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The legislation eliminates duplicative requirements
associated with the school and district improvement planning
processes and revises a number of other statutory requirements to
reduce school districts' administrative and financial burdens
associated with publishing financial information, administering
building code requirements, and obtaining waivers and modifications
of School Code mandates. "When we began reforming the State Board
of Education, eliminating the bureaucracy and red tape that wastes
time and money for local schools and teachers was one of our top
priorities. So far, we've eliminated nearly 500 pages of unnecessary
rules and regulations. And the bill we passed today [March 30] gives
us the authority to do even more," Blagojevich said.
When Blagojevich appointed new members to the State Board of
Education in September of 2004, he called on the board to reduce red
tape and bureaucracy creating unnecessary burdens on school
administrators and teachers, thereby diverting focus from the
classroom. The state board immediately launched the Less Red Tape
initiative, soliciting extensive feedback from educators and parents
about how state requirements could be changed to allow districts to
focus on their core mission. As part of this effort, the state board
has eliminated approximately 500 pages of rules and numerous
unnecessary regulatory burdens. Senate Bill 2829 builds on these
efforts to ease the bureaucratic burdens on teachers,
administrators, schools and districts.
The legislation was sponsored by Sen. Kimberly Lightford,
D-Westchester, and Rep. Lou Lang, D-Skokie.
"For the last several years I have been working with Governor
Blagojevich on the Less Red Tape initiative," said Lightford. "We
have made great progress in helping the Illinois State Board of
Education run more efficiently. Ultimately, this initiative is
allowing our students to have greater learning opportunities by not
burdening teachers and administrators with more work than they can
handle. This initiative will provide an opportunity to increase
teacher-to-student contact time, alleviating some of the
time-consuming paperwork requirements."
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 "It is critically important that we give our administrators and
teachers the opportunity to use their time educating our children
rather than filling out paperwork," said Lang. "This legislation is
a big step forward in cutting out some of those burdensome
requirements, and I look forward to the governor signing it."
"We appreciate the fact that legislators are increasingly
supporting our Less Red Tape initiative," said Jesse Ruiz, chairman
of the Illinois State Board of Education. "Our schools are being
asked to shoulder plenty of responsibilities, and burdensome
paperwork shouldn't be draining their time, energy and resources."
Senate Bill 2829 includes the following:
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School and
district improvement plans: School districts across Illinois are
struggling to comply with the federal mandates set out in the No
Child Left Behind Act of 2001. Senate Bill 2829 eliminates
several state-imposed planning burdens and allows the Illinois
State Board of Education to better support districts' efforts to
implement the federal requirements. The legislation also
eliminates duplicative requirements associated with the school
and district improvement planning processes.
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Reporting, fiscal
and administrative requirements. The state should not mandate
reporting from school districts and teachers unless the benefits
of receiving the information outweigh the burdens on districts
to provide it. Some statutory reporting requirements fail this
test. A number of other statutory requirements can be revised to
reduce school districts' administrative and financial burdens
associated with publishing financial information in newspapers,
administering building code requirements, and obtaining waivers
and modifications of School Code mandates.
With the governor's signature, Senate Bill 2829 will take effect
on July 1.
[News release from the governor's
office] |
