Illinois school boards should provide opportunities to all kids in their districts

Mailee Smith

Senior Director of Labor Policy and Staff Attorney

Mailee Smith
January 27, 2025

Illinois school boards should provide opportunities to all kids in their districts

Some Illinois school boards allow all resident children – including private and homeschooled kids – to participate in district activities. That should be the case for all taxpaying families in all districts.

Illinois residents pay the second-highest property taxes in the nation, and on average nearly 60% of property taxes go to local school districts.

Yet thousands of parents are paying taxes and getting nothing from their public school districts because their children are homeschooled or attend private schools. In many districts, their children are prohibited from participating in any district activities, even if they attend public school part time.

Kids aren’t one-size-fits-all. Neither are their educational needs. Whether it be for academic, health, religious or other reasons, thousands of parents throughout Illinois have decided a full day of public school, five days a week, isn’t right for their children.

Those families still pay taxes. Yet their children are denied access to extracurricular and other school district activities their taxes support simply because their children’s educational needs differ.

That doesn’t have to be the case. Some school boards have proactively adjusted their policies to allow all resident children access to district activities with minimal attendance requirements.

Interested in empowering parents in your district? Here are four things you should know:

  • Taxpayers should get what they pay for.
  • A school district loses no money when a family decides to remove their child – but it could receive more money via registration and other fees by allowing that child to participate in activities.
  • Current law and other policies – such as those maintained by the Illinois High School Association – allow students attending just one class period a day to participate in sports and other activities.
  • Some Illinois districts have already paved the way, allowing nonpublic school students to participate in extracurricular and other activities.

Taxpayers should get what they pay for

Illinoisans paid a median $5,089 in property taxes, according to 2023 data available from the U.S. Census Bureau. The largest share goes to school districts, according to the Illinois Department of Revenue.

In fact, for extension year 2022 (i.e., taxes paid in 2023), nearly 60% of Illinois property taxes went to school districts.

Even residents who rent their homes are affected, as landlords pass along the high property tax burden in the form of higher rent.

Yet parents residing in many public school districts are denied access to extracurricular or co-curricular activities if their children do not attend at least a half- to a full-day in the district.

Whether owning or renting their residences, many parents who have children in private school or who homeschool are paying for school district services they do not get.

A school district loses no money when a family decides to remove their child – but it could receive more money via registration and other fees by allowing that child to participate in activities

Opponents may argue that allowing nonpublic school students who reside in a school district access to district activities will encourage other families to also choose private school or homeschooling. They may claim it will decrease enrollment and therefore funding to the district.

But a district will not lose any state funding if families choose to homeschool or attend private schools. State funding is not dependent on enrollment numbers.

In 2017, Illinois adopted an “evidence-based funding” formula, which does not rely solely on enrollment numbers for funding. The formula includes a “base funding minimum,” which the Illinois State Board of Education describes as a “hold harmless provision.” It guarantees a district will not receive less money than it did before.

“Per statute, the Base Funding Minimum amount grows annually,” according to the Illinois Association of School Boards. When asked in an interview if the base funding minimum will ebb and flow based on the number of students in a district, Michael Jacoby, the executive director of the Illinois Association of School Business Officials, answered unequivocally, “No.” He explained the law would have to be changed in order for funding to be converted to per-pupil funding in the future.

This base funding minimum is further explained in the Illinois Association of School Boards’ May/June 2023 Journal, in which a supervisor within the Illinois State Board of Education explains, “Each year that districts receive Tier Funding, that funding becomes part of the next fiscal year’s BFM, so districts are always receiving at least the funding that they received the year prior.”

In other words, a school will not lose funding if enrollment goes down.

On the other hand, the school district will be receiving registration and other fees from the students’ families without taking on the expense of educating the child. They also receive taxes from that family.

For example, the family of a homeschooled child participating in public school marching band would pay 1) the regular school registration fees, potentially pro-rated for the period of the day the child attends band class, plus 2) any band or other activity fees required for participation. The district would not be expending any additional resources on that child. That’s registration money the district would not have obtained otherwise.

With year-over-year enrollment in Illinois public schools dropping 13 times in the past 15 years, allowing nonpublic school students to participate in extracurriculars could act as a bridge to register them as part-time students for the classes in which they do enroll and receive some fees.

Current law and other policies allow school boards to open district activities to nonpublic school students residing in the district

Neither Illinois law nor sports associations in Illinois prohibit nonpublic school students from participating in extracurricular activities as long as the students meet minimum guidelines. In fact, both the Illinois High School Association and the Illinois Elementary School Association explicitly allow nonpublic school students to participate in sports with minimal requirements.

Illinois law

Illinois law allows students to attend public school part-time under the following conditions:

  • The request is made by May 1 of the previous school year.
  • There is enough space available in the school.
  • The child lives within the attendance zone of the school.

