East Central Reporter

Illinois state Sen. Jason Plummer (R-Edwardsville) has been critical about the shortfalls in student education at the Chicago Public School system, while teachers continue to receive high praise from the district's administration.

Plummer recently lashed out on Facebook where he stated the district was spending $30,000 for each student, and only 11% of Black students and 17% of Hispanic students could read at grade level last year. He also noted that all CPS teachers received "excellent" or "proficient" evaluations. 

"As a society, we sit back and watch young kids being set up for a hard life because of politics," Plummer wrote in an Oct. 4 post. "In Illinois, education is often no longer about providing students the knowledge and skills they need to be productive members of society. It's often about political donations, unions, votes, patronage and jobs, budgets, indoctrination, and many other things none of which are focused on kids. Do you know what's happening at your child's school?"

In his post, Plummer shared a link to a Wirepoints article where Ted Dabrowski reported that while student spending rose drastically in 2021, reading proficiency for minorities dropped by more than 30% during the pandemic when compared to 2019. Dabrowski wrote, "A few readers were quick to remind us we'd left off one key point, and that's how well CPS teachers had been evaluated in 2021, despite the dramatic drop in student scores, the teacher walkouts and forced remote learning."

Late last month, Wirepoints called for the dismantling of the Chicago Public Schools system because of the poor student data. The article mentioned some of the reasons for the drastic move including taxpayers having to fork up more money for each student, corruption, and union excess. In the article, Ted Dabrowski and John Klingner wrote, "There are really no legitimate arguments left for keeping the system intact. The 'public good' argument falls flat considering the district's abysmal results.'"

Plummer hasn't just been critical of CPS, but also other political figures. Back in August, he was chosen to serve on The Illinois Republican State Central Committee. He announced he'd had been elected to be on the state central committee, Metro East Sun reported. In an August Facebook post, Plummer announced he'd been selected for the position writing, “Reform is long overdue at the Illinois Republican Party and I will be a strong, independent, and conservative voice for change at the state party.”