A blistering new report from the Chicago Public Schools (CPS) Office of Inspector General is raising alarms after revealing the district spent $14.5 million on what investigators called “excessive” travel expenses across fiscal years 2023 and 2024.
According to Fox News, the findings come at a time when academic performance in the nation’s third-largest school district remains dismal. In the spring of 2024, just 30.5% of CPS students in grades 3–8 were proficient in reading, and only 18.3% were proficient in math.
Chicago pastor Corey Brooks did not mince words in reacting to the report.
“It is a sad commentary on just how far our city has fallen and how bad the leadership is,” Brooks told Fox News Digital. “These individuals believe that spending money on themselves benefits our educational system more so than spending it on the children who so rightfully deserve it.”
Brooks said the numbers should shake city officials.
“In our neighborhood, there’s a 6% reading proficiency,” he said. “And now you’re talking about the overall for Chicago being 30%, that is something that needs to be spoken by everyone who is in power.”
The OIG report showed CPS spent $7.7 million on travel in FY 2024 alone — a staggering 2,467% increase from the $300,000 spent in FY 2021. Even before the pandemic, travel spending was significantly lower, totaling $3.6 million in FY 2019.
Investigators reported that CPS officials took trips to destinations including Las Vegas, Egypt, Finland, and South Africa.
Student performance remains troubling at the high school level as well. Data shows just 22.4% of CPS 11th graders were proficient in reading on the SAT in spring 2024, while only 18.6% scored proficient in math.
Corey DeAngelis, executive director of the Educational Freedom Institute, called the situation “a complete dumpster fire.”
“Chicago Public Schools spend about $30,000 per student, and most of the kids still can’t read on grade level,” he said. “The government school system is a bottomless pit, lighting taxpayer money on fire, while constantly asking for more.”
Chronic absenteeism is compounding the crisis. CPS labels students who miss 10% or more of school days as chronic absentees — and in 2024, 40.8% of students fell into that category.
“These young children aren’t even going to school now, and you never hear about it,” Brooks said. He warned that low proficiency and absenteeism feed into the same cycle. “You have third, fourth, fifth, sixth graders who can’t read… they’re just disinterested, and they’re falling by the wayside every single day.”
CPS responded to Fox News Digital by noting that it formed a committee on Oct. 29 to review travel expenses and has already moved to restrict “nearly all employee travel.”
A CPS spokesperson said improvements are coming with a new Enterprise Resource Planning financial system, which will increase transparency and automatically enforce spending restrictions.
“We take seriously the findings and recommendations from the Office of the Inspector General (OIG),” the spokesperson said. “We will continue to ensure our District policies and procedures support the highest ethical standards and that our employees act in the best interest of our students, the District, and our city.”
Brooks argued that leadership across city and state government remains out of touch.
“[They] are looking at the interest of themselves… they get to send their children to private schools and the best schools while children in our neighborhoods continue to fail,” he said. “That’s not right.”
