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Education budget rally draws hundreds

Less than 12 hours after a large group of school officials from throughout the state congregated for a rally urging legislators to approve a new state budget, lawmakers did just that.

And while that budget will cover only the first six months of the new fiscal year, it does address the reason for last Wednesday’s rally in downtown Vandalia – allowing all schools in Illinois to open their doors this fall.
Now, with that behind them, the school officials who put together last week’s rally will return to its original focus – equitable school funding in the state.
About 50 district and regional superintendents were on hand for last Wednesday’s rally next to the Vandalia Statehouse, and they were joined by several hundred people of all ages, from both Vandalia and other school districts in this region.
The rally included a dozen speakers, including Vandalia Superintendent of Schools Rich Well; Sandoval Superintendent Jennifer Garrison, a graduate of Vandalia Community High School; and Forrest Claypool, a St. Elmo native and SEHS graduate who is currently serving as the chief executive officer of Chicago Public Schools.
While speaking to the large crowd, Garrison pointed out that 180 school districts in the state were represented at the event.
Garrison and Well have been involved in Advance Illinois, a coalition of school officials from all parts of the state working for equitable school funding.
After state legislators took action before midnight last Thursday, Well said, “We’re definitely happy that they have a budget.”
The stop-gap budget approved by legislators includes a $250-million increase for education through a poverty grant.
The Vandalia district, Well said, will receive “about 98-100 percent of what we should be getting” from the state. “It’s the best it’s been in about five years.”
However, Well said, “My one concern is that we still have no (funding) formula change.
“Until the formula is changed, it’s still year to year whether they fill in with a poverty grant. We are still at the mercy of the poverty grant,” Well said.
“So the discussion (on equitable funding) is still out there,” he said.
Well believes that last Wednesday’s rally may have had an affect on passage of at least a stop-gap budget.
“Not that it was the magic wand, but I think it could have had an impact, not simply because it was held, but because of the number of people who participated, the number of entities that were represented,” he said.
Well said that Vandalia was picked as the site for the rally after an Advance Illinois press conference at the state capitol and a meeting of the group in Litchfield.
“We thought it would be an intriguing location,” because of the Statehouse, Lincoln’s ties to the community and the ability to get participation from districts in Southern Illinois."
He said that Advance Illinois is working to show the governor and General Assembly “what pro-ration is doing to rural, poverty-disproportionate districts.
“This education advocacy group is interested in doing what we felt we needed to do to represent our communities,” Well said.
He said that he believes the rally was good for the people of Vandalia to experience.
Well said that he has been talking about the unfairness of school funding in the state for sometime, and hearing other school officials say the same thing “It was good for our people to hear, to hear that we are not the only district going through this.”
While about a dozen speakers talked about the need for equitable funding, “We could have brought up 10 more who said the same thing, about having to cut programs, cut electives.”
Well opened the rally by telling the crowd that he has three children in school and that he is “in charge of 1,500 students who are currently suffering under the current funding inequity in Illinois.”
With the uncertainty of a state budget looming on Wednesday, Well said, “There are thousands of students in school districts across the state who are unsure if schools will open (in the fall) and if they do open, for how long they will be open under the current funding formula and lack of a budget.
“In the past five years, we have lost approximately $2 million in pro-ration that would have gone toward the educational needs of our students.
“We’ve lost 50 percent of our teachers and support staff, and it has caused us to enlarge class sizes, lose class electives, close buildings and put almost all of our extracurricular and co-curricular costs on the backs of the families in our community,” Well said.
“Yet, we’ve gotten more mandates and more expectations,” he said.
Those echoing his comments included Melisa Livingston, a member of the Citizens for Education group in Taylorville that was formed earlier this year.
In the Taylorville school district, Livingston said, “We have been devastated by this inequitable school funding formula.”
The Taylorville group, like Advance Illinois, is working to see that its students “receive the same world-class education that some school districts are already providing.”
The same came from Claypool.
“I know, because I grew up here, that the values of the communities that are represented here today in Central and Southern Illinois are the same values that we have in Chicago.
“We all care about our children – that’s what unites us. We want every single child, no matter where they live, to have a bright future, the same opportunities.
“But, in recent years, with cut after cut after cut … the opportunities for children who live in some parts of the state are growing less and less bright,” Claypool said.
“Wealthy districts that already have enough resources receive more and more under a broken funding system,” he said, noting that Gov. Bruce Rauner lives in Wilmette, home to one of those districts.
“Governor Rauner is entitled to his own opinion, but he is not entitled to his own facts, and he is trying to divide the state, along geographic lines and along racial lines … and that is ugly and that is wrong,” Claypool said.
Their presence at the rally, he said, shows that there are “people who are trying to do the very best they can to provide a good education for their kids, despite the failures of the state.”
Speaking on Lincoln’s ties to Vandalia, Claypool said that if Lincoln were alive today to see the educational funding system, “he would be horrified.”
In closing the 35-minute rally, Well said, “It is my job to protect these kids right here, and one of the hardest things that I have had to do is make cuts and take away things from those kids that they desperately need educationally, and to take things away from these teachers, resources that they desperately need.”
Well said that when he took over as superintendent of the Vandalia School District, “The last thing I thought was going to be our problem was the state of Illinois.
“And, here we are, we’re on the doorstep of some very bad scenarios in the next month or two,” he said, talking about the need for the passage of a state budget.
 

Forrest Claypool, a St. Elmo native who currently serves as the chief operating officer of Chicago Public Schools, talks about education funding inequities during last Wednesday’s rally.

Jennifer Garrison, a Vandalia Community High School graduate who currently serves as the superintendent of the Sandoval School District, speaks during last Wednesday’s rally in downtown Vandalia.

Melisa Livingston of Citizens for Education in Taylorville, speaks during the rally. At right is Vandalia Superintendent of Schools Rich Well.

Those who attended the K-12 Education Budget Rally last Wednesday afternoon near the Vandalia Statehouse are pictured at the end of the rally. The large crowd included about 50 school district superintendents and regional superintendents, as well as local teachers and a number of local school children bearing signs that urged state legislators to approve a state budget.

Much of the 100 block of South Fourth Street in downtown Vandalia was filled with people for the K-12 Education Budget Rally last Wednesday afternoon. The rally was organized by Vandalia Superintendent of Schools Rich Well, Sandoval Superintendent and Vandalia native Jennifer Garrison and other school officials in a coalition working for equitable school funding in Illinois.

Those attending the budget rally included a large crowd of Vandalia students and teachers holding signs urging legislators to act on a state budget.

About 50 education officials from throughout Illinois, including district superintendents and regional superintendents, were present for the rally in Vandalia last Wednesday afternoon.

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