By: Brittany Flaherty Theis

Today, March 27, 2018, the Illinois State Board of Education (“ISBE”) hosted a webinar regarding site-based expenditure reporting, which the federal Every Student Succeeds Act (“ESSA”) requires for all states. This particular webinar was geared toward vendors that serve school districts throughout Illinois.

Participants in the webinar were asked to review ISBE’s Every Student Succeeds Act: Site-Based Expenditure Reporting Guidance (“Guidance Document”) prior to the webinar. The Guidance document can be found here:

https://www.isbe.net/Documents/ISBE-Site-Based-Expenditure-Reporting-Guidance.pdf

Site-Based Expenditure Reporting Overview

Starting with the 2018-2019 school year, ESSA requires all Local Education Agencies (“LEAs”) and other Reporting Entities to report per-pupil expenditure data at the school level. ISBE explained that this reporting will include allocations of central expenditures to schools, disaggregated by source of funds – meaning per-pupil expenditures of federal funds are to be reported separately from those of state and local funds, which may be combined. ISBE anticipates that, in addition to meeting federal requirements, this reporting and information will be used at the local level to inform decision-making. ISBE does not anticipate that this information will be used for state accountability purposes. Notably, ISBE’s Guidance Document includes only reporting requirements; not accounting requirements. However, school districts will likely find that it makes sense for them to evaluate their accounting practices to facilitate their site-based expenditure reporting – but they are not required to do so.

Site-based expenditure reporting will be submitted to ISBE, which data will then be posted to the Illinois Report Card. The timeline proposed by ISBE requires expenditure reporting to be completed using unaudited, year-end financial data.

Site-Based Expenditure Reporting Framework

In its Guidance Document, ISBE provided the following graphic to summarize the calculation of site-based expenditure reporting along with a sample table of calculations:

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Source: ISBE’s Every Student Succeeds Act: Site-Based Expenditure Reporting Guidance, January 2018

 

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Source: ISBE’s Every Student Succeeds Act: Site-Based Expenditure Reporting Guidance, January 2018

 

The Guidance Document and the webinar provide details regarding each of those inputs and how they are to be calculated. ISBE also provides additional information and guidance at its ESSA webpage:

https://www.isbe.net/essa

Whitt Law will continue to monitor the implementation of ESSA-related regulations and guidance in Illinois. If you are interested in discussing ISBE’s webinar from this afternoon or have questions regarding the Site-Based Expenditure Reporting requirements in Illinois as described in ISBE’s webinar and Guidance Document, please contact Whitt Law Attorney Brittany Flaherty Theis.

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