Clare Jellick, intrepid education reporter for the Journal Star, followed up on my previous post. She spoke to “Illinois State Board of Education spokesman Matt Vanover.” He gave her a different answer than the one I got from Lou Ferratier in the Illinois State Board of Education’s School Business and Support Services division. Now the State Board of Education says that District 150 does indeed have to close the school buildings.

I have no quarrel with Jellick’s post or with the new information provided by the ISBE, per se. But I am irritated that I was evidently given false information by the Illinois State Board of Education.

Jellick says, “Vanover said the state official quoted in C.J. Summers’ blog was likely speaking in generalities.” Well he shouldn’t have been. When I called, I identified myself, where I was calling from, that this was regarding School District 150, and I referred specifically to the certificates I had received through a Freedom of Information Act request from the district. I told Mr. Ferratier that I had a copy of the HLS documentation in front of me — I don’t know how much more specific or pointed I could have been in asking my question. I quoted verbatim from the certificate, told him that school board officials have been claiming the state requires them to close schools, and asked Mr. Ferratier if that was true. Answer: No; they don’t have to close them. They can close or repair them. If Mr. Ferratier was “speaking in generalities,” it wasn’t for lack of me asking for specific information.

Bottom line, though, Jellick and I agree:

All that being said, I’m not arguing that the closures were a decision handed down by the state, and District 150 was a helpless bystander. District 150 picked the schools that it wanted to replace. It knew full well that the schools would have to close if the replacement funding was granted.

And that was my main point anyway — that it really wasn’t a state decision, but a District 150 decision, and that the school board is trying to use the state as a scapegoat. The ISBE’s flip-flop doesn’t change that.