There is no minimum number of hours required to be considered a “part-time” student.

When it comes to activities, Illinois school districts are required to allow nonpublic students to participate in any “extracurricular component” that is part of a course in which they are enrolled. The Illinois State Board of Education explains, “For example, a homeschooled student enrolled in band at a local public school would be allowed to attend band practice after school if after-school practice was a required part of the course.”

While public schools have no obligation to make other extracurricular activities, such as sports, open to nonpublic school students, neither is it prohibited.

Sports associations

Both the IHSA and the IESA explicitly allow participation by nonpublic school students, with minimal requirements.

The IHSA requires high school students to attend just one course at the member high school each semester. IHSA bylaw 3.011 provides the following (emphasis provided by the IHSA):

A student must attend a member school and may only represent in interscholastic competition the member school the student attends. For purposes of this by-law, the term “attend” shall mean that the student is enrolled at the member school, and is taking at, or under arrangements approved by the member school, a minimum of twenty-five (25) credit hours of work for which credit toward high school graduation will be granted by the member school upon the student’s completing and passing the courses. The school which enrolls the student shall be exclusively responsible to verify the student’s compliance with all of the eligibility requirements of all IHSA by-laws. A homeschool student must be taking and passing at least one credit bearing course at the member school and enrolled in a program approved by the member school on a weekly and semester basis in which they are taking and passing a minimum combined total of twenty-five (25) credit hours of work.

The IESA has no daily course attendance requirement for middle school students, but they must meet other guidelines as provided in bylaw 2.034:

Students who are receiving their education through home schooling may be eligible at the public school at which the student would regularly attend, providing they are in full compliance with the following requirements:

  • all eligibility By-Laws other than the attendance By-Law,
  • the home-schooled student’s work must be accepted by the school district in which the student resides and be granted credit toward graduation by that school district,
  • the school district shall establish a method to monitor the academic performance of the home-schooled student on the same basis as for students in regular attendance at the school, and
  • the school certifies that the student is meeting the minimum academic eligibility standards for participation. The school at which the student will participate is required to keep all records to verify compliance with these requirements in the event the IESA is required to rule on the eligibility of the home-schooled student.

Notably, because both the state board of education and Illinois case law consider homeschool as “private school” for legal purposes, the IHSA and IESA provisions should apply to private school students as well.

Finally, there has been movement in the Illinois General Assembly to codify these types of association provisions into state law. House Bill 5880, introduced in 2024, would have required associations engaging in interscholastic athletics to allow students attending just one course to participate on teams in the district in which they reside. Illinois school districts could get ahead of the curve by implementing such policies now.

Some Illinois school districts have already paved the way

Illinois school board policies run the gamut in terms of outlining the minimum attendance required to participate in school activities. But some of Illinois’ top schools allow nonpublic school students to participate in district activities with minimal attendance requirements.

Take Adlai Stevenson High School District 125, which had the highest combined average SAT scores in 2024, according to the 2024 report card data from the Illinois State Board of Education, and is ranked the best district in Illinois by the review website Niche.com. Its school board policy manual provides the following in provision 7:40 under the subheading “Extracurricular activities, including interscholastic competition” (emphasis added):

A nonpublic school student is eligible to participate in: (1) interscholastic competition, provided his or her participation adheres to the regulations established by any association in which the School District maintains a membership, and (2) non-athletic extracurricular activities, provided the student attends a District school. A nonpublic student who participates in an extracurricular activity is subject to all policies, regulations, and rules that are applicable to other participants in the activity.

There is no minimum requirement of attendance hours listed. Arguably, the language would allow a student to be eligible for extracurricular and other activities simply by taking one course in the district. Similar language is used in other school districts, including Barrington Community Unit School District 220, Indian Prairie Community Unit School District 204 and Lake Forest Community High School District 115. Stevenson’s policy 6:190 also explicitly defines “extracurricular activities” and “co-curricular activities,” something not all school board policy manuals include.

Another example: Washington Community High School District 308’s school board policy 7:40, which allows nonpublic students to participate in activities if they are enrolled in just two class periods during the regular school day. Its policy 6:190 also provides detailed definitions of “extracurricular activities” and “co-curricular activities.”

Other districts are not as willing to allow resident children to participate in school activities, despite their status as taxpayers in the district. For example, Hinsdale Township High School District 86 and Dunlap Community Unit School District 323 only allow students to participate if they attend at least half the regular school day, excluding lunch. Evanston Township High School District 202 and New Trier Township High School District 203 don’t allow any part-time students to participate in activities. Glenbrook High School District 225 doesn’t even include a provision 7:40 in its school board policies.

These school districts are taking parents’ property taxes yet shutting their children out of district activities. It’s an unfair system, and one that school boards should revise before the 2025-2026 school year.

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