.  It was obvious that that they had held one of their infamous, illegal closed-door sessions to receive Torkelson’s orders and rehearse their roles.

School board members Christa Reinert and Karl Anderson, who were overwhelmingly elected to the school board by Mercer voters to clean up the school’s administrative mess, tried valiantly and in vain to open a dialogue and get the answers the Mercer citizens had come to hear.  They were shut down by Brandt in every attempt, with Brandt ignoring or talking over them.  Brandt purposely mumbled into his microphone so that the crowd would be unable to hear his feeble attempts to deny them the information they sought. (7/24/18)

 

 “SCHOOL BOARD” LETTER COULD BRING CHARGES

In an attempt to try to cover the mysterious misspending of thousands of Mercer taxpayer dollars, School District Administrator Erik Torkelson submitted 73 meaningless documents to the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction.  But one document stands out as being the epidemy of flawed judgement.

It was a letter dated May 1, 2018, in which the “Mercer Board of Education” feebly tried to explain two earlier meetings.  “Mercer Board of Education” is in quotes because two of the five signers as board members were not on the board at the time.

The DPI saw through the scheme and pointed out that the May 1 meeting violated the open meetings law because it was never legally posted.  The Iron County district attorney has been asked by several citizens to investigate the matter. (9/2/18)

 

Community Service Fund 80

A $1.5 MILLION TAXPAYER RIP OFF

How would you like to reduce your Mercer real estate taxes by $42, $84, $126 or $168?  It’s possible, but you will need to force the school board to eliminate Community Service Fund 80 programs or charge for them.  Fund 80 is costing each Mercer taxpayer $42 per $100,000 assessed property valuation; so, multiply the $42 by your property valuation, and you’ll know by how much you are being ripped off.

A number of people questioned Fund 80 programs and their costs at the January school board meeting.  Why not have the few people using Fund 80 programs pay for them instead of all taxpayers footing the bill, seemed to be consensus? Wisconsin Statute 120.13(19) allows school boards to “collect fees to cover all or part of the costs of such (Fund 80) programs and services.” 

Every Mercer taxpayer is paying for Fund 80 programs but only a very, very small number of people actually use any of the programs.  An earlier survey of Mercer residents found that only 20% were familiar with Community Service Fund 80.  Of those 20%, only one-third had ever used any of the programs.  (2/9/18) 

 

MAJOR STORY REVEALS INSENSITIVE TREATMENT OF DEAF-BLIND CHILD AND HIS PARENTS

In a well-researched and documented story in Friday’s Lakeland Times, the plight of a Mercer school nonverbal, deaf-blind child and his parents was reported in a story that began on page one and continued to a full page inside.  The excellent reporting by Brian Jopek painted a disturbing and grim picture of the insensitive way in which the child and his parents have been treated by Administrator Erik Torkelson and Special Education Director Deb Davis.

The whole affair has caused the parents of Lelyn Schmidt to take the boy out of the Mercer school out of concern for his “safety and well being.“  Lelyn’s mother, Stormi Schmidt, is quoted in the article as saying  that their “current problems with the  Mercer School District actually began when in April 2018 they removed Leyln’s seven-year-old  brother from the school because of bullying.”

To add insult to injury, Torkelson had asked the Iron County district attorney to file disorderly conduct charges against the Schmidts because of a meeting he and Davis had with the Schmidts.  A 911 call Torkelson had placed to the sheriff's office during the meeting was found to be unwarranted, and the DA has declined Torkelson’s request to press charges.  (9/28/18)

 

More Woes for Torkelson

DPI REPORT FINDS FEDERAL AND STATE IEP VIOLATIONS

The Mercer School District failed to “properly develop and implement” a federal and state required individualized education program (IEP) for a nonverbal, blind-deaf child whose parents said they took him out of the school over their concern for his “safety and well-being.”

The Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction has issued a 1,524 word, four-page report citing the school’s failure to follow IEP rules for the five-and-half-year-old child and ordered the school to provide a “corrective action plan” for other children enrolled as IEP students. (12/8/18)

 

MILWAUKEE JOURNAL SENTINEL SLAMS TORKELSON

Reports on Years of Mismanagement, Misspending

The Pulitzer Prize-winning Milwaukee Journal Sentinel has done it again – this time reporting on Mercer School District Administrator Erik Torkelson’s “inappropriate” spending of taxpayer dollars and the history of other questionable management practices.  Widely acclaimed Journal Sentinel educational writer Annysa Johnson did another masterful job in researching and writing the expose.

