Governor Rauner says that SB1, the new school funding formula bill, gives too much money to CPS because it would pay for part of CPS pensions.  But now CPS is the only district in the state which pays for its pensions itself. The state directly pays the employer pension cost for every other district in Illinois.

The General Assembly’s spring session is scheduled to end next Wednesday, so it's crunch time for many bills in Springfield. Here’s what you need to know right now about the bills on the elected school board, student privacy, and the State charter commission.

The Student Online Privacy Protection Act, SB1796, does the opposite of what it is intended to: instead of protecting student data, it will write into law tech companies' existing misuse of students' personally identifiable information. For every small benefit children get with this bill, website and app operators get a huge gift. Call your state rep and tell them to vote NO.

Ever more digital data is collected about and from students in public school, and the security and privacy of this data is a major concern for parents. We would love to see robust legislation passed in Illinois that builds on the protections of our existing student privacy law in this new era of big data and ed tech. But SB1796, the Student Online Privacy Protection Act, is not that legislation.

Update: It's still not too late on HB768!

The bill was pulled from the hearing today 5/17 due to pressure from charter industry and has now been moved to the Executive Committee for a 2pm hearing tomorrow 5/18. You must fill out a new witness slip as a PROPONENT here.

Prompted by a group of 21 community and advocacy organizations, 34 legislators have signed a letter to Governor Bruce Rauner to urge him to keep school voucher programs out of Illinois and to keep public dollars within the public education system not to be diverted to private and religious schools.

On Friday, former Chicago Public Schools CEO Barbara Byrd-Bennett was sentenced to 4.5 years in prison for defrauding students and taxpayers with a no-bid contract with SUPES, her former employer---a contract approved unanimously by the unelected Chicago Board of Education. BBB's connection to SUPES was considered "a plus, not a negative" by the Board, according to Andrea Zopp, board member at the time.

An important bill is moving to the House floor for a vote next week. This bill, HB768, would prevent the unelected state charter commission from approving charter schools that have been rejected by local school boards. Our existing schools are underfunded and in need of more resources, not fewer. Help stop this appointed commission from forcing charters on districts that don’t want or need them.

Fill out a witness slip as a PROPONENT for HB3567, a bill that prohibits charter schools from opening in financially distressed school districts in IL. There is a hearing for this bill Tuesday, 3/28 at 2pm in the Appropriations Elementary and Secondary Education Committee.

Please see below for detailed instructions.

There is a hearing this Wednesday, March 29, in the IL House for HB3786, the LSC Empowerment Bill. Take 2 minutes to fill out a witness slip and share with your contacts.

Even if you filled out a witness slip for this bill recently, you should do so again. While this bill was on the hearing schedule previously, it did not come up for a vote and therefore the witness slip process needs to start over again.

Please see below for detailed instructions.