Milwaukee Public Schools must strategically invest in aquatic facilities
One of Milwaukee Public Schools’ best-kept secrets is our inclusive and inspiring high-school athletics programs, where teenagers from across the city can try on a new sport for size – tennis, soccer, and baseball are just a few examples – without any prior experience.
My son, a soccer player since age four, learned this the very best way when he joined the Rufus King High School swim team as a freshman and new swimmer in 2022. At the team’s first practice that fall, Coach Pete asked how many of his athletes knew how to swim. He welcomed each one regardless of their answer.
“We are glad you are here,” Coach Pete said. “We will meet you where you are and make you better.”
And that’s what he did. Together, coach and his team of 18 swimmers finished a close second to the Reagan Huskies at the MPS City Conference meet in 2022. The Rufus King Generals returned to the city conference tournament in the winter of 2023 as a team of 25. They won the conference’s junior varsity and varsity titles, sending nine athletes to the WIAA Sectional meet and one athlete to state. “This is the best sport I’ve done at King,” a first-year swimmer posted on Instagram.
That same weekend, Rufus King also won its first city conference wrestling title since 1977, coached by a full-time science teacher who also runs the school’s board-game club.
Although city conference athletes and coaches are performing at their very best, their shared high-school aquatic facilities are literally the worst. The Generals and Riverside Tigers teams suffered through one pool-facility breakdown after another in the weeks leading up to the city conference meet. The week of January 17, the Washington High School natatorium was closed due to a mechanical failure. That same week, a burst pipe in Riverside’s natatorium forced an automatic pool drain. Canceled practices, communication mishaps, disappointed coaches, and sidelined swimmers were the reality for the district’s swim teams at a time when our athletes should have been preparing for competition.
Even when Milwaukee Public Schools’ remaining natatoria (built in the 1970s and 1980s) are in basic working order, they don’t work for our student-athletes. The starting blocks at Washington are unusable because they are located in water that’s only three-feet deep. Riverside ran out of seats for ticketed spectators at the city conference meet and disappointed MPS swim fans went home instead of cheering on their community. Dismissal time for MPS high schoolers is 3:40 p.m. That’s when swimmers citywide begin their daily bus commute to reach a working pool for practice. Most weeknights, swimmers don’t get into the water until 4:30 or 5 p.m. and don’t get home until 6:45 or later.
Our athletes and their coaches deserve better, and we know that better is possible. A short drive to neighboring school districts like Wauwatosa and Shorewood reveals gorgeous, gleaming natatoria with state-of-the-art equipment and ample accommodations for fans.
School-funding disparities aside, there is one sensible, strategic solution to our district’s pool problems and it’s located a few yards from Rufus King, a school that was built in 1934 and last renovated in 2001. District parents and King neighbors are asking the MPS Board of Directors and administrators to consider purchasing a vacated county facility on Fiebrantz Street and renovating it into a northside natatorium and athletic practice facility.
There, our students could have an operational athletic home where they learn essential life skills: swimming, teamwork, and self discipline. The neighborhood could share the space before and after hours and on weekends for walking and running groups, swim lessons, and more. The starting blocks could be placed in the deep end of the pool, where they belong.
We must not let the status quo and education funding caps limit our children’s potential in any way.
As a community that loves our youth and wants to prepare them for long, healthy and happy adulthoods, let’s collectively answer the call to renovate MPS athletic facilities that are lacking, over-extended, and in desperate need of maintenance and repair. Let us also construct new facilities which match our student’s excellence and brilliance.
Maybe a pool at every MPS high school is a busted-pipe dream, but a northside natatorium near Rufus King and a twin facility on Milwaukee’s south side are community-building, lifesaving solutions and we can go from there. This journey is a marathon, not a sprint. Time to get started!
Emily Laga is a proud Milwaukee Public School mom and owner of SCOUT Wine Merchants in Shorewood.
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Aging and inadequate school pools a barrier to student participation.