 In this recent article she referenced an earlier page-one story she authored when Kelly Kohegyi showed the sexually explicit movie “Fifty Shades of Grey” to a group of young Mercer school girls.  That incident gave Mercer a big black eye when the story went viral and was used by broadcast and print media around the world.

This latest article will most likely receive similar widespread notoriety because the Journal Sentinel is a member of the Gannett Co. family of hundreds of broadcast and print media outlets, including USA Today.  As a Pulitzer Prize- winning newspaper, the Journal Sentinel does not print articles without thoroughly researching, fact checking and top professional writing.  So, we can rest assured that Annysa’s article is 100% correct.  (7/11/18)

 

Another Black Eye

MERCER SCHOOL ADMINISTRATOR/SCHOOL BOARD SCANDAL DRAWS NATIONAL ATTENTION

Print and broadcast news media across the nation have focused on Mercer as a “tiny northwoods school district” with a major “mismanagement and misspending problem”.

The unfavorable but fully justified attention began with a page one exposé in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel which documented Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction charges that Mercer school district administrator Erik Torkelson misspent taxpayer-funded Community Services Fund 80 money.   The state’s largest newspaper is  part of the USA Network, which resulted in the news article being passed on to 500 other television, radio and newspaper outlets, many of which used the story.

Regional news media then did their own research of the charges and published and broadcasted major news stories.  (8/2/18)

 

A Record of Failure

THE ADMINISTRATOR’S REPORT CARD

 

      SCHOOL                QUALITY

 

          TAXES             OF EDUCATION

 

    ↑              ↓

 

       + 16.3%                  - 22%

 

                            2010 to 2017

 

In the business world a CEO with the dismal results of the Mercer School would be given his walking papers.  In the military a commanding officer would be relieved of his command and possibly even court martialed.   But what do you do with a school administrator who continues to mismanage and misspend while depriving the students of a needed and deserved education?

Mercer residents are facing such a dilemma with a school administrator – Erik Torkelson – providing sub-standard educations for Mercer students while hitting taxpayers with record high school taxes.  Since Torkelson was hired in 2010, school taxes have skyrocketed 16.3% while the quality of education – the composite ACT scores – has plummeted by 22%.  (6/3/18)

 

Another Failing Grade

THE OFFICIAL MERCER SCHOOL AUDIT

Have you wondered who in the Mercer school office is using a school credit card and what is being charged?  Or what about the gasoline being charged, or the Best Buy and Amazon account charges for which there is no reporting on what is being purchased and by whom? 

As a taxpayer, who is footing the bill, you should want to know because big bucks are involved.  You would think that the school’s auditors, Eagle Audit & Accounting, would also like to know because in its audit for the school year ended June 30, 2017, it noted a “significant deficiency of the purchase order policy and consistent use.”  It sounds like what Eagle Audit is suggesting is that credit charge accounts should not be used and that purchase orders, which clearly show what is being purchased and by whom, should be used instead. 

“Purchase orders provide additional control over budgeting, approval, receipt and recording over the procurement function,” Eagle Audit noted.  “Our audit procedures disclosed instances of purchase orders not being used...”  (3/12/18)

 

Another Investigation?

CHARGE CARD, CREDIT PURCHASES REMAIN A MYSTERY– FOR NOW 

Even while facing possible serious consequences for misusing Fund 80 money and excessive pay violations, “someone” in the Mercer school office boldly continues to use a school charge card, make credit purchase at a local food store and gas station, and make on-line Amazon purchases -- all without any explanation as to what is being purchased and by whom.

These purchases have until now been kept secret.  But, school board member Christa Reinert wants to change that by requiring that line item explanations be included in the school’s monthly check payments reports.  Christa’s requests have met with lame excuses by former board president Deanna Pierpont as to why it could not be done.

Pierpont and administrator Erik Torkelson apparently do not want Mercer taxpayers to know who is using the charge card or making credit purchases and identifying what is being purchased.  But Torkelson has lost two of his collaborators because Pierpont is out as board president and Torkelson’s mother-in-law, Kelly Kohegyi, was voted off the board in the recent school board election.  (5/18/18)

 

TORKELSON AND HIS FAMILY-RELATED BUSING CONTRACT

Mercer taxpayers will never know if the five-year, $1 million school busing contract School Administrator Erik Torkelson awarded to family members is a good deal or a bad deal.  They will not know because he apparently defied state law and school board policy by not obtaining required competing proposals and bids.

