As part of a deal to fund public schools, Illinois Governor Bruce Rainer slipped in a $100 million fund to pay for private and religious schools. Rauner, as is well known, is a billionaire hedge fund guy; he is contemptuous of public schools and unions. His partner in the voucher deal was the Catholic Cardinal Blase Kupich. Illlinois, supposedly a blue state, now has the largest tax credit program in the nation.
The group that lobbied for the change controls $33 million:
“Now, the small advocacy organization that drafted the tax credit scholarship legislation and lobbied for it behind the scenes, has emerged as the main group collecting donations and handing out scholarships. The group changed its name in November to Empower Illinois and now controls $33 million in taxpayer contributions. That’s 74 percent of all scholarship donations pledged statewide since the program began in January.”
The state will be expected to pay for every kind of religious schools, not just Catholic schools.
Here’s my deal: I will not ask you to pay for my children’s religious education if you don’t expect me to pay for yours.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
So what happens if one religious group promotes discrimination against another group – like women, gay people etc.
Is everyone ok with public money funding that choice?
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GOOD QUESTION, M. Dunderheads are in charge.
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Supporters of public education should do a “close reading” of the state charter and other laws to find a loophole and grounds to challenge this reallocation of public funds.
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Thomas Jefferson on the Separation between church and state:
http://candst.tripod.com/tnppage/qjeffson.htm
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ACLU: https://www.aclu.org/other/joint-statement-current-law-religion-public-schools
Illinois is WRONG to use public monies for private and religious schools.
Then there’s the “gentrification” of cities. HOLY MOLY:
https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/jul/14/white-privilege-gentrification-denver-america-favourite-city
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Good last sentence Diane: “Here’s my deal: I will not ask you to pay for my children’s religious education if you don’t expect me to pay for yours.”
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The “Invest in Kids” state tax credit scholarships are funded by taxpayers, who then get a credit to reduce or eliminate their tax liability with the state. The cap on donations — $100 million — makes it the biggest first-time tax credit scholarship program in the country.
How is this fair?
So private school parents now contribute nothing to public schools?
Everyone else in the state who pays taxes contributes to public schools with the exception of private school parents? People who don’t use schools at all pay for public schools but private school parents do not pay?
It’s bad government. In their zeal to weaken and then eradicate public schools ed reformers create lousy government.
You-all should have seen the coverage of this. It was 100% focused on vouchers.
The 90% of families who attend public schools in Illinois were completely ignored. No one in ed reform could be bothered with them. If they had to trample on the interests of 90% of families in the state to reach their ideological goal they were more than happy to do it.
Public school families in that state should be outraged. There was no one representing their interests.
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It is a great way to create a gigantic deficit. It represents the worst of special interest groups that pervert the intent of the common good and poor stewardship on the part of state government.
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This was a HUGE win for ed reform, by the way.
Public school families got absolutely nothing out of this shady backroom deal but then ed reform could care less about public school families, so for them it’s all win.
Meanwhile, 90% of families are still waiting for one of these politicians to notice they exist.
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Illinois politicians got together and decided they would work SOLEY to protect the interests of a small minority of students who attend Catholic schools, and the hell with the 90% of students who attend the unfashionable public schools, who cares what happens to them.
They should all be replaced. They don’t do their jobs.
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How many court cases will be focusing on this fraud of a real-life horror story with an obvious agenda to turn back the calendar for the United States to the flat earth era of Church inquisition and witch trials?
Will we soon be hearing about textbooks that claim the sun and the unvierse revolves around Earth … again?
Will Galileo once again be censored for heresy for daring to say Earth orbited the sun and not the other way around?
Will idiots like Betsy DeVos and Donald Trump proclaim, “We pronounce, judge, and declare, that you, the said Galileo… have rendered yourself vehemently suspected by this Holy Office of heresy, that is, of having believed and held the doctrine (which is false and contrary to the Holy and Divine Scriptures) that the sun is the center of the world, and that it does not move from east to west, and that the earth does move, and is not the center of the world.”
