Author: Adam Stoffel

As the class of 2026 has now officially graduated and they head off to college this fall, a remarkable number of Whitefish Bay student-athletes will be trading Blue Duke uniforms for college ones. Building on the tradition highlighted in our earlier look at current D1 athletes, here’s a look at the incoming college athletes from WFB, from Power Five programs to storied D3 institutions.

As with the last time, this list is a best effort and may not capture everyone. All of the below information was pulled from public resources, namely Instagram (my wife points out that I am the last 30-something on the planet to finally sign up for Instagram so that I could research this post).

NCAA Division I

Sage Miskel — Women’s Basketball, Butler Bulldogs Miskel joins Butler’s women’s basketball program this fall, where her father Chris Miskel played. On the court, she helped lead the team to a D2 state title and earned WBCA All-State and co-Conference Player of the Year honors.

Anne Dickinson — Women’s Swimming & Diving, Indiana Hoosiers Dickinson moves on to Indiana this fall as one of the most decorated swimmers in WFB history. She finished her high school career with 10 total individual state championships and helped lead the team to two state championships.

Clare Schaefer — Women’s Tennis, Butler Bulldogs Schaefer heads to Butler this fall to join the women’s tennis program. A standout at WFB and one of the North Shore Conference’s top players this fall. She came in 4th place in the state for doubles her senior year and won a singles state championship her junior year.

Charlie McIntyre — Baseball, Youngstown State Penguins McIntyre heads to Youngstown State this fall as a two-time All-State and three-time All-District selection. As co-Conference Player of the Year, he led the team to a co-Conference Championship. He was a member of the state championship 2023 team.

Fischer Jakowski — Men’s Swimming & Diving, Saint Louis Billikens Jakowski ships out to Saint Louis University’s program this fall. A key contributor to WFB’s state championship boys swimming program, was a three-time All-State swimmer his senior year and holds multiple school records.

Tosin Kolawole — Football, U.S. Air Force Academy Falcons A standout who played LB and RB for the Blue Dukes, Kolawole was one of the most impactful players on WFB’s 2025 Cinderella story team, reaching the WIAA Division 3 state semifinals. 

Kate Hunter — Rowing, Wisconsin Badgers

Finley Jorgensen — Rowing, Wisconsin Badgers

Committed for 2027-28

Chase Wolter — Baseball, UIC Flames (WFB Class of 2027)

Aibhy King — Women’s Swimming & Diving, Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets (WFB Class of 2027) 

Madonna Helf — Women’s Soccer, Wisconsin Badgers (WFB Class of 2027)

More Blue Dukes Playing in College Sports

Kellen Busalacchi — Football, UW–La Crosse 

Marcus Webb — Basketball, UW–Eau Claire

Steven Camacho — Swimming, UW–Eau Claire

Hattie Amato — Lacrosse, Bryn Mawr College

Gabby Wallace — Track & Field, MSOE

Zoey Addeo — Soccer, Edgewood College

Grayson Ogren — Soccer, Lawrence University

Alec Jacquart — Soccer, Endicott College 

Wes Grunau — Soccer, Eckerd College

Linus Pajot — Baseball, Loras College

When we last checked in with the School Board, the focus group format and questions were being hammered out and the survey was getting a green light in principle. Wednesday’s meeting was about finalizing the coming survey and additional focus groups. 

As always, here are my observations on what matters for those tracking the referendum process:

The First Focus Group: 80+ Residents, Varied Perspectives

Superintendent Dr. Jamie Foeckler shared a brief recap of Monday night’s community focus group, which drew more than 80 participants across 16 tables. He thanked the community for showing up and described the experience of rotating around the room as hearing “a lot of varied perspectives and approaches from people.”

The themes from that session haven’t been formally compiled yet. That synthesis will come out in the future and be posted publicly on the district website. The second community focus group is still scheduled for July 14.

