Since he took office, President Donald Trump has called for the dismantling of the Education Department, saying it has been overrun by liberal thinking. In July the U.S. Supreme Court upheld mass layoffs that halved the department’s staff.

Gov. JB Pritzker and the Illinois Board of Higher Education on Monday announced that total enrollment in Illinois public universities increased for the second year in a row and hit its highest overall level in 10 years.

“The moment that the raids started happening and people started getting pulled off the street, you could just see it,” volunteer Alyssa May said. “You could see less students, less families, less vendors. And it really did change. It just became a really quiet place.”

CPS Inspector General Philip Wagenknecht’s office on Wednesday published a new report on the district’s travel and overnight spending, which jumped from around $300,000 in fiscal year 2021 to nearly $8 million in 2024.

Chicago Public Schools leaders say new data shows elementary school students showed improvements in reading and math proficiency, while high schoolers increased their graduation rates while earning a record-high of more than $3 billion in scholarships this past year.

Stacy Davis Gates was unanimously elected president of the Illinois Federation of Teachers (IFT) on Saturday. The organization is one of two major statewide umbrella teachers unions in the state.

Sister Jean Dolores Schmidt, the chaplain of the men’s basketball team at Loyola University Chicago who died last week, will be honored during a wake and funeral mass scheduled for later this week.

Interim CPS CEO Macquline King on Wednesday said the district command center in order to provide “round-the-clock support” to school communities experiencing “heightened stress due to activity outside their building.”

Citing financial issues, the Board of Directors overseeing Chicago’s only public arts high school informed the school district earlier this week that it would not submit a renewal application.

The pact asks the schools to accept the government’s priorities on admissions, women’s sports, free speech, student discipline and college affordability, among other topics.

After back-to-back years of enrollment growth for the first time in more than a decade, Chicago Public Schools on Thursday announced it has seen a drop in its number of students for the new academic year.

Interim CPS CEO Macquline King on Thursday stood by the district’s commitment to its existing policies after the Department of Education threatened to withhold millions in funding.

Public school enrollment is projected to tumble 5.5% between 2022 and 2031, largely due to changing demographics, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. Other factors include the shift by some students to private education or homeschooling and some immigrant families’ decisions to leave the country.

The Illinois State Board of Education next month will begin hosting listening sessions around the state on the first draft of its Comprehensive Numeracy Plan, which the board said will provide guidance that supports educators, schools and districts in advancing student success in math.

The University of Chicago ranked sixth in the nation, jumping up five spots from eleventh last year, while the Evanston-based Northwestern University fell one spot into a tie for seventh.

The U.S. Department of Education is cutting hundreds of millions of dollars in grants to universities serving predominantly students of color — known as minority-serving institutions.