The head of the Bloomington School District said he expects a Trump administration to push for more school voucher programs.
District 87 Superintendent Barry Reilly said Trump's choice of education secretary Betsy Devos, a proponent of vouchers and charter schools, sends a message about vouchers, though financially those can be problematic for public schools."You know those dollars are meant for the public school, not for any particular private or charter school. The system is not set up in a manner to offset that in any way. Now, people will look at that and say, well, that's one less student. The math might look like it works that way, but it really doesn't," said Reilly
Reilly says a portion of per student state aid goes to supporting infrastructure as well as cost per student.
That said, Reilly said expansion of vouchers probably would not result in huge changes in where Bloomington students attend school.
"They have capacity issues as well. It's not like if you were to see something happen, immediately in this community all of a sudden you are going to see all of a sudden you are going to see this mass exodus to private schools because, here in Bloomington we have high quality public schools and we have high quality private schools," said Reilly.
Reilly said he welcomes a Trump administration's likely emphasis on local decision making in education. He said he thought that would be a helpful influence on the implementation of last year's bi-partisan compromise legislation, Every Student Succeeds Act, or ESSA. That replaced the often maligned No Child Left Behind law.
District 87 has also been nominated for a Chamber of Commerce Small Business Excellence Award. Reilly said he is stoked about that and the nomination is a reflection of work over time by the board, teachers, his predecessor as Superintendent, Bob Nielsen, and staff.
The Town of Normal revised its travel and expense reporting policy last year because of inaccurate reporting by Council member Scott Preston who double billed, ordered frequent room service, and showed up late to conferences while still billing for the full hotel stay. That did not result in charges. District 87 has also revised its policy. In this interview with GLT's Charlie Schlenker, Superintendent Reilly told why.
