by Jodi S. Cohen and Jennifer Smith Richards

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Citing an urgency to protect students’ civil rights in a second Trump administration, Illinois lawmakers filed a new bill Monday that would explicitly prevent school police from ticketing and fining students for misbehavior.

The legislation for the first time also would require districts to track police activity at schools and disclose it to the state — data collection made more pressing as federal authorities have signaled they will deemphasize their role in civil rights enforcement.

A 2022 ProPublica and Chicago Tribune investigation, “The Price Kids Pay,” found that even though Illinois law bans school officials from fining students directly, districts skirt the law by calling on police to issue citations for violating local ordinances. It also found that Black students were twice as likely to be ticketed at school than their white peers.

Following the news investigation, the governor, state superintendent and lawmakers urged schools to stop the practice, but legislative efforts repeatedly stalled. The bill introduced Monday in the Illinois House takes a new approach to end police ticketing at schools by making clear that police can arrest students for crimes or violence but that they cannot........

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