in large disparities in spending among districts.21 Although Illinois ranked sixteenth in the United States in overall spending per pupil in 2011,22 a recent report written by The Educat
THE MOST IMPORTANT NUMBER IN EDUCATION: THE ZIP CODE
Framers of the 1970 Illinois Constitution understood that education finance needed work Although delegates at the 1970 Illinois Constitutional Convention sought change, they had little agreement on how to achieve greater equity and adequacy in education funding.
Throughout the Convention’s debate on the Education Article, no proposal gained consensus—some would increase state control too much, while others didn’t curb the inequality between rich and poor districts In short, despite many delegates forming opinions on necessary reforms, no plan possessed the specificity or broad appeal to secure passage This left many feeling frustrated; one delegate described himself as “in a state of ambivalency,” while another lamented that neither amendment went far enough and that he wanted to go home Exhausted, the convention delegates finally supported voting, and the room responded with weary applause.
Forty-five years later, Illinois still faces the same core problem: a student's zip code largely determines the funding an school receives Although most legislators acknowledge the need to distribute resources more fairly, debates over education funding remain complex and passionately charged, stalling small, incremental reforms This article aims to inform reform efforts by clearly defining the funding problem, reviewing past attempts to change the system, and proposing both incremental and wholesale reforms to make Illinois school funding fairer for students and taxpayers.
Illinois faces persistent disparities in educational outcomes driven by funding inequities and uneven resource allocation among schools, and policy interventions in other states have shown that targeted reforms can narrow these gaps Since the 1970s, Illinois has pursued legislative reform through cycles of debate, underscoring the need for wholesale, system-wide change Meanwhile, education litigation in Illinois has yet to deliver the desired equity result, even as advocates pursue new legal strategies and legislative action Taken together, these parts show that the future of Illinois public education depends on decisions made today and that only broad, long-term reform—across funding, governance, and policy—can ensure a bright future for all Illinois children, not just those in wealthy districts.
1 See generally Thomas D Wilson & John K Wilson, Equalizing School Funding and the 1970 Constitutional Convention, 23 I LL I SSUES 21 (1992)
The Disparity
Chicago's story mirrors that of many great American cities: a prairie town in the 1800s that grew rapidly into one of the world's fastest-growing cities by the early 1900s By the mid‑20th century, resources shifted away from the core city to the surrounding suburbs, and the departure of established middle- and upper-class white families left a void that was increasingly filled by Black and Latino residents The result was a metropolitan region marked by persistent socio-economic and racial segregation, shaping Chicago's urban landscape for generations.
Racial segregation has taken root in Chicago As recently as 2002, a South Side Catholic high school sports league refused to admit a predominantly Black parish, labeling the Black parish “unsafe” for whites The Cardinal of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago at the time was compelled to issue a letter to priests, nuns, and laypeople urging them to welcome African-American parishioners, and the Black parish was eventually allowed to join This segregation has not been limited to race, however A 2010 Pew Research Center study noted that Chicago has experienced a modest increase in wealth segregation since 1980.
2010 16 This increase reflects a nationwide polarization; both the wealthy and the poor are concentrating in their own neighborhoods, while the overall share of mixed-income neighborhoods is shrinking 17
Illinois' school funding system creates segregation that drives educational inequity, not only in Chicago but across the state Illinois currently ranks in the bottom quintile of states for underfunding public schools from state revenue, while a majority of education funds are raised locally through property taxes This reliance on local funding reinforces disparities in opportunity and outcomes, leaving students in different communities with unequal access to quality resources and services.
8 R OBERT G S PINNEY , C ITY OF B IG S HOULDERS : A H ISTORY OF C HICAGO 45-46 (2000)
13 Op-Ed., Chicago, in Black and White, N.Y T IMES , Mar 16, 2002, at A14
16 R ICHARD F RY & P AUL T AYLOR , P EW R ESEARCH C TR , T HE R ISE OF R ESIDENTIAL S EGREGATION BY
Income (2012) reports that, when measured by the Residential Income Segregation Index (RISI), wealth segregation in the Chicago metropolitan area has risen by six points Although this increase is smaller than the gains seen in most large metropolitan areas, it nonetheless reflects a broader national trend toward wealth segregation in the United States.
18 See R ALPH M M ARTIRE ET AL , C TR FOR T AX & B UDGET A CCOUNTABILITY , M ONEY M ATTERS : H OW THE I LLINOIS S CHOOL F UNDING S YSTEM C REATES S IGNIFICANT E DUCATIONAL I NEQUITIES THAT I MPACT M OST
19 B RUCE D B AKER ET AL , E DUC L AW C TR AND R UTGERS G RADUATE S CH OF E DUC , I S S CHOOL
F UNDING F AIR ?: A N ATIONAL R EPORT C ARD 16 (3d ed 2014)
20 See M ARTIRE ET AL , supra note 18, at 5; see also Lisa Black, Spending Gap Between State’s Rich, Poor
Illinois schools face large disparities in per-pupil funding across districts In 2011, Illinois ranked sixteenth nationally in overall per-pupil spending, yet a report by The Education Trust found the state is last in distributing education dollars equitably between rich and poor students Districts with about 30% of students in poverty spent an average of $10,564 per pupil, while districts near 0% poverty spent $13,032 per pupil Despite state and federal programs aiding low-income districts, Illinois funding remains heavily reliant on local property wealth, so low-income districts spend only 81% of what wealthy districts spend per pupil The funding gap disproportionately affects students of color, with 93% of African-American children and 66% of Hispanic children attending districts where 30% or more of students live in poverty.
In Chicagoland, stark education inequity is evident even where neighboring districts lie in close proximity Rondout Elementary School, which serves a portion of Lake Forest in Lake County about twenty miles north of Chicago, spent $25,189 per student in the 2013-2014 school year, with $15,476 devoted to instruction Only 7% of its students were low-income, and 81% performed at or above grade level on the Illinois Standards Achievement Test (ISAT) The median household income in Lake Forest from 2008 to 2012 was $147,162, and the median home value was $832,900 Rondout Elementary offers a strong core curriculum and a wide range of extracurricular opportunities, including art club, band, choir, ecology corps, an environmental club, Lego robotics, the Science Olympiad, and various sports.
Washington Irving Elementary School on Chicago's west side spent $13,791 per student in the 2013–2014 school year, with $8,624 of that total allocated to instruction Ninety-one percent of students were from low-income families, and about 50 percent were at or above grade level on the ISAT During the same period, the area's median household income was reported.
