People are not overreacting to the thefts and fighting problems at the high school, but I feel the administration, even though they have made some expulsions and suspensions, have still not done enough to resolve these issues. There is one boy in particular who happens to have some athletic ability but since the school year has begun was invovled in a hallway brawl where he repeatedly punched another student, only received a 3 day suspension because he did not throw the 1st punch? He was allowed to play on the basketball team, only to be suspended for poor school grades, but was allowed to suit up and play again. Then recently he was caught mooning a teacher then rubbing his bare butt in a students face. He did not even receive a detention for this behavior. What is he still doing in our school? Is it a racial issue because this boy is African American, Is it because he is an athlete? My son has a friend who found an I-POD on the floor in a hallway, he picked it up and was giving it to a teacher, when he was accused of stealing it and given a 3 day suspension. What kind of lesson does that teach young kids? Hear no evil, See no evil ?

When the schools make rule changes regularly, enforce the rules only when they feel like it, and have too many cooks in the kitchen- it is no wonder we have an increase in problems. There are way to many administrators running the show. Here is an idea: get rid of some of the dead weight and use that money saved to spend on reducing the expences for us taxpayors. We used to have one HS principal, now we have many.

One of the problems I see this year is the school making way too many changes at once. Even I can't handle all of them. Try to take away so many things at once and hope that nobody rebels. It isn't working. The changes this year are unreal. No backpack, no open lunch, homework not graded any more in some classes, new dance rules. Seriously for the first draft of the dance rules to even mention no halter dresses is unbelievable. I went to school at MFEHS many years ago and we wore halter dresses to the dances and I have some nice black and white year book pictures to prove it. This is a public high school, not a convent. Also, the article in this paper states that the open lunch policy only affected Juniors and that is not so. All the incoming freshman and soph. knew that this was a high school privilege that they were looking forward to that got taken away. Further, regarding the over crowding in the lunch room; I filled out the survey I was sent about this and noted that I did not think there was enough room in the new lunch room to house the additional students eating lunch at school if this was the route they decided to go. Wow, wish someone would have actually read my survey Glad to hear suspensions are up; maybe the people doing this are finally having to deal with it. Based on what Joe Fox said though some kids may be getting stuck in the middle of the process; which is really sad.

This is a very serious problem. My son is a junior at MFHS and often talks about the daily fights that occur in school. I think the administration actually minimizes the problem. My son and his friends have a new name for MFHS...MPS West! I would love to know how many of the expulsions, suspensions and detentions involove Chapter 220 / school choice students. I'm sorry but once you are suspended you should be out of the district! I'm sure I will be called a racists for asking this but the truth hurts! Did school administration ever think that crowded hall ways are caused because kids can't carry as many books with them and must return to their lockers? Maybe we should consider opening TJ again and put 9th graders back to North Jr High. A co-worker's wife worked at MFHS last year and now is in Franklin...she can't believe how much better things are down there. If the real estate market wasn't so bad I would be out of this school district in a heartbeat. They are more concerned about the sports teams than our children's safety. Unfortunatley, school crime is only the tip of the iceberg at MFHS...poor test scores, idiotic grading policies (not using homework towards grades) and backpack rules are just the start. This district needs to make some serious changes at MFHS and at district offices. Time to focus on real issues.

I'm glad I don't go to this school.

Concerned Parent: You hit the nail right on the head. Teachers are 30- 45 days behind with grading the homework, using unreliable websites for auto corrected assignments, and many of them beat the kids out of the building at the end of the school day! We get 3-5 phone calls a week from the auto-generated message advertizing a basketball game, the district hired an athletic trainer to dish out ice packs at sporting events (at our cost)- and yet the district is looking to cut athletics for the younger kids to save money?? Try to cut the administrators and numerous Principals at the HS, this would be a fiscally responsible thing to do. I think it is time to renegotiate the teacher contract- pay reductions are occurring everywhere in Corporate America. It is time they start to pay for some of the costs of healthcare like the rest of us. If they want stellar benefits- then they should do a stellar job. Fixing the issues will take drastic action, the first step in the process is to clean house- from the top down.