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Lloyd,
The Catholic Church has had centuries of knowing how to persecute those who don’t believe in the Catholic DOCTRINE.
You are right.
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I love reading your comments, Lloyd.
Dump is another Hitler…frightening.
https://www.thetrumpet.com/literature/read/1194-germany-and-the-holy-roman-empire/56
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Hitler is dead. Trump is not dead. If Trump lives long enough and somehow survives as president for two full terms or even does away with term limits like China just did for its president, Trump could become far worse than Hitler. Only time and history will reveal that answer.
I’m convinced that Trump is the type of person who could become a tyrant like Hitler at any time and end up far worse than Hitler.
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For a number of years Illinois was surrounded by states attacking public schools via charters, vouchers, and virtual schools funded with taxpayer dollars. We held out for along time. But a blue state is no guarantee of protection for public schools, because too many Democrats are tepid at best regarding supporting public education and are cozying up with Republicans whose intent is to destroy public schools. Years ago, Garrison Keillor wrote, “When you wage war on the public schools, you attack the mortar that holds the community together. You’re not a conservative, you’re a vandal.” Well, the vandals have scaled the schoolyard gates in Illinois led by Betsy DeVos and her minions from both political parties.
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Rick,
YES indeed: “…minions from both political parties.”
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Without Duncan and Obama, we would not have a DeVos. So many Democrats have allied with the corporate vandals, and Chicago is a perfect example of this with Rahm Emanuel.
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True, retired teacher. Your comments are so right on.
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Illinois has the largest underfunded state pension system in the US. Rauner spent something like $27 million of his own money to get elected. When is this country going to learn that Republican businessmen do not support decent government? Illinois has a flat tax rate. Rauner does not want his wealthy friends to pay more in taxes. Unfortunately, a flat tax rate is written into the constitution. Changes to a progressive tax would require a constitutional amendment.
The Teachers’ Retirement System of Illinois and all state pension systems have been underfunded for years. The state has borrowed money for years to pay state bills. Teachers are being labeled ‘greedy’ because we want our pensions.
And now the state has money to put into charter and religious schools? Something stinks.
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ILL-I-NOISE is in trouble.
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You misspelled that. It’s ILL-ANNOY. 😉
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That’s rbmtk’s spelling/1
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Sorry, I’m an incorrigible thief. rbmtk will have to sue me.
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I think she would be pleased to see someone else adopting it.
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The underfunding of Illinois’ pension system and Illinois’ flat tax cannot be laid at the feet of Rauner. Granted, he has done nothing to improve either situation, but he inherited both from his Democratic predecessor Pat Quinn (who lost to him largely because he choose public education destroyer Paul Vallas (who now thinks he should be mayor of Chicago) as his running mate – for more on Vallas, read here: https://deutsch29.wordpress.com/2018/01/27/paul-vallas-might-want-to-be-mayor-of-chicago-tell-him-no/ )
And, yes, Quinn likewise inherited both situations from his predecessors, both Democrats and Republicans alike.
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A MISSED DETAIL: The group that receives and distributes the money withholds 5% of the total as compensation for their work. A nice payday for the hard, complex task of writing and mailing checks.
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They’re masterful. They build constituencies for their legislative agenda by bringing more stakeholders into the system. The Catholic Church, a powerful lobby in cities like Chicago, is now invested in destroying public education. And a nonprofit gets a slice, so here they come, too.
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YEP!
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Now let’s just wait until the state starts requiring results, feedback, data from those religious institutions. Wait until the state and the reformers start pushing common core, standardized testing and data collection on these kids. There is always a price to pay when on accepts money from the government.
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With government “sheckels” come government “shackles”.
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Almost!
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Frankly that’s how it should be. Taxation without representation didn’t just refer to not having a democratic representative that could be thrown out if they implemented unfair tax policies.
It works the other way too, the public can’t hold the democratic representative
responsible if they are not informed why their tax money was taken and how it was used to achieve a democratic purpose.