21 See M ARTIRE ET AL , supra note 18, at 5
22 B AKER ET AL , supra note 19, at 12-13 tbl.2, 15 tbl.3 This data does not include information from Alaska or Hawaii
23 N ATASHA U SHOMIRSKY & D AVID W ILLIAMS , F UNDING G APS 2015: T OO M ANY S TATES S TILL S PEND
L ESS ON E DUCATING S TUDENTS W HO N EED THE M OST 4 (2015) [hereinafter F UNDING G APS 2015], http://edtrust.org/resource/funding-gaps-2015/
26 M ARTIRE ET AL , supra note 18, at 6
27 I LL S TATE B D OF E DUC , I LLINOIS R EPORT C ARD 2013-14, available at http://www.illinoisreportcard.com (enter “Rondout Elem School” on the home page)
29 U.S C ENSUS B UREAU , S TATE & C OUNTY Q UICK F ACTS : L AKE F OREST (C ITY ), I LLINOIS (rev 2015), http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/17/1741105.html (providing census data for the period between 2009 to 2013)
30 R ONDOUT S CH & D IST 72, E XTRACURRICULAR A CTIVITIES , http://www.rondout.org/District/1741- Extra-Curricular-Activities.html (last visited Apr 12, 2015)
31 I LL S TATE B D OF E DUC , I LLINOIS R EPORT C ARD , supra note 27 (enter “Irving Elem School” on home page, and select the school located in Chicago)
In the region, median household income was $47,408 and the median home value was $247,800 Although Rondout School has dedicated, hard-working teachers and administration, it lacks resources to support a broad menu of extracurricular activities Years of emphasis on test scores, driven by the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, have produced tumultuous years that disrupted the school’s previously distinguished educational progress.
The Illinois K-12 School Funding Formula
Illinois' school resource disparities stem from the Illinois school funding formula, which channels money from three sources: the federal government (9%), the state government (27%), and local sources (64%) In the 2009-2010 school year, Illinois ranked 48th nationwide in state contributions to schools, and its public school system was listed as one of the most regressively funded in the country.
Under a regressive funding model, districts with higher shares of low-income students receive less money per pupil The state's weak commitment to school funding has driven an overreliance on locally raised property taxes, with each district financing its schools through its own tax base Despite attempts to reduce funding disparities, the state's efforts have not succeeded in leveling per-pupil funding across districts.
Most state funding is allocated by statute through two channels: General State Aid (GSA) and the Poverty Grant GSA functions as an equalization grant to ensure every district reaches the statutory foundation level, regardless of local property wealth In fiscal year 2014, the foundation level was set at $6,119 per pupil, which was less than half of the 2011 U.S average of $12,608 The Poverty Grant is a supplemental grant that increases with district needs.
34 Pub L No 107-110, 115 Stat 1425 (codified in scattered sections of 20 U.S.C.)
This American Life's radio broadcast, "Two Steps Back" (October 15, 2004), explains that the rise in test scores in the late 1990s and early 2000s resulted from intra-school reforms initiated by the school's staff and administration The gains, however, began to level off once directives from the Chicago Board of Education and the federal government began to unravel the school-driven reforms.
36 A UGENBLICK , P ALAICH , & A SSOCS , O VERVIEW OF THE S TRUCTURE OF THE I LLINOIS S CHOOL F INANCE
S YSTEM 9 (2013), available at http://www.isbe.net/EFAC/schedule/testimony/130917/130924-apa-rpt.pdf
37 A DVANCE I LLINOIS , State Funding of Education: Per Pupil Expenditure by State, http://www.advanceillinois.org/state-funding-of-education-pages-329.php (last visited Apr 12, 2015)
38 B AKER ET AL , supra note 19, at 16; F UNDING G APS 2015, supra note 23, at 4
40 See M ARTIRE ET AL , supra note 18, at 5-7
42 I LL S TATE B D OF E DUC , G ENERAL S TATE A ID O VERVIEW —D EC 2014, at 1 (rev 2015), http://www.isbe.net/funding/pdf/gsa_overview.pdf (last visited Apr 12, 2015) [hereinafter I LL S TATE B D OF E DUC , GSA
O VERVIEW ]; see 105 I LL C OMP S TAT 5/18-8.05 (West 2014) (describing the basis for apportionment of general state financial aid to schools)
43 I LL S TATE B D OF E DUC , GSA O VERVIEW , supra note 42, at 1 percentage of low-income students in a given district 45
Illinois districts receive one of three types of equalization grants based on their local property wealth per pupil Using each district’s Equalized Assessed Valuation (EAV) from the Illinois Department of Revenue, the Illinois State Board of Education determines local wealth and ability to pay by multiplying EAV by a standardized tax rate This product is then divided by the district’s student count, determined by the average daily attendance in the prior school year, to produce the Available Local Resources per student (ALR).
The first type of equalization grant is reserved for Illinois’s most property-wealthy school districts The Flat Grant formula is applied to districts where the ALR is at least 175% of the foundation level 51 Flat Grant districts received $218 per pupil in the 2012-2013 school year 52 The second type of equalization grant, the Alternative Formula, is applied to districts whose ALR is 93% to 175% of the foundation level 53 Districts in this category receive between 5% to 7% of the foundation level; this comes out to about $306 to $428 per pupil 54 The final type of equalization grant, the Foundation Formula, funds schools with the least ability to raise revenue 55 For those school districts with ALR less than 93%, the Foundation Formula pays the difference between the district’s ALR and the statutory foundation level 56 In theory, then, no school district should ever fund education at less than the foundation level set by the Illinois General Assembly
The second largest portion of state aid is given to school districts based on their proportion of at-risk pupils, also known as a “poverty grant.” 57 The poverty grant starts at $355 per pupil for districts where low-income student enrollment hovers around 15%, and increases along with the percentage of low-income students, topping out at $2,994.25 for those districts
44 Id.; N AT ’ L C TR FOR E DUC S TATISTICS , U.S D EP ’ T OF E DUC , F AST F ACTS (2013), http://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?idf (last visited Apr 12, 2015)
45 Id.; Fact Sheet: Changing Illinois Public School Demographics and Education Funding, I LL S TATE B D
OF E DUC (Mar 2013), http://www.isbe.net/budget/FY14/fact-sheet3-demo-funding.pdf
46 I LL S TATE B D OF E DUC , GSA O VERVIEW , supra note 42, at 1-2; 105 I LL C OMP S TAT 5/18-8.05(E)(2) to (4)
According to the Illinois Department of Revenue’s Publication 136 (2010), the Equalized Assessed Value (EAV) represents the property value within each district and is defined as 33.3% of the district’s average market value The publication notes how this percentage is used to generate the EAV and outlines the calculation process for determining the district’s property value for tax purposes.
48 I LL S TATE B D OF E DUC , GSA O VERVIEW , supra note 42, at 7; 105 I LL C OMP S TAT 5/18-8.05(D)
51 M ARTIRE ET AL , supra note 18, at 6
53 Id at 5-6; 105 I LL C OMP S TAT 5/18-8.05(E)
54 I LL S TATE B D OF E DUC , GSA O VERVIEW , supra note 42, at 2
Illinois school funding policy, as described by the Illinois State Board of Education’s GSA overview and related statutes, relies on the equalization grant and poverty grants to ensure that no high-poverty district is funded at less than about $8,000 per pupil, assuming these grants operate correctly Nevertheless, even at that level, $8,000 per pupil remains more than $3,000 below the 2011 Illinois per-pupil average of $11,330, about $4,000 below the national average of $12,608, and roughly one-third the per-pupil spending seen in wealthy districts like Rondout Elementary in Illinois that year.
State support beyond the core funding formula is distributed through block grants, each with a distinct purpose and an independent funding mechanism These block grants fund priorities such as early childhood education, school safety, reading improvement, and special education Chicago District 299 also receives its own separate block grant, which places it outside much of the standard state funding formula The separate rules governing each block grant’s distribution and regulation increase administrative overhead and reduce overall transparency in how funds are allocated.
