As chairman of the House Appropriations-General Services Committee, state Rep. Fred Crespo said several years ago, there were repeated audit findings at the Illinois Department of Revenue. “I recommended and we did cut their budget by 15% that year. As you can imagine, it’s amazing how all of a sudden they did pay attention to the findings…So there have to be some teeth to these audit reports.”

“We are no longer training students for $10 an hour jobs where you sweat all day. We have students who start in the mid-50s, $50,000 a year or more, with a 2-year college degree,” said agronomy professor Bill Harmon. “We have not produced enough graduates from the community college and the university level to meet the number of jobs that are available in all areas of agriculture.”

Some argue outmigration is driven by retirees seeking better weather or college students living out-of-state, but 64% of residents who left were between ages 26 and 54, the prime working years. Polling showed the No. 1 reason residents consider leaving Illinois is high taxes.

Pension costs have more than tripled in that time: A 2009 budget summary shows just 14 cents of each higher education dollar went to pay for faculty pensions instead of supporting instructors and students in the classroom, but beginning July 1, those pension payments to the SURS will consume 43 cents of every higher education dollar spent by the state.

Matt Paprocki, of Illinois Policy Institute: “The reason Springfield killed Invest in Kids is simple: political expediency, corruption and pressure from radical teachers union leadership. Springfield is more interested in bowing to the Chicago Teachers Union than working on behalf of the vulnerable constituents who need them.”

“The state of education for poor minority students in the United States is a disgrace…In Illinois, data showed 53 schools — most of them in Chicago — where not a single student could do math at grade level, and 30 where not a single student can read at grade level…There is simply no excuse for keeping kids trapped in schools like these.”