Weekly Review
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April 14,
2009
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From the Capitol
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Senate Passes Cigarette Tax Increase
The Illinois Senate has approved raising the
state's tax on cigarettes by $1 a pack over
the next two years. The current $0.98 state
tax per pack of cigarettes would increase by
$0.50 in September and another $0.50 a year
later. The increase would generate an
additional $365 million in state revenues.
The bill now sits in the House.
Should the bill become law, the new revenue
will be diverted to hospitals and nursing
homes, triggering a federal match from the
Obama administration's economic stimulus
program. With the federal match, Illinois
would raise nearly $1 billion in revenue.
Democratic Senator Jeff Schoenberg won
Senate approval of the bill 30-26, without
any Republican support. He told the State
Journal Register that Governor Quinn and
House Speaker Michael Madigan are on board.
On April 2nd, the federal cigarette tax
increased $0.39 to $1.01 per pack.
Read SB 44 here
Read CTBA's analysis of the FY 2010 proposed
budget here
View Resources from CTBA's 2009 fiscal
symposium here
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Education
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Illinois
selected to receive $9 million grant to improve
education data infrastructure
The Illinois State Board of Education has been
selected by the U.S. Department of Education to
receive a nearly $9 million Statewide
Longitudinal Data System grant. Illinois has
proposed developing a Longitudinal Data System
that will collect and maintain high quality
individual staff and student data from
pre-school through college and careers that is
linked with districts across the state. ISBE
will receive nearly $1.2 million during FY 2010
for activities to support LDS development, with
additional funding to be spread over FY 2011-13.
The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 requires a
greater use of data by educators in decision
making. The State Longitudinal Data Systems
grant is intended to promote the generation and
accurate use of data by states and local
districts. It allows states to design, develop
and implement statewide systems to manage,
analyze, separate and use individual student
data.
Illinois has already put into place some of the
foundation for a longitudinal data system,
including the development of a unique student
identification system and collection of student
level data. Moreover, ISBE, along with the
Illinois Community College Board and the
Illinois Board of Higher Education, has proposed
legislation (Senate Bill 1828, sponsored by
Senator Heather Steans) designed to further
promote the development and implementation of
the LDS.
The federal grant and the pending state
legislation will allow ISBE to begin taking the
next steps of integrating all ISBE student-level
data and connecting it with data from other
parts of the agency, including staff data and
special education. The LDS will also, among
other things, ease the burden of data collection
on Illinois' local school districts and
streamline the process of state and federal
reporting.
Specifics of the Program
The Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) has
already designed, built, and deployed some of
the fundamental building blocks of a statewide
longitudinal data system, including
implementation of a unique student ID and
student-level data collection. While in a better
position to support the tracking of individual
students, ISBE needs to take the critical steps
of integrating all ISBE student-level data
collection systems and connecting student-level
data with data from other parts of the ISBE
education enterprise (e.g., staff data, special
education, and school district finance). In
addition, ISBE and its state education partners
seek to link P-12 data maintained by ISBE with
postsecondary and employment data on Illinois
graduates in order to analyze the impact of
educational programs on student outcomes.
The goal of the ILDS Project is to establish the
technical and management systems necessary for
ISBE and its education partners to manage, link,
and analyze P-20 education data through the
following interrelated components:
Component #1-Establish
a State Education Data Advisory Group. ISBE will
convene a broadbased
group of stakeholders to advise ISBE and its
education partners on data use and management.
This project component will establish a defined
body responsible for advising on data
coordination across agencies and implementation
of joint data activities.
Component #2-Develop
an Enterprise-wide Data Architecture. ISBE will
establish standard data
definitions to support federal reporting, define
a data architecture for data warehouse
development, and
identify data transaction sets to support
interoperability with LEA systems.
Component #3-Improve
Data Quality Through a System of Data Stewards
and Enhanced Data Audit
Procedures. ISBE will establish a system of data
stewards with responsibility for data quality
and
management for all ISBE centers, establish a
process of statistical checks for LEA data
submissions, and expand LEA training
opportunities to improve data quality.
Component #4-Develop
an Education Enterprise Data Warehouse. Through
development of a data
warehouse, all student-level data maintained by
ISBE will be linked to other student-level data
and K-12
education data. LEAs will be able to obtain
numerous additional data reports and have
expanded ability to perform data analyses using
data maintained by ISBE. Within the data
warehouse, ISBE will create a Data Mart
specifically for federal reporting that draws
data from multiple systems and significantly
reduces the reporting burden on the SEA and
LEAs.
For more information on the program visit:
http://www.ed.gov/programs/slds/index.html
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Calendar
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WHAT:
Rally for the Common Good
WHEN:
May 6, 2009
WHERE:
Capital Rotunda - Springfield 1:00pm to 3:30 pm
INFO:
If you or your organization would like to
participate please fill out
a form here and submit to Jennifer
DeLeon at stephen.taylor@lssi.org or fax
(847-635-6764) before Friday, Apr. 3rd
WHAT: Dupage Federation on Human Services
Reform, Making the Connection: Accessing Public
Benefits for Low Income Persons
WHEN:
October 1, 8, 15, 22, 29
February 18, 25
March 4, 11, 18
June
3, 10, 17, 24
July
1
WHERE: All trainings held at NIU
Naperville, 1120 Diehl Road, Naperville, IL
INFO: Making the Connection training
sessions contain information in an
easy-to-understand format regarding many
programs available to assist low income persons.
Individuals who register for a Making the
Connection training session now receive
membership access to the Federation's newly
developed Making the Connection Illinois
website, www.mtcil.org.
To register and for more information please
visit www.dupagefederation.org.
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Do you have something to add to the
Weekly Review?
email Chrissy Mancini @
cmancini@ctbaonline.org
___________________________________________________________________________
Center
for Tax and Budget Accountability
70 East Lake Street, Suite 1700
Chicago, IL 60601
312-332-1041
www.ctbaonline.org
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