Some Vermilion County schools officials are heading to Springfield next week in an effort to help districts that are interested in forming a cooperative high school to gain access to state grant funding for new school construction projects.

Superintendents Gary Lewis, Mark Janesky and Keven Forney of the Catlin, Jamaica and Oakwood school districts respectively and some of their board members, along with state Rep. Chad Hays and state Sen. Michael Frerichs, are scheduled to meet with Lt. Gov. Sheila Simon and Illinois State Board of Education officials on Tuesday morning.

"We plan to lay out our needs and make a case as to how a cooperative high school would satisfy those needs," said Forney, who sees the option as one way of achieving the state's goal of improving student learning opportunities and reducing duplicative administrative costs. "Hopefully, that will translate into some support for some additional construction funding, if not for our particular project, then for projects like ours."

The three rural districts in southwestern Vermilion County have explored some type of merger for 20 years or so and, specifically, creating a cooperative high school for the last seven. That option allows the districts to form one larger high school and maintain their own elementary and junior high schools.

While school officials have met some resistance from residents who see their community's identity tied to their school system, they said the main hurdle has been obtaining the school construction grant funding essential to building a school that is centrally located and can accommodate the 650 or so high school students as well as potential growth in the future.

Forney said the last construction estimates given a few years ago were $20 million to $25 million, but it would probably be closer to $30 million today, and taxpayers can't foot that bill alone.

Currently, individual districts can apply for state grant funding, and Catlin, Jamaica and Oakwood have put in requests. However, there isn't an avenue that allows districts who haven't already joined through consolidation or co-oping to pursue the funding, local state legislators said.

"We want to create a pathway that will get those construction dollars to those districts," said Hays, R-Catlin.

"If the state really wants to reduce administration costs in education, we should provide financial incentives for the school districts to do that," added Frerichs, D-Champaign, who initiated the meetings with Simon.

The lieutenant governor is heading up the Classrooms First Commission, which has been charged with soliciting input from the public on ways that school districts can reduce duplicative administrative spending and improve educational offerings. Local leaders first met with her this spring to discuss the cooperative high school concept.

"It's still such a relatively new way of realigning schools," Forney said, adding the Paris Cooperative High School, formed by the Paris-Union and Crestwood school districts, is the only one in the state. However, he pointed out, the two districts didn't need to construct a new building; they used the Paris school, which Crestwood students were already attending under a deactivation agreement between the two districts.

The superintendents said Simon was interested in the idea and wanted to hear more about their tentative plans. They plan to present that information, along with how the advantages align with the state's goals.

Lewis said the larger high school would be able to offer students a more-robust curriculum, which would give students a more competitive edge when applying for college or jobs. It would also allow schools to operate more efficiently, Janesky added.

"Right now, we're offering some upper-level classes in chemistry, physics and calculus that have only four or five students in them, while at Catlin, they may have a class with six students," Janesky said. "With a larger high school, we could have a class with 12 or 15 students and be more efficient."

Hays added the three districts wouldn't have to continue pouring resources into older buildings, at least one of which is not compliant with the Americans With Disabilities Act.

"Hopefully, they will be a model for the rest of the state," Frerichs said, adding he favors the cooperative high school approach over mandatory consolidation to achieve to the state's goals.

If funding is made available, the districts' school boards would have to approve putting a referendum on the ballot, then voters in each district would have to approve them.