(The Center Square) – The president of the Illinois Education Association applauded Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s record on Monday, but other teachers unions have called on the governor to do more for schools.
Pritzker accepted the IEA’s endorsement during a campaign event at College of DuPage in Glen Ellyn. With more than 135,000 members, the IEA is the largest union in Illinois.
IEA President Karl Goeke thanked Pritzker for his policies.
“He’s funded new construction at Illinois community colleges and universities. He’s helped increase the number of Illinois students eligible for federal tuition aid, and he ended Illinois voucher programs,” Goeke said.
Illinois’ Invest in Kids scholarship tax credit program expired on Dec. 31, 2023. Pritzker has not opted Illinois into the federal Education Freedom Scholarship Program ahead of the January deadline.
Thirty-one states have opted into the initiative that allows tax credits for donations to scholarship organizations that fund education-related expenses for students in public, private and homeschool settings.
Last week, the Illinois Federation of Teachers urged Pritzker to call a special legislative session, after Illinois State Board of Education data showed the state’s school funding gap grew by more than $1 billion in one year.
“Today’s report should serve as a wake-up call. A child entering kindergarten today will graduate from a high school that is still underfunded,” IFT and Chicago Teachers Union President Stacy Davis Gates said in a statement.
On Monday, Pritzker criticized President Donald Trump and Illinois Republican gubernatorial candidate Darren Bailey, calling Bailey “an existential threat” to public education.
“We don’t have to wonder what his vision for education is, we’ve seen it through the grammar school he and his wife started,” Pritzker said.
Darren and Cindy Bailey founded Full Armor Christian Academy in 2016.
Darren Bailey said Pritzker’s education policies have failed and too many students are leaving Illinois.
“One of the biggest reasons why they go to other states to go to college is because the colleges can afford to attract them. It’s cheaper to go there,” Bailey said at the Illinois Agricultural Legislative Roundtable in Shirley, Illinois last week.
Independent candidate Collin Corbett said the number of adequately-funded school districts in Illinois has declined for three consecutive years under Pritzker.
“As a result, lower-income rural and suburban districts are falling even further behind. No kid’s education should be held back because they happen to be born in the wrong zip code,” Corbett said in a statement provided to The Center Square.
Esther Wickham contributed to this story
