Community Helps Develop Master Facilities Plan
The Manitowoc Public School District is committed to its mission to educate, engage and inspire all learners to thrive in a global community. Our #1 priority is to provide our students with high-quality learning opportunities and staff to support them.
We also are committed to providing safe, modern facilities to assist student learning and achievement. However, due largely to state revenue limits that since 1993 have capped how much the district can spend in any given year, the MPSD has long had inadequate funding for annual maintenance of our schools and other facilities.
Long-Term Facilities Planning
FEBRUARY 2025 TO FALL 2025: A community Facilities Advisory Committee began meeting monthly in February 2025 to develop recommendations to the Board of Education before December for a long-term district master facilities plan. The Board sought community volunteers and 45 residents offered to serve. The group will review district facilities needs, enrollment, budgets, state funding and revenue limits, the district's building footprint and school boundaries.
At the same time, a separate staff Facilities Advisory Committee also is meeting and going through the same review and exercises. Michael Hacker of Cadence Consulting is facilitating both the community and staff meetings.
In May and June, our facility advisory committees participated in a “Build Your Own District” activity, collaboratively generating more than 40 ideas for how our district could look in the future. This exercise included discussions on the number of schools and grade configurations. Throughout July and August, we will work on narrowing these ideas into a set of potential options for the board’s consideration. Please feel free to reach out to Supt. Lee Thennes or MPSD Buildings & Grounds Director Mike Schwarz with any questions.