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Even Muslim schools? Pagan schools? Usually even the complacent start to complain about publicly funding Muslims who might be teaching (horror of horrors) SHARIA.
I guess the idea of separation of church and state is so yesterday.
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The scenario you postulate is already occurring. Tax money is flowing to Islamic schools, which teach Sharia. see
https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2014/08/120-american-charter-schools-and-one-secretive-turkish-cleric/375923/
Islam teaches that the husband can chastise (beat) his wife or wives (Islam permits up to four wives). Children are property of the husband’s family in perpetuity, in case of divorce. The function of women is to bear sons. Homosexuals are to be killed (preferred method is to push them off buildings). All of these doctrines are taught in Madrasses (Islamic schools). These doctrines are being taught with schools receiving tax dollars. Islam is the third larges religion in the USA, and growing fast.
Separation of church and state, is still very much alive (See the 1st amendment). Public tax money may be used to obtain educational services from religiously-operated schools, this has been settled constitutional law for over 16 years. Where have you been?
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Charles,
You have succinctly explained why Thomas Jefferson insisted on a wall of separation between church and state and why every voucher referendum on every state ballot has been defeated.
If you don’t ask me to support your religion, I won’t ask you to support mine.
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TJ postulated the “wall of separation” in a letter to the Danbury Baptists in 1802. see
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baptists_in_the_history_of_separation_of_church_and_state
The Constitution and the Bill of Rights were ratified in 1791. The “wall of separation” concept, is a semantic device in a letter that was written 11 years after ratification. It was never official policy, and still is not.
I do not see your connection between this letter, and the defeat of ballot initiatives on school choice. If there is a cause and effect, I do not see it.
The prohibition against the establishment of religion, still stands. No one expects anyone to support any religion through the public treasury. It just is not happening, and will not happen.
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No school choice question on the ballot has ever passed.
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The article says it is the largest “first-time” tax credit scholarship program. Florida, at nearly $1-billion, has the largest tax credit scholarship program in the nation. And what is particularly horrifying is that it can increase (as stated in legislation) by 25% per year (which it has been doing each year thus far). At that unbelievable rate, in 15 years the spending on these voucher scholarships would exceed the current education budget of $21-billion and in 20 years, it would be almost as large as the entire current $87.2–billion Florida state budget. That is unlikely to happen but it just shows how absurd a 25% growth rate is.
Florida gets its money for this $1-billion and rising program by diverting corporate income and other taxes to two non profit scholarship-funding organizations (SFOs): Step Up for Children and AAA Scholarship Foundation. Step Up for Children gets the lion-share of the money for which they get a 3% cut. They also actively solicit money from corporations. Step Up for Children was set up by John Kirtley, a close associate of Betsy DeVos.
Now with the passage on Monday of Florida House Bill 7055, the amount of money diverted to vouchers that should be going into the general treasury is further expanding as is the source of the money. The legislation stipulates that money to fund sending students who are victims of bullying to private schools will come from a consumer sales tax allowing residents to allocate $110 in sales tax when they purchase a car or transfer registration from another state. So now, it is not just corporate taxes but also consumer taxes that are tapped. A recent article indicated that state revenue projects for this year are down and cuts will have to be made. It is no wonder revenue is down despite a supposid booming economy.
There is a growing backlash to these privatizing maneuvers in Florida and pretty much all but a few Democrats in the State legislature are on the correct side. (Of course, the Republicans far exceed the Democrats, especially in the FL House of Representatives but this might change a bit in November.) Where I live in Sarasota, a group of us set up last summer an organization, Protect Our Public Schools (POPS), to fight school privatization. The impetus for this was the passage of HB 7069 legislation (a big giveaway to charter schools, particularly corporate-managed charters among many other really awful things). From the start we tied fighting privatization to working for a high quality education for all students. Since the Parkland shooting, we decided to expand our mission to include addressing school violence in all its forms. We are attending school board meetings, holding public forums, staffing tables at marches (e.g., The Women’s March, the upcoming March for Our Lives) and getting a great response. I have developed a presentation on school privatization in Florida and have been invited to present to a bunch of Indivisible groups and just the other day was invited to address the local UU Church. So the movement is growing but our enemies are strong and very well funded and are increasingly using dark monies to target and replace pro-public education school board members.
