By: Ted Dabrowski and John Klingner
We recently reported new 2023 student outcome data that shows only one-third of Illinois K-12 students statewide can read at grade level and only one-quarter of them are proficient in math. The statewide results are dismal and can be found here and here.
But what’s gotten less attention is just how much Illinoisans are paying for those results. The spending numbers have jumped, especially when you add up everything that goes into the costs of educating kids. Not just the daily operating costs to run classrooms, but also the debts, pensions and infrastructure costs.
Here are the big picture numbers you should know.
In 2019, Illinois had about $35 billion in state, local and federal sources to pay for the education of nearly 2 million students. On a per student basis, that was nearly $18,000.
Just two years later, total sources had jumped to more than $45.5 billion, or $24,000 per student. Federal covid support helped push up spending by 36 percent in those two years.
Now in 2024, the numbers are almost as large. Wirepoints estimates Illinois will spend approximately $44 billion in K-12 education dollars for just 1.85 million students – just shy of $24,000 per student.
The spending numbers above are higher than what’s typically reported by the state. The 2023 report card data says Illinois spent $17,952 per student. But that’s only the “operational” spend, leaving out expenses for capital and debt.
Chicago Public Schools
At CPS, the all-in spending is even higher and the recent jump has been greater despite recent failing results. CPS will spend nearly $9.5 billion this year on its 323,000 students. That’s just over $29,900 per student.
Spending has jumped by 40 percent compared to 2019, when the district spent $7.6 billion on 360,000 students – just under $21,000 per student.
For the record, the State Board of Education shows in its latest report card that CPS spends just $18,300 on operational expenditures per student. Readers should understand that number doesn’t include the costs of both debt and infrastructure. (See our recent commentary on the $14 billion CPS officials want to spend on infrastructure.)
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The above numbers are important considering the fate of the Invest in Kids Act is at stake during the next three days of the legislature’s veto session.
What should be increasingly obvious is just how much money is being wasted on an education system that’s failing students dramatically. In a sane world, it would make the reauthorization of the Invest in Kids Act a slam dunk.
Read more from Wirepoints:
- 1.2 million Illinois public school children can’t read at grade level, and yet legislature, unions push to kill state’s only school choice program
- 5 facts they don’t want you to know about Illinois’ 2023 student test results
- Chicago: Where violence and dismal education intersect
- Chicago wants $14 billion to ‘modernize’ public schools, one-third of which are half empty
- While Illinois set to kill school choice, North Carolina passes school choice for all
Appendix.
Audio and summary 
If this bill passes, say goodbye to local control over all Illinois parks and expect to see open drug and alcohol use, needles, no sanitation and fire hazards, but no ordinary park users.
CPS spends about $27 per student per hour. Lots of money for poor results. Someone is getting rich off this scam.
Show your work.
You have to remember the definition of success for a liberal is not results, it’s the amount of taxpayer money spent.
The teachers are all communist agitators,
They only care about themselves.
I hope I live to see it all fall apart, that will make for some good TV
If a member of the State Board of Education purchases a washer and dryer for $30,000 dollars and it is defective and won’t work or do the job, wouldn’t they return it? Why should we be any different? We’re talking our kid’s future here. Give me my money back, they sold me a defective education product.
You should be different because they don’t care what you think and how you feel about being ripped off. They don’t care about your children. If they did, and they had contrite hearts, they would attempt to fix it. They won’t. It’s not about the kids. It’s about money and power. Always has been, always will be.
Where is the accountability?
When Ms Gates is convicted of fraud and stealing, will she claim racism?
Are we getting what we are paying for? NO!
Taxpayers should demand education choice.
And the union is demanding no education choice, backed with lots of money. Heads they win, tails you lose. Pritzker threw the school choice decision into the lap of the General Assembly, which has been bought by the union. What are the odds that you’ll get school choice? Hmmm . . .
The odds are we won’t get school choice. But that doesn’t mean we can’t complain about it and let those making the choices know we don’t like it. We’re not about to just sit back and say nothing. So Pritzker threw us under the bus again. Big deal, what else is new?
Talk about a disastrous return on investment. Setting these young people up for a life of disappointment and under achievement. Media ignores the data.
My assumption has been that the fish wraps ignore the situation because in the future then all they have to do is publish the funny pages that match the eroded mentality of the Illinois future voters.
When public education finally implodes nobody will miss it. Like a communism rally in Russia today.