To Junior's Dad:It's not necessarily that the teacher is behind in grading the homework; some of the departments were told NOT to grade homework any more. The thought is that the quiz and test scores are what really tell the story of a student. What a dumb idea! What it is doing is causing lower GPA's for kids who are not good test takers, but always to their homework. It is also causing the students who do not like school and do not like doing homework to not do their homework at all because it's not graded. Don't the people at central office understand that this is really hurting this type of student who isn't learning at all if they don't do the homework.

AMEN to all the comments! What is it going to take for the MF administration to take notice of the problems in the high school???!!!! The no-grade-for-homework policy is ridiculous!! "Parent of a Student" was absolutely correct about what is going on with the homework. My student is exactly one of those kids who bails on the homework and then fails the tests. Not everyone is a good test taker. In addition, I am concerned when my child comes home and tells me about all the fist fights in the school. Just where am I living? Time to wake up and get these problems resolved. I am also tired of getting bombarded with messages about upcoming games and sporting events. Let's focus on the real reason for our schools--to learn! One last thing...it is about time for teachers to pay health insurance. The rest of the world has to (if they're lucky enough to even have such a luxury!!!).

Overcrowding seems to be the issue here. Maybe it's time to end Chapter 220. Students are not getting the education or the experience the deserve. Chapter 220 students themselves may not be the problem, if a reduction in numbers is what it takes, then non-resident students is where it should start.

You wonder why there are fights? My kid tells me there are many days they have no trays left during lunch. They run out of many foods regularly as well. Imagine not being able to eat your lunch- or carry it to your table to eat. Yes, I would get irritated about this and it explains why there are issues with fighting in the cafeteria. Now, why are trays not washed? I can explain that one- not enough help hired in the cafeteria. Budget constraints obviously will cut this area instead of teacher salaries- God knows they are terribly under paid. 180 days a year, 6 hours a day- that is 1080 hours a year; 1000 hours short of a full time job! Yet we pay them very well and give them the best benefits in the country. Principals make more than $150,000 a year, the ones running MFHS are certainly not worth $150/hour. Time to hire people who are willing to do their job, and are competant at the job! District offices are moving to Village Hall. This will be temporary, as soon as they sell TJ and the old District Office- that money will be wasted on a new building that we voted no to before. Mark my words on this, it will happen.

I have two kids at MFHS and both are on the honor roll and very active in the school. Are there problems, yes of course there are but there is also some great things going on. Aca-Deca just won state, FBLA, Student Council, arts, music. We have a lot to be proud of at MFHS, lets keep the problems in perspective. I agree that we are heavy with adminstration and could use some improvements in teacher contracts, but seriously its not exactly MPS.

When is Dr. Marty going to wake up and get rid of the principal--he hasn't done anything since he came. Send him back to Homestead. He is not a team player unless--he is taping the boys basketball game. Does he know the community? NO!!! Why does he get to do his job-if he was in private industry he would be FIRED!!! Wake up school board and do something before the high school is totally ruined.

Where is the School Board? Why don't they look at this principal and his assistant-who is out the door fast to get to Catholic Memorial. Dr. Marty needs to take control and get new administration--there are lots of problems on the inside the public does not see.

Send the Chapter 220 kids back to Milwaukee, this will eliminate 95% of all the problems in the distict. They don't appreciate the opportunity they are given to attend MFHS and proceed to act out and cause disruptions that are not necessary. And if the HS is overcrowed, why are we even accepting out of district students. END CHAPTER 220!!

I believe that the administration thinks that parents will simply accept their reassurances that everything's being dealt with and is improving. The problem is that our children/students have both eyes and brains and do share their concerns. There are too many collaborative complaints to ignore. I think that the administrators (and there are too many of them also) need to start listening to students and parents.

I think the main problem at our school, is the number of administrators (especially since most of them, with the exception of Mr. Vitale, who the students all respect, seem highly underqualified to be in their positions) . Not only does having more than one principal eat up a lot of budget that could be used to pay for the teachers being cut, it also makes the students feel like they don't have a say in the way the school is run. I'm not talking about diciplinary issues here (or lack there of) but about the day to day things that students have to deal with. Many may think that this is not the students job, and that they should just worry about going to school and doing their work, but if a student is not comfortable, or stressed, in the environment that they are supposed to be learning in, they will not be successful, both in their academic endeavors, and social. I truly believe that the increase in fights is not so much due to the overcrowdwing (I will not deny that, that is a factor) but because of the high levels of tension and stress in the building. If we could replace the administration with somebody who, not only understands the dynamics of a school, but is also respected by everyone in the building (i.e. Former Principal Woosencraft) there would be a drastic improvement in the performance and safety of the students and teachers.

there's is more than just fighting and theft. there's terrible low test scores, and also the ever increasing drug problem. so many administrators, but nothing to show for it. absolutely pathetic.

