Six thousand protesters, wearing bright orange T-shirts, could ring Wrigley Field during the first Chicago Cubs playoff game, under a plan by state Sen. James Meeks to move his school funding protests to a national stage.

With the Cubs expected to clinch the playoffs soon, Meeks said Thursday he hopes overhead TV shots from the Goodyear Blimp during the first home playoff game -- probably a night game on Oct. 1 -- will give the entire nation a view of protesters upset about Illinois' inequitable school funding system.

"We want the Goodyear Blimp shot,'' Meeks said following a breakfast forum about Illinois school funding at the Union League Club.

"This is a national audience. We want the nation to know we have a good baseball team, but we have a problem here with our schools.''

More than three dozen buses dropped off about 1,400 Chicago public school kids and parents at the Northfield campus of New Trier Township High School on Sept. 2 in the first such major protest organized by Meeks, pastor of a South Side megachurch.

Meeks said Thursday he caught some heat for pulling CPS kids away from the first week of school for the New Trier rally and another protest the next day in downtown Chicago office buildings. So, Meeks said, he is now planning one kids can join after school -- including New Trier students who voiced support for Meeks' cause during the Sept. 2 protest.

"I plan to have 6,000 kids wrap themselves around Wrigley Field and bring more attention to the disparity in school funding,'' Meeks told a group gathered to hear a new report on state school funding inequities by the Center for Tax and Budget Accountability.

"We have to do something big. We have to do something dramatic, even if it means kids will be hauled off to jail because they want a quality education, or if it means embarrassing the heck out of the city and out of the state,'' Meeks said.

"Somebody has to do something about this problem and the people who need to do it, they are not in this room, but they will be watching the Cubs game.''

Chicago Police Department officials said the prospect of dropping off young children in dozens of buses to a sporting event in a congested area filled with excited fans who could be intoxicated raised definite safety, traffic and crowd control concerns.

"Unlike New Trier, where the environment was controlled and enclosed, this . . . is an open environment where children can be subject to vehicular traffic, intoxicated fans -- there are a number of external factors,'' said Monique Bond, spokeswoman for the Chicago Police Department.

"We can't compromise the safety of children, the safety of fans and the safety of residents.''

Meeks' comments followed the release of a new study that found that a small number of Illinois districts with the most property wealth spend $2,324 more per pupil on instruction annually than the vast majority of Illinois districts.

In addition, the study by Ralph Martire of the Center for Tax and Budget Accountability found that Illinois elementary-only districts with some of the fewest poor kids tended to do better on state tests when they spent more on their students, especially if they spent at least $6,000 per pupil.

Also Thursday, Chicago Schools CEO Arne Duncan told a legislative committee that the state should pass a modest income tax hike to boost school funding and forget about a "tax swap'' that would link property tax relief with higher state taxes.

A stalled bill by Meeks suggests raising $8 billion in new education dollars by reducing property taxes but increasing the state income tax from 3 percent to 5 percent. However, Meeks said Thursday he also would support leasing or selling the lottery to fund education.