Patrick McIlheran is Executive Editor at the Badger Institute of Wisconsin. Prior to his public policy work at the institute, McIlheran served U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson for more than 10 years as deputy chief of staff, communications director and policy adviser. Previously, he had a 14-year career with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, including seven years as a columnist, where one of his primary focuses was Milwaukee’s complex environment of school reform. Before that, he worked more than a decade as a journalist at newspapers in Wisconsin and Minnesota.