By Illinois Radio Network

SPRINGFIELD – School leaders across Illinois are going to get very serious about their spending in 2018 due to a pair of new requirements.

First, the state’s new evidence based school funding formula will have schools figure out their adequacy target and their extra needs, and then ask the state to fill in the gap.

Secondly, the new Every Student Succeeds Act for the first time requires individual schools, not just school districts a whole, let parents know how much they are spending on kids, administrators, and teacher salaries.

LeRoy Superintendent Gary Tipsord said there are unanswered questions about both, and about how they work hand in hand.

“Starting in 2018 you’re going to see a conversation about what the evidence-based funding model is, and what it informs us about our schools,” Tipsord explained. “And then you’re going to see a conversation about ESSA. What does that look like? How are we going to measure? How are we going to report?”

Tipsord said ESSA and the new evidence-based model go hand-in-hand, and are worth – potentially – a lot of money to local schools.

“If we’re going to get resources, if the state of Illinois is going to invest in public education, are we going to spend that on research-based best practices that will actually move the needle in the interest of student achievement?” Tipsord said. “Because that’s where the dollars should be spent. They should be spent in the interest of kids.”

There are 27 different things that schools have to track just to get their adequacy target under the evidence-based funding formula. Schools will measure everything from what they spend on after school activities, to computers, to school nurses and administrators.

ESSA will require reports for more than a dozen other expenses, and for the first time in 2018, schools will have to report how much each school building is spending. That information will end up on the Illinois school report card.

The Illinois State Board of Education said earlier this month ESSA and the Illinois’ new funding formula are two different things. But they both work toward the same goals of adequacy and equity in Illinois schools.