I just graduated last year and I don’t know where all the problems came from. I don’t understand how people can jump to the conclusions that all the problems and fights at the school were from chapter 220 students. There has been a huge increase in students at the high school this past year. I thought the hallways were crowded already last year so I can’t imagine it this year. There weren’t that many fights last year and we had chapter 220 students last year. So what has changed? The amount of fights and the amount of students. I think the problem is students and the implication of many rule changes all in one year. The completely changed how the school was organized and that is what should be addressed. I wouldn’t want to attend MFHS, just because everything I came to expect from the high school has changed. Open lunch ended for a lot of students, which lead to more students in the lunchroom and less food available. The rule to get rid of backpacks lead to an increase in the amount of time students spend in the hallway which leads to overcrowding (especially when it was already a problem last year). I feel that Hintz had a plan and an agenda from the time he got here and slowly implemented it to create his school and to put his stamp on the school. Wozencraft didn’t implement these new rules and the school ran just fine. Also the dance policy is absurd from a student’s standpoint and an economic one. The dance is a fundraiser for the school and the fact that they restrict what the students do for 3 hours at a school function is unrealistic and I commend the students for taking the initiative and creating their own dance. Once again the school is out some needed money..

As a senior at the high school i have seen a lot of different changes in behavior in the past few years, but none as big as this year. It was anticipated that there would be more problems because more people means more problems, especially because the addition to the school is a younger age group. I personally am not involved in issues we're having but i know there are some very serious problems going on as far as stealing and fighting. Even the behavior in the hall ways is no longer as harmless as years past. What used to be concidered all in good fun picking on each other has turned into trying to get under eachother's skin and start some drama. I don't understand what drives the younger grades to do this, or why they feel the need to be so defensive about it when someone does call them out. I'm seriously hoping some major attitude adjustments and maturing happens over the course of next year. I am very proud of the school as a whole, and i'd hate to see it be brought down by a reputation of poorly behaved kids. If this kind of stuff keeps happening, who knows what could happen next?

after reading some of these comments i feel it also needs to be said that not everything has gone down the tubes here. Please parents, keep in mind that we are NOT MPS, nor do most of us know what MPS is even like. sure we have serious issues to address here, but we need to keep in mind of what we DO have going for us as well. Take it from a student that a lot of the kids have formed very positive relationships with other students from different grades, races, genders, you name it. We have also has a lot of success building as well. I feel that the issues we have don't apply to everyone, but rather a much smaller group. Menomonee Falls has always been a very conservative area, and when shiesty things start happening of course people are going to become upset about it. another thing i'd like to say has to do with our principal/administration. some of the comments i'm reading makes our administration sound aboslutely horrendous. i'd really like to see some of you complainers try to do the job they are doing. i give a lot of credit to anyone who is willing to tackle problems like stealing and fighting even if their tactics aren't working instantanious miricales like we want them to. their jobs are not by any means easy, and the fact that they always have parents breathing down their neck to fix everything at once is not helping the problems get solved. parents, as students we have respect for you, and of course, we love you. but it's also important to keep in mind that things will not be solved over night.

First off, I want to say that i agree that homework should be graded and that’s how i learned a lot in high school. Secondly "The thought is that the quiz and test scores are what really tell the story of a student. What a dumb idea!" this is the foundation of everything I’ve learned about academics. In college my homework is 5% and tests are 95% of my grade. Everyone in college knows that the tests you take determine your grade. Also, in order to get in to college you take ACT's, SAT's, and AP tests. After college you take exams to get certified in almost every career field. So saying that your kid is a bad test taker isn't really an excuse. By telling your kid that it’s OK to be a bad test taker is probably the worst thing you could do and I would start making a spot for him in your house because he probably won’t get much more of an education. He will have to work harder than most if he is a bad test taker and I would start telling him that now. Effort doesn’t go much farther than high school.