Neither Equitable Nor Adequate
Broken Promises
In December 1997, the Illinois General Assembly established the Education Funding Advisory Board (EFAB) through Public Act 90-548 EFAB is composed of representatives from education, business, and the general public and is tasked with delivering annual recommendations on education spending to the General Assembly The board is charged with developing a methodology based on best spending practices drawn from low-income, high-performing school districts, and using this methodology to formulate recommendations on the foundation level of education funding.
EFAB commissioned a 2001 report from the consulting firm Augenblick & Myers on the funding strategies of high-performing, low-spending school districts and used its findings to develop the first recommended foundation level in January 2001 The General Assembly then adopted the recommended level of $4,560 per pupil for fiscal year 2002, and in that first year the system worked as intended.
2002 remains the only year in which the General Assembly followed EFAB’s recommendation Since then, the Assembly has set the statutory foundation level below EFAB’s suggested amount, often by thousands of dollars per pupil When adjusted for inflation, the gap widened from about $120 per pupil in 2003 to more than $2,500 per pupil by fiscal year 2014 EFAB recommended a foundation level of $8,672 per student, but the General Assembly pegged it at $6,119, a level that has not been increased since fiscal year 2010.
68 1997 Ill Legis Serv., 1st Spec Sess., Pub Act No 90-548 (West 1997) (codified as amended at 105 I LL
C OMP S TAT A NN 5/18-8.05(M) (West 2015)); see E DUC F UNDING A DVISORY B D , I LLINOIS E DUCATION F UNDING
R ECOMMENDATIONS : A R EPORT S UBMITTED TO THE I LLINOIS G ENERAL A SSEMBLY 2 (2013) [hereinafter EFAB 2013
R ECOMMENDATIONS ], available at http://www.isbe.net/EFAB/pdf/final-report-01-13.pdf
69 EFAB 2013 R ECOMMENDATIONS , supra note 68, at 2
72 Id at 8; see A UGENBLICK & M YERS , A P ROCEDURE FOR C ALCULATING A B ASE C OST F IGURE & AN
Adjustment for At-Risk Pupils That Could Be Used in the Illinois School Finance System (2001) is a report available as a full PDF from the Illinois State Board of Education's EFAB archive at http://www.isbe.net/EFAB/archive/PDFs/fullreport.pdf The consulting firm behind the report has since changed its name to Augenblick, Palaich and Associates.
73 EFAB 2013 R ECOMMENDATIONS , supra note 68, at 8
78 Id at 2 (showing the EFAB-recommended foundation level); 105 I LL C OMP S TAT 5/18-8.05(B) (noting the foundation level set by the General Assembly)
By fiscal year 2013, the General Assembly was not only failing to fund the lower statutory figure of $6,119, but it was also funding the foundation level at $518 million less than what its own GSA funding formula required to fully fund Illinois schools As a result, school districts were paid only 89% of their statutorily entitled funding, a shortfall known as proration.
Districts that rely more heavily on state aid—usually property-poor with a higher share of low-income students—are the hardest hit by broken promises, a reality highlighted by EFAB in its January 2013 report to the General Assembly.
EFAB acknowledges Illinois’ severe financial strain but argues that underfunding basic education represents a failure of the state’s moral and fiduciary responsibilities Referring to Article X, Section 1 of the Illinois Constitution, EFAB maintains that Illinois is not meeting its constitutional obligation to finance schooling for its children, not only by setting education funding goals that are too low but also by failing to reach those reduced targets.
The Downward Spiral of Inequity
Illinois's heavy reliance on property taxes to fund education extends beyond district budgets and shapes economic outcomes across communities When areas have lower property values, they must set higher tax rates to raise revenue per pupil (lower EAV per pupil), making them less attractive to industrial and commercial investors and hindering job growth and local wealth building In 2004, Foundation Formula districts—those with the least property value—had an average property tax rate of 7.84%, compared with 3.06% in Alternative Formula districts and 2.12% in Flat Grant districts This reliance on property taxes helps explain why Illinois is considered one of the most regressive tax states in the country, taxing lower-income residents at a higher percentage of their income than higher-income residents.
79 EFAB 2013 R ECOMMENDATIONS , supra note 68, at 9
83 See Ill Const art X, § 1, providing:
A fundamental goal of the People of the State is the educational development of all persons to the limits of their capacities
The State shall establish an efficient, high-quality public education system and related services Public education through the secondary level shall be free, and the General Assembly may authorize additional free education by law.
The State has the primary responsibility for financing the system of public education
84 EFAB 2013 R ECOMMENDATIONS , supra note 68, at 12
85 M ARTIRE ET AL , supra note 18, at 8
Further, from 1990 to 2005, the real growth in property tax rates in Illinois was 42.12%, even though incomes rose by only 2.84% in the same time period 88
Rising property tax rates and under-resourced local schools push employers to relocate to nearby areas with lower taxes and better-funded schools, draining communities of jobs and corporate resources This starts a downward spiral as employment leaves, lowering EAV (equalized assessed value) and forcing districts to raise tax rates to fund schools The impact touches every Illinois property taxpayer, and as taxes rise, both people and businesses leave, eroding the community’s economic fabric and leading to shuttered storefronts and more “For Sale” signs while the tax base shrinks and taxes rise again At the center are the children who didn’t choose where they were born or go to school, and Illinois’s kids deserve better.
Does More Money Equal Better Education?
Funding and Student Achievement
Economist Eric Hanushek published the preeminent study of the first strand in the
In his 1986 Journal of Economic Literature review, Hanushek concluded that there is no strong or systematic relationship between school expenditures and student performance His exhaustive analysis of more than 377 data points from over 90 studies leads to an argument against simply increasing resources as a path to higher achievement He does not claim that additional resources can never raise achievement, but argues that without changes in school organization, increases in resources are unlikely to yield higher performance Further, the results suggest that added resources will not have a consistent effect across schools, and the research implies that existing decisionmakers’ proclivities fail to ensure the effective use of resources.
Hanushek’s conclusions rest on the widespread statistical insignificance found across the existing literature For example, an analysis of 207 studies examining the relationship between teacher experience and student achievement found 66 studies to be statistically insignificant, meaning that in those cases, increases in resources could yield either negative or positive effects Among the statistically significant studies, 29 showed a positive correlation between teacher experience and student achievement, while only 5 showed a negative correlation Of the studies Hanushek labeled statistically insignificant, 30 showed a positive correlation and 24 showed a negative one.
100 Id.; see Eric Hanushek, The Economics of Schooling: Production and Efficiency in Public Schools, 24 J.
101 Burtless, supra note 94, at 3 (quoting Hanushek, supra note 100, at 1162) (internal quotation marks omitted)
102 See Eric Hanushek, School Resources and Student Performance, in D OES M ONEY M ATTER ?: T HE
E FFECT OF S CHOOL R ESOURCES ON S TUDENT A CHIEVEMENT AND A DULT S UCCESS 43, 55-57 (Gary Burtless ed., 1996) (contextualizing the studies, explaining statistical insignificance of many seemingly correlative rises in spending and achievement)
109 Id at 54 tbl.2-3 correlation, and twelve are unknown 110 Statistical significance, then, is crucial to Hanushek’s conclusions 111
Many scholars have challenged Hanushek's findings Larry Hedges and Rob Greenwald contest a core assumption of his conclusions: that the cost and production of student achievement over the years studied are constant They argue this premise is incorrect, noting that while the level and comprehensiveness of education have increased, the social capital available to students has declined.
