Illinois 2014–15 education test scores released Wednesday show only one-third of students are prepared for college and career. These are the first scores released under the Common Core-aligned Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) tests.
The following statements from education policy experts at The Heartland Institute – a free-market think tank – may be used for attribution. For more comments, refer to the contact information below. To book a Heartland guest on your program, please contact Donald Kendal, new media specialist, at [email protected] and 312/377-4000.
“The fact that only one-third of Illinois high school graduates are prepared for college illustrates the nearly complete failure of the public education system in Illinois and America.
“Sadly, rather than challenging the dogma that bureaucrats know best, America’s education bureaucracy uses statistics like this to double down on the failed experiment of mass centralization and excessive spending on needless administrators.”
Bruno Behrend
Senior Fellow, Education Policy
The Heartland Institute
[email protected]
312/377-4000
“These test results clearly show Illinois schools are failing the state’s children. The fact that these tests show two-thirds of students are not prepared for college or career gives parents reason to believe Illinois has manipulated test results for decades to hide this underperformance from them.
“Education choice is needed now across the state of Illinois. Failing education is not just an urban issue, it is a system-wide issue across the state. We must stop protecting a failing system and focus on educating children.”
Lennie Jarratt
Project Manager, Education
The Heartland Institute
[email protected]
847/302-3985
“We should probably pay little heed to disappointing results from PARCC testing of Illinois students when the testing regime itself has not been verified to be reliable.”
David V. Anderson
Senior Fellow
The Heartland Institute
[email protected]
312/377-4000
“While a .333 batting average is good enough in baseball to get you into the Hall of Fame, in public education it should get you a trip to the unemployment line. Government-run cartels like the public school system are the only areas of American public life where perpetual mediocrity, incompetence, indifference, and failure are not only applauded but richly rewarded.
“Illinois’ embarrassing and shameful scores on both PARCC and NAEP testing prove the time is now for true private school choice in the Prairie State. Our kids deserve far better than what the public school system can offer them.”
Tim Benson
Policy Analyst
The Heartland Institute
[email protected]
312/377-4000
“We have no way of knowing how reliable these results are because PARCC has still refused to publicly release the relevant technical data. Trustworthy NAEP data do agree Illinois students have far to go, however, and as the highest quality research shows, the most effective and least costly way accomplish that is private school choice. Given Illinois’s fiscal insanity, lawmakers better get on it.”
Joy Pullmann
Research Fellow, Education
The Heartland Institute
[email protected]
312/377-4000
The Heartland Institute is a 31-year-old national nonprofit organization headquartered in Arlington Heights, Illinois. Its mission is to discover, develop, and promote free-market solutions to social and economic problems. For more information, visit our Web site or call 312/377-4000.
Bruno Behrend, J.D., is a senior fellow for education policy at The Heartland Institute.
Lennie Jarratt is the former director of the Center for Education Opportunities at The Heartland Institute
Tim Benson joined The Heartland Institute in September 2015 as a policy analyst in the Government Relations Department.
Joy Pullmann is a research fellow on education policy for The Heartland Institute and managing editor of The Federalist, a web magazine on politics, policy, and culture.