I attended Monday’s gathering, and my group had a thoughtful discussion with a range of viewpoints. Multiple members cited the price tag as a significant reason for not fully supporting the first referendum. Other concerns included the Armory Memorial relocation, the lack of concrete plans for what residents would be paying for beyond a price tag, and the influence of negative discourse amongst community members in the WFB Villagers Facebook group. Interestingly, group members shared that they felt they didn’t have enough concrete information about what was being proposed, while also expressing concern that the $67.7 million price tag on the new middle school included ‘all the bells and whistles.’ It’s hard to know whether a proposal is too luxurious when all we know is the headline number, but that gap between what Villagers know and what they may perceive to know points to the exact challenge up ahead for the district as it moves towards a presumed November vote.

Two New Stakeholder Sessions Added

The board approved two additional focus group invitations, both in July, targeting groups with specific stakes in the middle school question.

The first is for community members specifically involved in or concerned with the Armory Memorial. That session will be held on July 20th at 6pm in the Middle School Library Media Center. The letter going to that group asks specifically about where the memorial should be placed if a new school on the site moves forward: on the exterior of a new building, or on the green space at the current middle school site.

The second is a neighborhood focus group for residents living on the streets immediately surrounding the middle school/park — Kimbark, Meadow, Sylvan, Lake, Henry Clay, and Ardmore. That one is July 21st at 6pm in the Middle School Gym. 

It appears they will use the same format for these two meetings as the broader community sessions, not a special agenda or Q&A format. Board members discussed that all will be welcome to attend those sessions.

The Survey: Approved After Significant Wordsmithing

The board voted to approve a new community survey after a lengthy line-by-line discussion that produced several notable changes from the draft. The Donovan Group, the district’s communications firm, handled the original draft and will finalize revisions based on Wednesday’s discussion. A few board members lamented the absence of The Donovan Group at the meeting as they were not able to attend. The survey opens June 29, with postcards and QR codes arriving in mailboxes around July 1-3. It closes July 31. This version of the survey will be submitted online as opposed to the prior paper survey.

For readers curious to see the original draft, I’ve uploaded it to Dropbox here. Please note that this draft is going to be updated as mentioned above.

A Side Note on Why the Referendum Matters

Buried in the Building and Grounds committee meeting was a useful illustration of what’s at stake. The district’s Siemens building automation system — the controls that run HVAC throughout the high school and can impact both Cumberland’s and Richards’ HVACs — failed for about a week this past April. The district got it back online, but the underlying system dates to the 1990s and is increasingly fragile. The board was presented with three options: do nothing and accept the risk, do a partial upgrade for around $220,000, or replace the whole thing for over $1 million. The catch: any money spent now would almost certainly be torn out and replaced anyway if a referendum passes, since full HVAC replacement at the high school is part of the proposed scope. Even if voters approve something in November, referendum-funded work wouldn’t start until summer 2028 at the earliest. As one board member put it, any fix short of the referendum is “a decent-sized bandage.”

What’s Next

The survey opens June 29th and will be conducted online. The second community focus group is July 14th. The Armory Memorial focus group is July 20th, the neighborhood focus group July 21st. Survey results go to the board August 12th, with a follow-up meeting August 19th to shape a potential November ballot question — all ahead of the August 25th statutory deadline for a referendum question on the ballot.

When we last checked in with the School Board, the path toward a November referendum was coming into focus. This week’s meeting shed more light on the coming details, and specifically, what next Tuesday’s community focus groups may actually look like. Additionally, the board discussed what the Village has requested from the district on the Armory Memorial if they create a formal memorandum of understanding, and whether a community survey is happening.

To view Superintendent Dr. Jamie Foeckler’s memo that outlined much of the referendum discussion, click here (loaded to Dropbox, for those not fond of Boarddocs). 

Here’s what was debated from my perspective.

The Village Wants an Answer: Building or Green Space?