I'm a junior at MFHS, and to start off with, I don't think the problems going on are as serious as the community takes them to be. I don't deny that there are problems, but all the yelling and fist-shaking towards the school can only increase the sense of hostility. The true issue at our school is not lazy teachers, it's not chapter 220 students, it is our adminstration's inability to enforce rules with any sort of consistency. With the transition of the freshmen to the highschool, the older students have been given some rules that we were not expecting at the beginning of the year. These include no backpacks, closed lunch (for some), and general strictness in areas such as dress code and homeroom curriculum. Many of these changes came as a shock to us, so many students, I being one of them, have protested. However, these "protests" only ended up being the creation of a facebook group, and then we moved on. The main reason there are still problems at the high school is that there is no consistency in how the rules are enforced. At the beginning of the year, we were told we would not be able to have backpacks other than the school approved/sold bags. However, the administration seemed to give a laxer version to the teachers, because to this day, people are able to use any drawstring bag or purse that they want. I have spoken to teachers openly about this inconsistency, and have been told that the general policy that the administration tells the teachers to use is "do what you think is right." That results in a wide variety of teachers who enforce the rules their own ways, which results in different punishments for the same crimes. With this happening students are able to pinpoint which teachers they can do bad things in front of, and which they cannot. The administration, if it wants to create new rules, needs to first inform the teachers of exactly how they should enforce them.

To former student: What your comments say nothing about is the student who will not go on to college. FYI there are many at MFHS who get average grades or below average that will get skilled jobs out of high school and be very productive members of society. They deserve to learn something in high school! They will learn by doing the homework and have a teacher grade the homework and show them why they did not get the answer correct. If you do not do this for your average student or below average student there is no way they will get a good grade on any test or quiz. It's tiring to have people always refer to how it's done when you get to college. Not everyone plans to attend college.

Great comments! 900 detentions, 80 suspensions and 8 expulsions in just one semester and Principal Hintz says there is a misconception that MFHS is not safe! REALLY! Maybe he should stick to his broadcasting career. MFHS has lots of great things going on but by reading posts of current and past students this administration is trying hard to pretend nothing is going on. Imagine how students, parents, staff and administration will react when a weapon is brought into the school...will this be another misconception that the school is not safe. Violence is just one small issue as shown in this forum. Lack of food and trays, understandable during the first months of the transition but not 8 months later. All these changes at one time were foolish. What was this administration thinking...not thinking is more like it.

I think all of the problems come from the top down. Sports is the priority - not learning. The good old boys club is back.

The problems at MFHS are very serious. Too many kids in the school, too many in every class, no wonder there are so many issues!! With overcrowded classrooms, no wonder our kids aren't doing well! Teachers have no time to teach. Students and teachers have told me it takes 5-10 minutes at the beginning of each class just to get control of the room. Maybe with all the principals we have now, one of them could actually make some relevant decisions! Or just eliminate the extra positions that were created out of convenience and use that money to help make positive changes. If my child weren't graduating soon, we would've left the district THIS YEAR. Unfortunately, MFHS is going downhill FAST.

I have had several children over a span of 15 years graduate from MFHS. I was always impressed with the caring teachers. As my last child graduated a year ago it was different. His friends took classes-like senior foods--for an honors credit--I was shocked and then my older children informed me that it is the easiest class at the high school and students spend 9 weeks making gingerbread houses and second semester they spend time making a soup or preparing for a compeition-which they are required to attend or will fail so Menoonee Falls can bring trophies back to school fo the teacher to look good--why is this an honors course. What has changed in this class over the last 8 years--according to my children and their friends as they discussed this the last week-nothing. Where is the adminstration that they let these courses be taught? Students are taking AP courses and worrying about getting into college and then thiese cake walk courses are being taught. Lets get serious about courses in the day and age with cuts before we lose great teachers who work.