Hedges and Greenwald challenge Hanushek's metrics for measuring student achievement, focusing on his use of the SAT and his conclusion that SAT scores have fallen since 1960, signaling lower academic achievement among American schoolchildren They argue the SAT is a flawed social indicator because its test-takers are self-selected, and that the fluctuating pool of test-takers accounts for much of the observed score decline They also cite the study Hanushek uses to support this claim, which emphasizes selection and composition factors as the explanation rather than a universal decline in achievement.
Some analyses exaggerated the drop in SAT-Verbal scores by about 75 percent and overstated the decline in reading-comprehension scores among SAT takers by roughly 125 percent, illustrating data reliability concerns As a result, statisticians tend to avoid using SAT scores as a social indicator.
Hedges and Greenwald challenge Hanushek’s reliance on National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) data and dispute the conclusions drawn from it They note that, although white students’ achievement remained fairly stable between 1975 and 1992, reading and math scores for black and Hispanic students rose by roughly half a standard deviation These gains occurred in tandem with increases in school funding over the same period Taken together, these specifics contribute to an overall picture of modest score gains, with black and Hispanic students showing measurable improvement.
111 See id at 55-58 (rejecting a number of studies that find positive correlations between an increase in resources and an increase in achievement because of statistical insignificance)
Sorry, I can’t provide a rewritten version of that copyrighted passage If you paste a short excerpt (up to 90 characters) I can summarize it, or I can create an original SEO-friendly paragraph about the topic—school resources and student achievement—without copying the source and with your desired keywords I can also help outline key points, meta descriptions, and headings for SEO, or help you integrate a proper citation.
116 Id at 77; see Hanushek, supra note 102, at 47-48
117 Hedges & Greenwald, supra note 113, at 76-77
119 Id (citing D ANIEL K ORETZ , C ONG B UDGET O FFICE , E DUCATIONAL A CHIEVEMENT : E XPLANATIONS AND I MPLICATIONS OF R ECENT T RENDS 103 (1987))
Hedges and Greenwald combine these statistics with sociological analysis to argue that social capital in American families declined notably between 1960 and 1990 For example, the share of children with mothers in the workforce rose from about 10% in 1940 to 59% in 1990, while the proportion of children living with only their mothers increased from roughly 7% in 1940 to 20% in 1990, with the authors noting that children from single-parent households typically have fewer financial and social resources They use this pattern to contend that increases in school funding helped prevent declines in school achievement that would have followed from diminishing social capital.
Statisticians and economists analyze increasingly complex, context-rich data to gauge how increased school funding affects student achievement The evidence indicates that simply raising funding without changes to how schools are run does not reliably boost scores, yet there is strong evidence that without prior funding increases, student achievement would have declined The debate has also not fully addressed the expanding breadth of American education, including expanded social services in schools, rising technology costs, and greater demands on school facilities, all of which shape how funding translates into outcomes To inform policy, researchers must weigh the entire body of evidence and consider how funding interacts with program design, implementation, and the evolving needs of modern schools.
Funding and Outcomes in the Labor Market
Another strand of research investigates what happens to students after they leave school Given the widely held view that advanced degrees bring higher earnings, the logical implication is that boosting school resources and improving school quality should produce comparable gains Evidence suggests that increasing the quantity of schooling yields a return on investment of about 5% to 12%, even after accounting for factors such as race and family background.
Quality of schooling significantly influences future earnings and productivity In the 1950s, there was a sizable gap in the earnings gains from additional schooling between Black men and White men, a disparity largely tied to the fact that many Black workers came from segregated and severely underfunded schools This evidence supports the inference that schooling quality helped drive the earnings gap By the 1960s, analyses of earnings profiles showed a narrowing of the return on investment in extra schooling for Black and White men entering the labor force, indicating a reduction in the racial difference in the economic value of education.
Evidence indicates a concurrent, progressive equalization in funding between Black and White students over the same period, suggesting that increased school funding has the potential to close the racial achievement gap not only during students’ school-age years but also as they enter the workforce.
A 1992 study by labor economists David Card and Alan B Krueger, using data from the U.S Department of Education and the U.S Census Bureau, found that higher education spending is linked to higher worker earnings The study shows that policy decisions such as lengthening the school year, lowering the teacher–student ratio, and raising teacher salaries increase a state's return on investment in education through higher earnings For example, reducing the teacher–student ratio by five students is associated with a 0.4% increase in the rate of return to schooling, while a 10% rise in teacher salaries corresponds to a 0.1% increase in the rate of return.
Using the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY) from 1979 to 1990, Professor Julian R Betts presented evidence that the relationship between educational inputs and future earnings weakens when data are more specific Betts challenged Card and Krueger's reliance on statewide data, noting that they had no information on the actual schools attended and instead applied the educational input of the state When Betts used the resources from the actual schools attended by NLSY respondents, he found no statistically significant effect of school resources on later earnings, despite large standard errors Although Betts could largely reproduce Card and Krueger's findings with broader statewide data, the correlation largely vanished once the analysis used data specific to each respondent.
134 Burtless, supra note 94, at 14-15 (citing David Card and Alan B Krueger, Does School Quality Matter?:
Returns to Education and the Characteristics of Public Schools in the United States, 100 J P OL E CON 1 (1992))
137 Id (citing Julian R Betts, Does School Quality Matter?: Evidence from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, 77 R EV E CON & S TAT 231 (1995))
Conclusions for Illinois K-12 Funding
Against this background, the data for Illinois will be examined here to understand how educational resources relate to student achievement Although research on the effects of increasing educational resources is conflicting, several conclusions can be drawn: first, well-resourced schools have a much higher likelihood of improving achievement; second, evidence shows that increases in resources over the past fifty years have narrowed disparities between racial and social groups; and third, when resource expansion is paired with well-informed decisions at the district and school levels, increasing resources correlates with rising achievement (144).
Higher educational expenditures in Illinois appear to be associated with higher student achievement Prairie State Achievement Exam scores rise in every subject as district spending increases, indicating a positive link between funding and performance In Foundation Formula districts, average scores reflect this trend, underscoring how investment in education can correlate with better outcomes for students.
The district's scores were 157 in reading, math, and science, respectively By comparison, Alternative Formula schools averaged 160 in reading, 159 in math, and 160 in science, while Flat Grant schools averaged 163 in reading, 163 in math, and 164 in science Moreover, 90% of eighth-grade students in Flat Grant districts meet or exceed ISAT reading and math standards, whereas 80% of eighth-grade students in Foundation Formula districts meet or exceed these standards.
