(The Center Square) – Republican State Rep. Martin McLaughlin deems legislation crafted to address Illinois’ rising in-state tuition costs as a needed adjustment in fine-tuning a system where homegrown students now incur the ninth most expensive in-state tuition costs across the country and second highest in the Midwest.
Introduced by state Rep. Jeff Keicher, House Bill 5037 calls for a study of the entire system, followed by a 10-year plan to make it more competitive and affordable.
“I think the overall theme here is Illinois is not competitive for our own students, which is why far too many go to University of Kentucky, Indiana State, Iowa State, because they are a better financial deal than our state university systems just on a dollar-to-dollar comparison,” McLaughlin told The Center Square. “When we pay incredibly high taxes in Illinois, it should cover the cost of the university system. Our kids and families are being asked to contribute 20 to 40% more than other out-of-state universities.”
As in-state tuition costs at all the state’s public universities have risen by about $6,000 a year from 2009 to 2025, overall enrollment at those institutions has dipped by roughly 13,000 as at least nine of them have lost population.
Illinois Policy Institute Senior Fellow and former state Rep. Mark Batinick is among those fearing HB 5037 won’t be enough to prompt the kind of change he feels is warranted.
“They are approaching this in the wrong way,” he told The Center Square. “The formula that they’re coming with doubles down on stupid. It rewards failure and punishes success, gives schools more money for losing students on a per pupil basis, more money for having lower graduation rates. You end up giving a lot more money per pupil to the schools that are struggling and taking money away from the schools that are that are doing well.”
With the bill now sitting in the House Rules Committee, both lawmakers agree something needs to change for the sake of the whole state.
“You can’t have a ratio of young professionals starting families, growing families, adding population growing businesses if those kids leave and they do that in other states, surrounding states,” said McLaughlin. “It has an incredible economic impact on Illinois.”
Adds Batinick, “unless we fix this we are going to continue to have a brain drain and our youngest and brightest are going to continue leaving the state, and studies show that a high percentage of people who go to school out of state stay out of state after they graduate.”