As a parent I agree that many changes must be made at the high school, however as a teacher I cannot believe people are cutting down the teachers. This is an administration issue, after all it begins with them. As far as teacher salary and working "6 hour days". That is unbelievable that someone actually believes that is how much a teacher works. Lets just start with lesson planning and how many hours outside of school time that takes to create interesting lessons. Also grading assignments, tests, etc. I do not think it is even physically possible to do all of that in 6 hours while teaching over 125 students. I have never actually timed how long it takes to do my job but if you actually believe it takes only 6 hours a day, you are more than welcome to give it a try. My guess is that it will take you over 50+ hours a week as it does most teachers. I also pray that they figure out the mess at the high school because I have a middle school child that will be there shortly. However if things do not improve, we will be searching out other options. I will not allow my child to be subjected to this type of an environment. What is even more sad is that we moved to Menomonee Falls years ago because of the district. I am ready to move out of the city because of the situation at the High School. This is in no way an overreaction because as far as I am concerned, the period of adjustment was the first month or two of school. We are way past that and it does not appear to be improving anytime soon.

To Parent/Teacher:some of the teachers do their jobs well and some do not. That's why a lot of people would rather give a raise to the good ones and have the bad ones get nothing. I needed to discuss some things with my kids high school english teacher a few years ago and e-mailed him and asked him to call me because I didn't want to be discussing the subject back and forth through e-mails. He replied that e-mail was how he communicated because he was involved in an extra curricular activity after school and couldn't call me. (I pretty much told him to call me or heads were going to roll.) Then my kid had a science teacher who told me that if my son ever needed extra help he would stay after school with him and the teacher would miss coaching football practice to do it because his teaching job came first. So not all teachers put in the extra effort or even the effort they are paid to do. Guess which teacher I would want to give a 7% raise to and which one would get zilch?

Get real: 50 hours a week? Seriously, you can't spend almost as much time planning and grading as you spend in the classroom. Considering many teachers are 4-5 weeks behind grading assignments, maybe that is why there are an occassional 50 hours of work. Half of them use on line grading software. ( which can be down and kick students off the night before the assignment is due ) I agree the problems exist due to the lack of leadership from the top down, but the issues also exist at a lower level as well. Be happy you have an existing contract, because given what the real employment world is facing- you would be looking at a lot of changes. I think we need new administration, and then clean up the train-wrecks at the classroom level.

Are you kidding me? Just one example of mismanagement of human resources: What is the need for a 70,000 dollar a year administrator who is there to oversee the ninth grade transition? This is a problem with the Superintendent. Keith Marty is the Superintendent and he is ultimately responsible for everything that goes on. It was his decision to keep administrator Tays as an administrator at the expense of teaching positions. Last year he demonstrated his lack of faith in her when he chose someone else to lead the North Junior High campus. But when it came down to it, he could not make the tough decision to eliminate administrator Tays position-so he created a position for her-out of thin air. My children are involved here, and what they need is more teachers! Not someone who just takes up space and uses up limited funding.

I am an English teacher (not from MF) and papers take on average 20 minutes to grade. Classes of 28? Five classes? More than 47 hours JUST FOR GRADING (if I don't take a break ever between papers). Ask any teacher and you will also learn that merit pay might give a 7% raise to the coach unavailable after school and zilch to an English teacher who assigns and gives thorough feedback on a paper every two weeks.

We need to stop Chapter 220, all of the kids in it do NOT want to learn, and they hinder our learning experience. I don't care if you call me racist, as I am not. Every day the "basketball player" Mr. Fox is talking about is late to our class by up to 20 minutes daily, and the teacher thinks it's funny and doesn't mark him tardy. I can't recall ONE Chapter 220 student that does his work and doesn't disrupt others, but I can just about pick out every one that is known for causing fights and disrupting classes. Get a grip Mr. Marty, stop being such a pushover. I am 100% sure the problem is the Chapter 220 students and not overcrowding. As far as Mrs. Tays goes, send her back to North. As far as the administration as a whole goes, please leave. Our district seems to think the basketball program is more important than all of the education departments as a whole. Why don't our lazy teachers get off their butts and grade our homework once in a while, how am I supposed to repair or fix our grade if our grades are inputted 2 months after they are "graded", which is also known as putting a scantron sheet into the machine. Bottom line: -End 220 -Start thinking

I think the whole deal with homework not being graded is not working out. Students arent doing their homework because theres really no need to when its not graded, and test scores reflect this. That is why tests and quizzes scores are lower this year.