Last time, we talked about how the Village and the School District wanted to formalize their potential transfer of property (the Village owns the Armory Park land) should the School District decide to move forward with a plan for a new middle school on the site. Architect Nicholas Kent from PRA walked through what a memorial could look like if a new middle school were built at Armory Park. He was careful to stress that there are no designs at this point, but the concept identified three exterior opportunities:

• The northeast corner facing Lake Drive, where the memorial sits today, as a high-visibility anchor that could incorporate elements of the existing memorial
• The east face of the building along Ardmore, which could extend the memorial experience southward
• The south face overlooking the playfield, a future potential gathering spot for events like the well attended Memorial Day ceremonies

The Village would need the district to choose, for purposes of the memorandum of understanding, whether the memorial would be integrated into the new building or rebuilt on the green space that would open up at the current middle school site. And for all of this to align with the timing of a November referendum, it would likely need that answer by the end of August.

Several board members weren’t ready to commit. One pointed out that the Armory has been at least a small part of educating Whitefish Bay students since 1932, and that the memorial group and veteran community haven’t yet weighed in. The suggestion was even floated that the answer might be “both”: a prominent memorial at the new building plus a garden space at the vacated middle school site.

Focus Group Format: Set for Next Tuesday

The first focus group is June 16, with a second on July 14. About 100 residents have signed up so far (there is still time to sign up). The potential structure:

Tables of six to seven people, each with a moderator/note-taker from the administrative team or partner groups.

After considerable wordsmithing, the board seemed to land on three questions for discussion:

1. Please share why you voted the way you did on the referendum question. (Non-voters will be asked to share their perspectives.)
2. What stands out to you as the greatest needs and constraints across our facilities?
3. Please share your thoughts on tax impact tolerance.

The board was clear the tax tolerance discussion should stay at the level of an overall number, not get tied to specific projects. A reference sheet recapping the April referendum projects may also be on each table, deliberately framed as what was proposed, not what will be proposed. As one board member put it, the projects may change but “the needs are constant.”

Running beneath the question-wording debate was a familiar tension: is the board open to completely new proposals, or is this process headed toward a relative do-over of the April referendum with a smaller price tag? One member stressed that the sessions should be about collecting community feedback before the board comes up with a referendum question — not that the board has a question in mind that they are asking people to give feedback on. Others were equally insistent that nothing fundamental has changed since the April vote: the needs identified six months ago are the same needs today. 

The Survey is Back on the Table

The board supported moving forward with a community survey, this time through the Donovan Group, the communications firm hired last month. The board president was blunt about the reasoning: the focus groups will reach less than a tenth of the community, and quantitative data is needed alongside the qualitative.

The timeline is tight. The Donovan Group will provide a draft within days, board members will submit individual feedback by Monday, and the board needs to approve a final version at its June 17 meeting. The survey will then run the full month of July, with a postcard and QR code going out to the community.

Notably, this process will differ from the earlier survey used before the April referendum. It will be web-based, every resident in a household can take it (a point of confusion last time), and paper copies will be available if needed.

Enrollment Watch

The School Board also discussed new enrollment projections for next year. There has been significant discussion about the numbers in the past in the context of investing in the distinct’s future needs. The overall projected numbers are down from this school year, but still ahead of the projected numbers from the Community Change & Projections Report in 2025. 

Total enrollment across the four schools is projected to be 2,837 students for the 2026-2027 school year. The most recent numbers from January were 2,896 students. The CC&P Report had projected a drop to 2,783 students for 2027.   

The report had also concluded that nearly 100% of the recent historical drop in enrollment for Whitefish Bay was due to 1) the sunsetting of the Chapter 220 program due to changes at the state level and 2) the choice to not take any students through the open enrollment option from outside of the district. Chapter 220 enrollment next year will decrease from 37 students to 22 and will drop to 0 in two years.

The calendar gets tight from here: The first focus group is Tuesday, June 16th, with a second on July 14th. The survey window would last the month of July with results landing at the August 12th board meeting, where a draft referendum question would need to take shape, before the August 25th statutory deadline.