ED, should state spend more on education?

Capitol Fax Blog (Rich Miller) pointed me to a Chicago Tribune (Monique Garcia and Ray Long) article explaining that Sen. Kimberly Lightford (D-Maywood) has drawn a line in the sand on school funding.

Gov. Rod Blagojevich and fellow Democrats must forge a budget solution that addresses the disparities in school funding that have allowed rich districts to spend thousands of dollars more on each student than poor areas of the state can afford, Lightford said.

Let's compare what local high school districts spend per student. On the school report cards the expenditures are divided into "Instructional Expenditure Per Pupil" and "Operational Expenditure Per Pupil". I've combined them into a single figure.

* Elmwood Park--$14,217
* Leyden--$14,465
* Morton--$16,532
* York--$17,144
* Lyons--$21,456
* Proviso--$21,665
* Riverside-Brookfield--$21,745
* Oak Park & River Forest--$22,967

We know Proviso is 90th of 90 high schools in the Chicago area when ranked by test scores. But spending is almost as high as the highest cost districts in the area. (New Trier spends $25,186 per student.)

The numbers simply do not support the traditional liberal position--the position Lightford is arguing--that schools that don't perform are constrained by money.