From the Springfield Journal-Register:
New education funding formula will benefit Illinois’ children
Education funding reform has been a long time coming in Illinois, and the state is finally on the cusp of it arriving.
After plenty of political theater — including last-minute amendments, sitting on the bill, a far-overreaching amendatory veto by the governor, missing the first two payments to school districts for the new academic year, and three dramatic votes in the House before it garnered enough “yes” votes to pass — Illinois lawmakers have approved a new way to fund the state’s K-12 schools. Keep reading the editorial.
From the News-Gazette:
Sausage is finally made
The effort to pass a new school-funding formula aimed at boosting the poorest schools required a strong stomach.
Both Democratic and Republican legislators in the Illinois House took turns Monday denouncing the state's new education-finance-funding formula legislation before, collectively, giving overwhelming approval to the measure. Here's the editorial.
Sausage is finally made
The effort to pass a new school-funding formula aimed at boosting the poorest schools required a strong stomach.
Both Democratic and Republican legislators in the Illinois House took turns Monday denouncing the state's new education-finance-funding formula legislation before, collectively, giving overwhelming approval to the measure. Here's the editorial.
From the Chicago Tribune:
In Illinois, a big day for little people
Two years ago, the nonpartisan Education Trust based in Washington, D.C., released a national school funding report. Illinois was dead last in providing adequate resources to low-income schoolchildren who need the most help. On just about every metric the trust studied, on just about every chart and graph, the abbreviation “IL” appeared in the very last column.
Lawmakers finalized a decision Tuesday to pull Illinois from that shameful column. They sent a bill to Gov. Bruce Rauner that, if signed into law as expected, would rework how the state pays for education. A brief review: No school districts would lose what they receive currently from the state. But new money would get pumped through a formula directing more resources to property-poor communities. And a new scholarship tax credit program will provide private school options to low- and middle-income children stuck in underperforming public schools. In a school-choice-averse, teachers-union-subjugated state, this tax credit program marks a dramatic pivot from the status quo. Read the entire editorial.