With Slated Foxconn Arrival, Area School Districts Begin Planning Discussions

Some southeastern Wisconsin school district leaders are starting informal discussions about how the Foxconn factory slated for the Village of Mount Pleasant will affect student enrollment. Some say it’s possible the LCD manufacturing plant could increase school sizes.

“We’re looking at possibly 10,000 or more employees arriving for Foxconn. We have no idea where they’re going to live, we have no idea how many children they’re going to have,” said Dennis Wiser, the school board vice president of the Racine Unified School District.

Wiser and school board President Robert Wittke Jr. say although it’s premature to make any decisions, they want to be ready for Foxconn’s arrival.

The Taiwan-based tech manufacturer is expected to hire 3,000 employees for its planned Racine County plant by 2020 and could eventually employ up to 13,000 people.

“Schools are not cheap and we don’t want to start building one right now needlessly but we may find ourselves with the need to build or expand rapidly,” said Wiser.

Racine’s school board plans to have future meetings to discuss how Foxconn could change school needs.

Wiser said the board would try to bring in people who could help estimate the number of students coming to the district, which currently serves nearly 20,000 students.

“We have to be ready for it and at this point there’s no indication that the state or the county or anybody is going to be helping us out with additional funds,” Wiser said.

The need to improve district performance also came up in a recent board meeting, according to Racine paper The Journal Times.

For the Bristol School District, whose borders could mean a 15 to 20 minute commute to the location of the planned factory, there has already been an increase in enrollment because of development unrelated to Foxconn.

The district hired additional staff this school year and plans to hire more next year, says district administrator Michael Juech.

“We’ve wanted to make sure that we stay ahead of that growth,” Juech said. “So Foxconn has definitely been a component of it but we’ve been fortunate to have growth even prior to that announcement.”

Juech said he plans to attend Foxconn-related forums in the region to get a better idea of what local impact could be.