by WorldTribune Staff, December 7, 2025 Real World News
While Chicago’s public schools were trying to recover from being shut down for 78 weeks during the Covid pandemic, its employees were living the high life on taxpayer funds, a report said.
The Chicago Public Schools (CPS) Office of Inspector General detailed how $23.6 million of taxpayer money was spent on luxury travel, “dollars that should have gone directly toward recovering from historic learning losses,” the Gateway Pundit reported last month.
On Dec. 7, The Gateway Pundit updated its report, noting that the consequences of Chicago’s waste have been devastating to the city’s students.
Public school employees were using taxpayer funds to pay for for high-end hotel suites, airport limousines, first-class airfare, and “professional development” conferences that resembled vacations more than training. One staff member extended a four-day seminar into a weeklong stay at a Hawaiian resort costing nearly $5,000.
“Another principal booked a luxury suite on the Las Vegas Strip and quietly extended the trip to celebrate an anniversary. In one school alone, 24 employees billed taxpayers $50,000 to attend a single Las Vegas conference,” the report said.
The abuses extended overseas. CPS employees charged more than $142,000 for travel to South Africa, Egypt, Finland, and Estonia—complete with hot-air balloon rides and game-park safaris.
“These trips took place while Chicago families were told that there wasn’t enough money to fully address learning gaps or chronic absenteeism,” the report said.
The spending spree only accelerated when federal pandemic relief funds flooded district budgets.
Of the $23.6 million identified, $14.5 million was spent in just 2023 and 2024.
“The money had been intended to repair the academic devastation caused by the Chicago Teachers Union’s decision to keep classrooms closed for 78 weeks—one of the longest shutdowns in the nation,” the Gateway Pundit’s report said. “Instead of investing in tutoring, extended learning time, or literacy interventions, district officials treated the funds as a travel account.”
The consequences?
About 40% of CPS students can read at grade level. Only 25% meet math standards. In some neighborhoods, proficiency rates sink into the single digits.
“Nearly half of the district’s students—and an outright majority of high schoolers—are chronically absent,” the report said. “A school system cannot prepare students for college or employment when tens of thousands no longer attend regularly.”
Report: Chicago public schools employees spent $23M in taxpayer funds on luxury trips added by Editor Two on
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