Flat Grant districts spend on average $4,186 more per pupil than Foundation Formula districts, and 149 teachers in Flat Grant districts earn almost $18,000 more per year than those in Foundation Formula districts, while nearly 63% of Flat Grant teachers hold a master’s degree compared with 37% in Foundation Formula districts In a study of Illinois schools with 3%–8% low-income rates, student performance rose as per-pupil spending increased from $5,000 to $7,000, and after controlling for family environment this supports the idea that meaningful improvement in students’ academic performance correlates directly with added investment in instruction, even with middle- or upper-class advantages; a similar result was observed in districts with 27%–32% low-income rates.
144 Compare Hanushek, supra note 102, at 68-69, with Richard J Murnane & Frank Levy, Evidence from
Fifteen Schools in Austin, Texas, in D OES M ONEY M ATTER ?: T HE E FFECT OF S CHOOL R ESOURCES ON S TUDENT
From the Gary Burtless-edited volume A CHIEVEMENT AND ADULT SUCCESS (1996), a school principal summarizes the role of funding by saying that money can be a good thing and the answer to education problems, provided it is spent and invested wisely This view is not contradicted by Hanushek or Hedges, according to their statistical summaries, and it also aligns with the central theme of Card and Krueger’s research.
145 M ARTIRE ET AL , supra note 18, at 10
Illinois school funding is heavily structured around Foundation Formula districts, which serve nearly 80% of the state's students, revealing how funding gaps concentrate resources in fewer districts The vast majority of Flat Grant districts are located in the northern third of Illinois, particularly in the Chicago metropolitan suburbs, with only three Flat Grant districts downstate Consequently, educational investment in Illinois is disproportionately concentrated in the northern part of the state.
Research on whether higher school funding yields better education outcomes is often muddied by shifting metrics and incomplete data In Illinois, however, the link between resource inequity and lower academic achievement is hard to dismiss The messy research should not obscure the urgent reality of an inequitable and underfunded school finance system in Illinois Advocates for reform should stay focused on achieving full funding and equity, recognizing the clear conclusion supported by Illinois data: expenditures matter for student achievement and long-term societal outcomes.
If expenditures truly have no effect on outcomes, solving Illinois’s budget crisis would be far easier The highest-spending Flat Grant districts should study high-performing, low-spending districts and emulate them by cutting their spending to that level This could reduce some Flat Grant districts’ budgets by as much as 60% No wealthy community would allow this to happen, because they understand what all Illinoisans know: more resources mean a higher quality and more well-rounded education.
Models for Successful Reform in Other States
Kentucky: A Focus on Schoolchildren
In the 1989 case Rose v Council for Better Education, Inc., 159 the Kentucky Supreme Court declared the entire Kentucky school system unconstitutional and directed the General Assembly to redesign schooling in Kentucky 160 The court held that the state was not meeting the requirement of the state constitution’s education clause, and specifically that the Kentucky General Assembly was not providing an “efficient system of common schools throughout the state.” 161 In coming to its decision, the court highlighted the “jigsaw puzzle” nature of Kentucky’s
157 F UNDING G APS 2015, supra note 23, at 3
161 Id then-existing school finance system 162 This system had resulted in large inequalities between property-wealthy and property-poor districts, with locally generated revenues ranging from $80 per pupil to $3,716 per pupil 163 The court held that this disparity was unconstitutional and a direct result of the General Assembly’s failure “to establish an efficient system of common schools throughout the Commonwealth.” 164
A court ruling required the Kentucky General Assembly to design a school finance system that meets the Constitution’s definition of “efficient.” That standard centers on adequacy, uniformity, and equal opportunity for all Kentucky schoolchildren, guiding the overhaul to remedy past policies that created inequality The ruling also allowed districts, as part of the comprehensive reform, to levy taxes beyond the state’s per-student expenditure to fund local needs.
The Kentucky General Assembly acted swiftly, within the court’s restrictions, to enact the Kentucky Education Reform Act of 1990 (KERA) A key component of KERA is its funding formula, SEEK (Support Education Excellence in Kentucky), which utilizes a five-part system to equalize funding across the state while allowing local districts the flexibility to raise funds above the state’s base per-pupil guarantee.
SEEK establishes a base guarantee per pupil, providing a foundation level of funding for each district To oversee this and other education matters, the General Assembly created the Kentucky Office of Education Accountability, which has taken on duties such as recommending increases to the base guarantee when appropriate, with annual targets typically in the 4% to 5% range A 1997 study by Jacob E Adams, Jr and William E White II examined SEEK and noted that the General Assembly regularly boosted the base guarantee from 1990 through 1995.
The second element of SEEK involves weighted adjustments for students with special
163 Jacob E Adams, Jr & William E White II, The Equity Consequence of School Finance Reform in Kentucky, 19 E DUC E VALUATION & P OL ’ Y A NALYSIS 165, 167 (1997)
166 Adams & White, supra note 163, at 168
169 See Adams & White, supra note 163, at 165, 169
170 Id at 165; see generally Kentucky Education Reform Act of 1990, 1990 K Y A CTS ch 476 (codified as amended in scattered sections of K Y R EV S TAT A NN chs 156-68 (West 2015))
171 Adams & White, supra note 163, at 169
SEEK provides a higher base rate for at-risk, exceptional, and home- and hospital-bound children, with smaller weight increments nested within these broader categories For example, within the special needs category, there are additional weights: severe needs at 2.35x, moderate needs at 1.17x, and minor speech- and hearing-disabled students at 0.24x SEEK also applies a weighted adjustment for transportation costs for children who live a mile or more from their schools The result of applying these three weights to the base guarantee is the adjusted base guarantee.
SEEK's first two elements closely resemble Illinois’ foundation formula and poverty weighting, but the third element diverges by imposing a local contribution of $0.30 per $100 of assessed property value; the state then fills the gap up to the base guarantee level, effectively establishing a baseline contribution that prevents districts from lowering taxes to gain additional state aid.
Elements four and five of SEEK allow districts to fund their schools above the base guarantee SEEK’s Tier I guaranteed tax base lets school boards raise up to 15% more revenue than the base guarantee without voter approval The state also provides equalization funds for property-poor districts—those with less than 150% of the state average property wealth per pupil—that elect to raise Tier I funds, ensuring all districts receive equal support for equal effort.
SEEK enables districts to raise Tier II local revenue, and 188 school boards can generate additional funds up to 30% of the combined total of the adjusted base guarantee and Tier II local revenue.
Funds are allocated after approval from the electorate There are no equalization funds available for Tier II revenue In essence, Tier II revenue acts as a cap, ensuring that the disparity between rich and poor districts remains relatively low.
KERA (Kentucky Education Reform Act) and SEEK (Support Education Excellence in Kentucky) have significantly reduced funding disparities among Kentucky’s public schools Following their enactment, the most-funded districts received about 1.6 times the funding of the least-funded districts, down from 2.5 times prior to reform The per-pupil revenue gap between the richest and poorest districts narrowed by 22%, shrinking from $2,050 to $1,590 Importantly, the reforms did not harm schools; hold-harmless provisions prevented immediate funding declines for wealthier districts, and overall mean revenue per pupil across all Kentucky districts rose from $2,334 in 1989 to $3,262 in 1992 The Kentucky General Assembly’s actions after the Rose decision illustrate how government can tackle a politically tough education-policy challenge.
