18th District Candidates on Public School Funding

WMBD 31 News is your local election headquarters. Leading up to Election Day, we're finding out where local candidates stand on the issues. In the 18th District Congressional Race, incumbent Republican Aaron Schock is being challenged by Democrat Steve Waterworth. Since Illinois schools continue to struggle with dwindling state resources, we're asking the candidates how they think the state should treat funding for public schools.

Waterworth:
"One thing that concerns me is the federal beaurocracy seems to test, test, more testing, more testing. I think we should leave education more in the hands on the local level, state level. The federal government can help with education, but to make, it's almost like we're working towards a standardized education system across the country and diversity is one of the strengths of America."

Schock:
"As- in some of the suburban districts they have two to three times the amount of money to spend per student than what we do in central Illinois. that's simply not a free and eqaul education as was designed by our founding fathers. I think the state's role really needs to be to ensure that equal funding is given to schools based on every student not where they live in the state. And the second thing is we've just got to make sure we have high standards for those school districts. And certainly our state-wide testing we do in Illinois is an important measurement of how students are doing. But at the end of the day the local decisions need to be made by our school boards."