If anyone knows people from other parts of Florida working on school privatization issues, please let me know. Given the fact that Florida has an increasingly state-run education system, it is important that we all work together.
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Carol,
Contact Carol Burris at Network for Public Education to make contact with others who want to stop privatization in Florida.
cburris@networkforpubliceducation.org
Also Sue Legg, education director of Florida League of Women Voters
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The linked article provides a lot more detail, of course, but basically here’s the backstory: Illinois has the most inequitable state funding of K-12 education in the entire country. Many years of work on a bipartisan ed funding bill (final version: SB 1947) finally yielded a bill for Gov. Rauner in summer 2017; he issued an Amendatory Veto that included a provision (a rider, essentially) for “scholarship tax credits”. The bill’s sponsors were gobsmacked and fought back, but it was too late – the bill had to be passed because it included a clause that forbade any distribution of funding to Illinois’s 852 school districts in lieu of the passage of evidence-based funding for schools.
The tax credit agreement was a deal worked out among Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel (no friend of Chicago neighborhood public schools), Cardinal Blaise Cupich (eager to save Chicago’s Catholic schools, whose enrollment has plummeted from 365,000 to 79,000), and the Gov (who at the time had replaced several key members of his top staff with advocacy people from Illinois Policy Institute, the State Policy Network’s Illinois organ).
One of the knock-on effects of this scholarship program will be to cause an uptick in enrollment in Chicago’s Catholic schools (more than half the state’s Catholic schools are in the city and nearby suburbs), which will lead to a further drop in enrollment in neighborhood public schools, which will lead to further calls by the Mayor and appointed BOE for further closures of public schools, which will in turn lead to further … and so on and so on.
There’s more to this story: the new bill requires an additional $350 million a year from the state budget go to local districts in accordance with the EBF model (by the way, it’s a good model, probably the most progressive model in the country). Instead of providing full funding, the Gov’s 2019 budget actually foresees shifting the costs of the TRS (Teachers’ Retirement System) to local districts (costs are currently shouldered by the state): 25% each year for the next four years, until 100% of pension costs are paid by local districts.
While this probably won’t be approved, it gives one more indication of how a very good – an excellent, really – educational funding bill can be perverted on the path to implementation.
The under-funding of TRS, by the way, goes back to the 1990s when times were good, and the state had plenty of money to spend on other things, shorting the pension payments for years to do so. Then times turned not-so-good with the GFC in the 2000s, and now there’s an enormous unfunded pension fund that nobody (including current candidates for governor) wants to address.
Of course, Rauner’s 700+ days of refusing to agree on a state budget only made Illinois’s financial situation worse. He certainly bears responsibility for the past three years of refusal to address the pension funding issue.
Addendum 1: There was plenty of opposition to the Scholarship Tax Credits; Illinois Raise Your Hand, for example. But it was too late to muster massive public opposition – mid-summer with the clock ticking towards the start of the school year, and no funds released to local districts. This really was a trap, and one needs to understand Illinois politics and the terrible state of state ed funding that set it up before starting to condemn every single legislator.
Addendum 2: Those interested can get in touch with Senator Andy Manar, SB 1947’s chief sponsor and the man who really pulled together all the players to get this bill written and passed over the course of four+ years of non-stop work. He got snookered, and he wasn’t happy about it.
Addendum 2: This is such a mess politically and financially that almost no one at the state political reporting level can really follow it in depth. But readers who are willing to get down in the weeds of Illinois educational policy and politics can try Dusty Rhodes, Ed reporter for NPR Illinois. She’s terrific.
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Thanks, dbrka, for a really clear summary of what happened with school funding.
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