 
Nevertheless, Torkelson got approval of a new contract at Monday night’s school board meeting from three of his stalwart members – Deanna Pierpont, Noel Brandt and Micki Pierce-Holstrom --without any of them asking a single question.

 

A fourth member of the board, Christa Reinert, was adamant in wanting competing proposals and voted “no’ to awarding the contract. The newest member of the board, Karl Anderson, said that he objected -- apparently to awarding the contract -- on the basis that the board should follow board policy requiring competing proposals.  But then, for some unexplained reason, Karl voted for the contract’s approval.  

Mercer’s school busing company, N&J Bus Service, is owned by family members related by marriage to Torkelson and his mother-in-law Kelly Kohegyi, who was voted off the school board in this year’s spring election. (6/26/18)

 

Justice Prevails 

KARL’S IN, KOHEGYI’S OUT IN MERCER SCHOOL BOARD ELECTION

In an overwhelming victory, Karl Anderson snowed under incumbent Kelly Kohegyi, 420 to 284, for a seat on the five-member Mercer School Board as Mercer residents took another major step in trying to regain control of a runaway School Board and administration.

 

Karl ran on a platform of restoring honesty and transparency and noted the major need for academic and financial overhauls, both of which are in dire need. 

 

Mercer residents took the initial step in the last election by voting Christa Reinert to the board and booting off Denise Thompson, who was a part of the destructive school board gang.  Since her election, Christa has tirelessly and relentlessly attempted to expose wasteful spending and mismanagement.  For this she has been intimated, harassed and embarrassed by Administrator Erik Torkelson, Board President Deanna Pierpont and Kohegyi.

 

Christa will now have in Karl Anderson a strong and valuable ally in cleaning up the School Board mess.

 

Kohegyi was soundly rejected by Mercer residents for numerous displays of bad judgement, including showing the sexually-explicit movie “Fifty Shades of Grey” to young Mercer school girls.  That gave Mercer a big black eye because of the resulting nationwide publicity.  (4/9/18)

 

“FIFTY SHADES’ SCANDAL STILL A REAL ISSUE

Some Mercer School Facts readers have asked what the “Fifty Shades of Grey” ruckus is all about.  Unless they were somewhere else at the time, they would have been overwhelmed by the negative publicity which resulted in embarrassing notoriety for Mercer. 

In brief, Kelly Kohegyi, Mercer school board member and mother-in-law to Administrator Erik Torkelson, showed the sexually explicit movie “Fifty Shades of Grey” to young school girls in the back seat of her vehicle.  The shocking incident received statewide –in fact nationwide – notoriety.  Print, broadcast and social media were saturated with telling how the decadent incident unfolded.  It was even cited as the “Mercer bad example” at a teacher conference as “what not to do”.   Members of the clergy condemned the act from their pulpits.

Now, in the April 3 election, Kohegyi is seeking reelection.  The resurfacing of the scandal has been criticized as “beating a dead horse” or “old news.”  But the issue clearly demonstrates the extremely poor judgment by Kohegyi, not only by showing an obscene movie to young girls, but in many other instances – like the huge conflict of interest issue by continuing on the school board while her son-in-law is the administrator.  (4/2/18)

 

The Actual Recording

THE ACT SCORES ARE “PATHETIC", NOT THE STUDENTS

The video of October 30 Mercer School Board meeting has been kept from Mercer citizens apparently to facilitate a scheme to humiliate and discredit another School Board/administrator critic.  However, this time an audio recording of the meeting was made by several people, and you can listen to the recording as a part of this blog.

In the recording you will hear Mercer resident Rick Duley calmly and politely explaining that the Mercer’s School’s failing ACT scores couldn’t get the students into college.  He called the scores “pathetic”, not the students.  Rick went on to ask the School Board to pledge to work to get the ACT scores up.

At that point you will hear Board member Micki Pierce-Holstrom shouting obscenities and Board member Noel Brandt shouting “sit down,” sit down” to Rick, as he charged at Rick in a threatening manner.  A sheriff’s deputy stopped Brandt.  (1/20/18)