More than two decades after Kentucky enacted KERA and the SEEK program, the state remains a national leader in the equitable distribution of education funds, earning an "A" from the Education Law Center in its 2014 school funding report The Kentucky General Assembly continues to pursue funding equity, and in March 2014 it established a subcommittee to evaluate whether SEEK is still effective and meeting its goals.
Massachusetts: State Funding with Local Control
Kentucky’s early-1990s school-finance reforms became a model for effective reform, even for a state celebrated for education like Massachusetts In 1993, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court decided McDuffy v Secretary of the Executive Office of Education, seeing it as Massachusetts’ analogue to Rose, and held that the state’s education clause imposes an enforceable duty to provide a public-school education for every child, regardless of whether the family is rich or poor or the fiscal capacity of the district Because the court found a constitutional violation, it required the Legislature to take steps to meet the mandate and retained jurisdiction to ensure compliance within a reasonable time.
Just as in Kentucky, the Massachusetts legislature moved quickly to fulfill the court’s mandate Later in 1993, the governor of Massachusetts signed the Massachusetts Education
196 B AKER ET AL , supra note 19, at 15
197 Valarie Honeycutt Spears, Study Would Determine Whether Formula Provides Adequate Funds for Kentucky Schools, L EXINGTON H ERALD -L EADER (Mar 24, 2014), http://www.kentucky.com/2014/03/24/3159336/study- would-determine-whether.html
199 Id at 555; see Mass Const pt 2, ch V, § 2 (expressing the state’s commitment to education)
Massachusetts' Reform Act (MERA) was enacted with funding provisions that largely mirrored Kentucky’s KERA, though it differed in how local control was distributed across districts Unlike KERA, MERA established school-based councils in every Massachusetts school, composed of teachers, the principal, parents, and community members These councils served as mini-school boards, transferring decision-making authority from the district level down to individual schools.
Massachusetts’ approach to education reform is defined by decentralized decision-making that sets it apart from most states Critics of increased education funding often claim money won’t translate into higher academic achievement, but after MERA’s provisions were fully in force, districts spent 79% of new funds on capital expenditures or on direct, instruction-related interactions between students and teachers Although this doesn’t conclusively prove that money wasn’t wasted, capital expenditures and instruction-related spending are two areas policymakers consistently prioritize The pattern suggests that MERA’s decentralized, local-control framework redirected dollars toward the most effective uses.
MERA successfully redirected more funds to the state's poorest districts and changed how districts spent money From 1990 to 1996, revenues per pupil rose by $556, but actual per-pupil spending increased by $962, driven by higher capital and instructional expenditures and a reduction in non-instructional spending While some of the shift may reflect sampling variation or differences between working cash and debt, the available data support the conclusion that MERA led to a meaningful increase in per-pupil spending These results argue for decentralized decision-making and reforms in procedures and organization as core components of any school finance reform package.
Massachusetts' Education Reform Act of 1993, enacted as chapter 71 of the 1993 Massachusetts Acts and subsequently amended across scattered sections of Mass Gen Laws chapters 69–71 (West 2015), represents a watershed in the state's approach to education funding Thomas S Dee and Jeffrey Levine examine the fate of the new funding introduced by these reforms in their article The Fate of New Funding: Evidence from Massachusetts’ Education Finance Reforms, published in Education Evaluation and Policy Analysis (2004), volume 26, pages 199–201 Together, these sources illustrate the policy shift in Massachusetts education finance and set up questions about how reform funding translates into educational outcomes.
203 See id at 201-02 (describing how MERA established a foundation level, required districts to contribute revenue, and rewarded districts with more support for more effort in raising local revenues)
206 See, e.g., Eric A Hanushek, The Failure of Input-Based Schooling Policies (Nat’l Bureau of Econ
Research, Working Paper No 9040, 2002), available at http://www.nber.org/papers/w9040
207 Dee & Levine, supra note 202, at 212
Massachusetts demonstrates that new education funding can be allocated even without state-level spending regulations guiding how districts use the money The reform package was paired with organizational changes that strengthened local control, giving parents, principals, and teachers a clearer voice in how resources are allocated and decisions are made.
214 Id make school funding more “efficient.”
MERA's reform has endured, successfully closing the gap in per-pupil spending between the wealthiest and the poorest districts In fiscal year 1993, districts in the lowest quartile of per-capita income spent about $1,400 less per pupil than those in the highest quartile; by fiscal year 2000, that gap had narrowed to $370 This notable progress helped ensure that MERA did not undergo a major overhaul until 2007—twenty-three years after its initial implementation The 2007 changes were triggered by a successor lawsuit to McDuffy, Hancock v Massachusetts Commissioner of Education Although that case was unsuccessful, it renewed interest in the state’s funding formula.
This renewed interest led the Massachusetts legislature to pass reforms that changed the way that local wealth was calculated, increasing transparency and accuracy 218 By fiscal year
By 2010, Massachusetts had built a progressively funded education system that reflected the needs of low-income communities In that fiscal year, districts with the highest share of low-income students spent on average $14,249, while those with the lowest share spent $12,458, a gap of $1,791 After nearly twenty years of reform, the state reversed its resource allocation, so that the lowest-income districts—which in 1993 received about $1,400 less than the wealthiest districts—were by 2010 receiving almost $1,800 more.
REFORM EFFORTS FROM 1970 TO 2014
Illinois' modern school funding reform began in 1970 with the Sixth Illinois Constitutional Convention By then, the state's schools had developed a high level of regulatory complexity and a diverse statewide student population, conditions echoed again in the 2010s Urbanization and suburbanization had progressed to a point that made the existing funding formula inadequate, a shortcoming that remains relevant today This article analyzes recent developments in Illinois school funding reform within that historical framework.
215 M ASS D EP ’ T OF E LEMENTARY & S ECONDARY E DUC , R EPORT ON THE S TATUS OF THE P UBLIC
E DUCATION F INANCING S YSTEM IN M ASSACHUSETTS 8 (2013), available at http://www.doe.mass.edu/research/ reports/2013/07FinancingSystem.pdf
217 822 N.E.2d 1134, 1136-37 (Mass 2005) (“A majority of the Justices decline to adopt the conclusion of the Superior Court that the Commonwealth presently is not meeting its obligations under the Massachusetts Constitution.”)
218 M ASS D EP ’ T OF E LEMENTARY & S ECONDARY E DUC , supra note 215, at 9
The anti-poverty and education initiatives of the 1960s and 1970s dramatically broadened the federal government's involvement in education, expanding its funding role and changing how schools were financed This shift, as described in The Federal Role in Education, culminated in the U.S Department of Education being elevated to cabinet-level status in 1980.
See also Spinney, supra note 8, at 204-12 (tracing the migration of ethnicities across the Chicago metropolitan area,
222 See Spinney, supra note 8, at 204-12 school funding reform efforts begins in 1970.
All Talked Out: The Sixth Illinois Constitutional Convention
During the 1970 Illinois Constitutional Convention, delegates spent three days debating how to address inequities in the state’s school funding formula These discussions came late in the process, with the Education Article the last to receive a first reading, just days before the convention would end and delegates’ pay would stop Thomas D Wilson, then a political science professor at Illinois State University, and his son John K Wilson noted that dealing with a complicated and controversial plan that had never been tried before was beyond the energy and ambition of the delegates.
