What a difference a year makes … or doesn’t.

On the third Wednesday of every December, the Illinois State Board of Education gets a preview of the budget outlook the General Assembly will encounter when returning to the Statehouse in January. And every year, Capitol News Illinois reports on that meeting. Here are two headlines, you guess which is from last week and which is from 2024:

“Budget pressures could impact K-12 funding”

“Education officials brace for lean fiscal year ahead”

No tricks, the first is 2024 and the second is 2025. Some of Peter Hancock’s body copy could’ve been copied and pasted.

From 2024: “With budget forecasters predicting flat revenue growth over the next year and continued demands for increased spending in other areas of the budget, such as pension costs and health care, members of the Illinois State Board of Education were told Wednesday that they are now in a different fiscal environment.”

From 2025: “With economic forecasts projecting little or no growth in state revenues over the next year and growing demands for increased spending in other areas of state government, [Superintendent of Education Tony] Sanders said the budget proposal he plans to bring to the board in January is likely to be modest.”

Close readers will key in on the actual numbers as context clues. In fiscal 2025 – the one that ended about six months ago – the state’s public K-12 spending was just shy of $11 billion. In fiscal 2026, it’s nearly $11.2 billion. Each figure constitutes about 20% of the General Revenue Fund.

Then there’s mandatory categorical spending. State laws dictate what districts must do (in areas like meals or transportation), but legislators don’t fully fund those obligations. To follow the laws, districts cough up the difference. ISBE estimated lawmakers would need to spend $142.2 million more in fiscal 2026 just to fall short by the same percentage as 2025; looking ahead to fiscal 2027, the figure is $151.5 million.

In other words, schools are getting more dollars, but in proportion to overall growth in expenditures. Which means the other annual tradition – November’s story about how many new funding requests ISBE amassed during an annual process – echoes identically this time around: hundreds of districts have needs and wants, most of those plans won’t come to fruition because lawmakers will have enough trouble just keeping pace.

In addressing this topic last December, I wrote, “There’s nothing wrong with asking, and the more that is understood about what isn’t being funded, the better we all can understand the priorities of the people we put in charge.”

That’s still true as well, but understanding doesn’t pay the bills. Schools won’t see a catastrophic shortage, but many goals remain unattainable.

• Scott T. Holland writes about state government issues for Shaw Local News Network. He can be reached at sholland@shawmedia.com.