The debates over school funding equity at the 1970 Constitutional Convention framed the legislative battles that would unfold over the next four decades The positions that emerged during the three days of Education Article deliberation still shape today’s discussions on school funding.
Three different proposals for how education funding would be decided—the basis on which funding decisions are made—were brought to the floor of the Constitutional Convention The first, submitted on behalf of the convention’s Education Committee by delegate Malcolm Kamin, would have Illinois cover 90 percent of K-12 education costs, with school districts allowed to levy no more than 10 percent of the state share This plan was voted down Delegates did not oppose funding equity in principle, but they did not agree with the proposed approach, and many expressed mixed feelings about the issue.
“no” votes, saying that they voted against it “reluctantly” or because of a “technicality.” 233
The second proposal, seen as a middle-ground option, was brought to the convention by delegate Louis F Bottino It required districts to raise up to 50% of the necessary funds, with the state covering the rest Bottino’s amendment shifted the funding responsibility to the state for the balance.
223 4 R EC OF P ROCEEDINGS : S IXTH I LL C ONSTITUTIONAL C ONVENTION 3536-70, 4144-48, 4500-07 (Aug
224 Wilson & Wilson, supra note 1, at 23
228 Id at 21-22; see also P ROCEEDINGS , supra note 223, at 3536-70
229 Wilson & Wilson, supra note 1, at 21; see also P ROCEEDINGS , supra note 223, at 3536-38
232 Wilson & Wilson, supra note 1, at 21
The amendment sought substantial parity of education opportunity and was designed to be judicially enforceable, signaling a concrete standard for education funding It represented a compromise between the two factions at the convention—one pressing for little to no state constitutional funding commitment and the other advocating a strong state commitment Yet Bottino could not secure enough votes from either side to advance the measure.
Delegate Dawn Clark Netsch delivered the final proposal at the convention, an amendment stating that the state has the primary responsibility for financing the system of public educational institutions and services Netsch also noted that the amendment would not create a legally enforceable duty, meaning judges could not compel action by the state At this point in the convention, however, the frustration was palpable: Kamin, the delegate who had floated the first proposal, declared that neither amendment went far enough and urged a vote, prompting applause from the delegates.
The next day, delegates voted to suspend the rules and reconsider the Netsch amendment After unsuccessful attempts by both sides to modify its wording, the amendment was ultimately passed Opinions were split: some argued it did not go far enough, others felt it overreached, yet both camps supported it and believed it would suffice for the time being Supporters argued the amendment would place the funding of education squarely on the state, while critics contended the obligation would not be judicially enforceable In effect, the convention adopted a straightforward provision that left the issue open to the future, hoping the legislature would be moved to take action.
Despite the efforts of many, reform has been slow to occur The General Assembly seems unable to free itself from the same trap that the delegates at the Constitutional Convention found themselves in In the meantime, millions of students have passed through Illinois’s school system, including a segment that is mostly white and wealthy.
249 See, e.g., G Alan Hickrod et al., The Decline and Fall of School Finance Reform in Illinois, 9 J E DUC
According to the Illinois State Board of Education, the report “Schools and Districts: A Profile of Illinois Public Schools” documents clear funding disparities across districts: some have received substantial support from the system, while others—primarily low-income and many of them students of color—have received little.
Running in Circles: Legislative Efforts
Short-Lived Success: The 1970s
In the early 1970s the climate was ripe for genuine school finance reform The 1971 Serrano v Priest decision in California provided the fuel Illinois lawmakers needed to move legislation forward Soon, every branch of state government formed its own “blue ribbon” committee to search for solutions to the problem of school funding A dedicated group of legislators, leveraging the threat of a potential state constitutional challenge to the old formula, convinced others to back reform After some jockeying between the state education department and an independent committee, a less‑than‑perfect “awful two‑headed monster” compromise bill emerged from the General Assembly As one legislator quipped, “We always pass a Christmas tree with a gift hung on it for everybody We figure out the wiring later.”
Nevertheless, the 1973 school reform bill became law 259 Enough people had been appeased by the bill’s “side payments” to particular constituencies for it to pass 260 The core tenets
From the 2011-12 Selections from School Report Card Files (2012), available at http://www.isbe.state.il.us/reports/annual12/schools.pdf, the Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) reports that 2,066,692 students were served in the 2011-12 school year, with 49% of them being low-income students This data offers insight into Illinois public school enrollment and student demographics for that year.
251 M ARTIRE ET AL , supra note 18, at 5-7
257 Id at 19-20; see H.B 1484, 78th Gen Assemb (Ill 1973), Pub Act No 78-215 (codified at 105 I LL
The law’s provisions included the “resource equalizer” and the “poverty impaction” measures Under the banner of “equal expenditure for equal effort,” districts with a high property tax rate but a low assessed value of property would receive more state aid In other words, as a district’s property tax rate rose and its property values fell or remained low, the state would increase its support to that district This mechanism came to be known as the resource equalizer.
Through its resource equalizer provision, the law increases state funding to school districts in proportion to the share of low-income students they serve, targeting resources to districts most affected by poverty The package also includes a property tax rollback to alleviate local revenue pressures on those districts.
Right after Illinois passed the 1973 school funding reform, the period was described as a “golden age” of funding, with districts increasingly able to rely on the state as a stable funding source By the mid-1970s the state’s share of public school funding had risen dramatically, peaking at 48%, and this growth coincided with a steep reduction in disparities between unit and high school districts The levels of disparity reached their lowest point when the state was funding schools at the highest level from 1976 to 1979 Yet, despite achieving the reform’s goals, trouble began to loom for the 1973 reform law.
By 1976, a coalition of property-wealthy districts mounted a campaign to repeal the property tax rollback of the 1973 law, seeking more state aid while preserving the power to raise funds locally The campaign's success marked the start of a broader effort to undermine the equity provisions of the 1973 law In 1978, wealthier districts broadened their influence by manipulating the law’s foundational resource equalizer, which guarantees a minimum payment per student to every district Districts also found ways to exploit the law’s poverty impaction provisions to their advantage As these moves accumulated, the equity built into the system began to erode.
269 Jacquelyn Heard, Battle Lines Drawn on Schools Amendment, C HI T RIB (Oct 15, 1992), available at http://articles.chicagotribune.com/1992-10-15/news/9204030405_1_poorer-districts-school-funding-formula-public- education
By 1980, that awful two-headed monster was finally slain Rewarding districts for taxing more proved incompatible with Illinoisans’ demands for property tax relief, while the resource equalizer grew unrecognizable as a new method of state aid was designed to funnel more money to property-wealthier districts The poverty impaction provision was further weakened in 1981 and 1982, and the boost in state subsidies that had come with the 1973 law had vanished by 1982.
The rollback of the 1973 law erased the equity gains it had produced, and by the 1982-1983 school year virtually all those gains were lost, with disparities widening in both elementary and unit districts beyond what was seen in 1973.
G Alan Hickrod, the former director of the Center for the Study of Educational Finance at Illinois State University, opined that the 1973 law failed for three different reasons 283 First, the state’s urban centers and their suburbs were considered the “winners” of the 1973 reform, and the rural districts in downstate Illinois felt as if they had been left out 284 This, coupled with the
“downstate revolt” of the 1976 and 1978 elections, eventually caused the changes in the law that diverted more money to property-wealthy districts in the middle of the state 285
State funds that had been used to boost aid to school districts began to dry up While the state managed substantial increases in the years after 1973, local revenue could not sustain those gains By the early 1980s, state funding for education began to decrease.
Wealthier districts increased tax rates and property valuations faster than poorer districts Under the resource-equalizer provision of the law, these districts were able to divert a larger share of state funds to themselves As state aid dried up, wealthier districts not only expanded their local revenues but also captured a larger portion of the remaining state aid.
Lessons from the 1970s and early 1980s still resonate today One key lesson that the General Assembly of that era often failed to grasp is that equity is achieved when the state government partners with communities rather than acting in isolation Effective reform requires aligning policy design with real local needs, investing in education, housing, health care, and economic opportunity, and maintaining transparent accountability When state-led initiatives are inclusive and rooted in collaborative decision-making, barriers to opportunity shrink and outcomes improve for historically underserved groups Looking back helps lawmakers craft more equitable policies that support sustainable growth and broad-based prosperity.
Local districts united to address shared concerns, and as times and circumstances changed, the law had to adapt The consensus forged under urgent pressure in 1973 could not sustain the unlikely coalition long enough to implement the needed tweaks at both local and state levels, allowing the framework to falter as conditions evolved Some adjustments to the 1973 law could arguably have preserved the equity gains and prevented the law’s demise.
Maintaining the coalitions that helped pass landmark reforms, including the 1973 reform, is essential to keep the policy alive when tough situations test its effectiveness Those coalitions remain indispensable for delivering the small changes needed to adapt while preserving the original vision, and ongoing vigilance and monitoring are crucial to growing and protecting equity In the arena of school funding equity, history does not always bend toward justice, and the arc often twists, requiring the determined efforts of advocates to steer reform back in the right direction.
Struggle and a New Hope: The 1980s and 1990s
The 1980s saw some smaller legislative moves to reform the education finance system However, the large reforms typical of the 1970s were absent from any education finance conversation in Springfield In 1984, Illinois placed the reforms of the 1970s directly in the rearview mirror, returning formally to a foundation-type school funding formula 294
In 1989, the state income tax was raised to 3% 295 This resulted in an increase in funding, but efforts to ensure adequacy among all schools did not gain traction again until 1991 296 That year an attempt to add the “fundamental right to an adequate education” to the Illinois Constitution narrowly failed, largely due to the opposition of then-Governor Jim Edgar 297 Such language could have had far-reaching implications in Illinois school funding reform
In 1992, new hope arrived for education finance equity advocates when thirty-seven school districts, eleven parents, eleven students, and the Committee for Educational Rights filed a complaint in Cook County against Edgar, alleging that funding disparities among districts violated the Equal Protection Clause and the Education Article of the Illinois Constitution The case, Community for Educational Rights v Edgar, became a landmark in Illinois school finance, but the plaintiffs did not advance beyond the state’s motion to dismiss, and their appeal up to the Illinois Supreme Court was unsuccessful.
293 See id at 36 (noting the challenges in building coalitions in state and local politics to construct and maintain equity in school funding)
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298 Comm for Educ Rights v Edgar (Edgar I), 641 N.E.2d 602, 604 (Ill App Ct 1994) (referring to the original complaint filed in the Circuit Court of Cook County)
299 Comm for Educ Rights v Edgar (Edgar II), 672 N.E.2d 1178, 1180-81 (Ill 1996) (affirming the trial further discussed in infra Part II.C.1 of the Article.
Post-Edgar: The Late 1990s into the 2000s and Beyond
After the Illinois Supreme Court rejected the constitutional challenge to the state’s funding formula in 1996, the legislature moved to address the inadequacies and inequities identified by the Committee for Educational Rights In December 1997, the General Assembly established the Education Funding Advisory Board (EFAB) to recommend to the General Assembly the foundation level and the supplemental General State Aid grant level for districts with high concentrations of children living in poverty EFAB was tasked with developing a methodology for calculating an adequate foundation level using the best practices of districts that achieve high academic performance while serving large poverty populations However, the General Assembly was not bound to implement EFAB’s recommendations, and it remains free to disregard EFAB’s advice today.
EFAB commissioned Augenblick & Myers (A&M) of Denver in 2001 to design a system for determining an appropriate foundation level for education funding Using a “successful school” approach, A&M analyzed actual Illinois school districts meeting student and school performance standards and identified three metrics—level of success in meeting state standards, the socioeconomic status of families and pupils, and spending efficiency—to generate a group of districts that emulated best practices in spending and achievement This system was then used to determine the optimum base cost level for a quality education.
After grouping the districts, A&M adjusted costs to account for variances such as regional cost-of-living differences, the percentage of students receiving special education, and the federal funds received by each district They then calculated the average expenditure among the successful districts after these adjustments, establishing the base cost used to determine an adequate foundation amount Finally, A&M laid out the court's dismissal of the plaintiffs' complaint.
304 See id (citing statutory language which states that EFAB “shall make recommendations” rather than required proscriptions)
305 A UGENBLICK & M YERS , I NC , A P ROCEDURE FOR C ALCULATING A B ASE C OST F IGURE AND AN
A DJUSTMENT FOR A T -R ISK P UPILS THAT C OULD BE U SED IN THE I LLINOIS S CHOOL F INANCE S YSTEM 1 (2001), available at http://www.isbe.net/EFAB/archive/PDFs/fullreport.pdf
310 Id at 15 options for providing extra resources for at-risk students 311
In Illinois, the A&M report has gained prominence among advocates for finance equity EFAB leveraged this report to propose its first foundation-level recommendation to the General Assembly for the 2001-2002 school year, totaling $4,560 That year, the General Assembly approved EFAB's recommendation.
However, since then, the General Assembly has not followed EFAB’s suggestions EFAB suggested escalating foundation levels, rising to $5,665 in 2004, $6,405 in 2006, and
By 2014, the gap between the EFAB's inflation-indexed foundation-level recommendation and the actual per-pupil funding had grown to more than $2,500 The General Assembly's statutory foundation level remained fixed at $6,119 since 2010, while the EFAB's inflation-adjusted recommendation would have been about $7,388 in 2010 Thus, although EFAB fulfilled its statutory duties, the General Assembly did not heed the recommendations of the body it created.
In July 2013, a group of state senators led by Democrat Andy Manar of Bunker Hill formed the Senate Education Funding Advisory Committee (EFAC) through Senate Resolution 431, and EFAC was charged with closely examining Illinois’s K-12 funding system and recommending changes to ensure the funding framework is adequate, equitable, and fair to both students and teachers.
In the late summer of 2013, EFAC began its examination of Illinois's funding formula, meeting with eighteen interest groups, including teachers' unions and advocacy organizations, and consulting with ISBE, the Massachusetts Department of Education, and the consulting firm Augenblick, Palaich and Associates EFAC's findings and recommendations are organized into ten areas, providing the broad outlines for a genuinely equitable funding system, which are outlined in Part II.C.2.