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University Professionals
of Illinois
Local 4100, IFT, AFL-CIO
Unions are happening!
May 18, 2026
UIS faculty attended the Higher Education Appropriation Committee meeting testifying for the Fair Funding of Universities Bill
4/23/2026 Special thanks go to Dr. Kristi Barnwell for also giving testimony on the critical need for equitable funding.
Please see her statement below:
I am first-generation college student, the child of a single mother who lived in financial precarity for most of my childhood. I loved learning always. Like many of my students, I understood higher education’s value for creating social mobility and increasing my chances of having financial stability.
Read more
Keep Up the good work
There has been a lot going on and it seems overwhelming. Take time for selfcare too. It's important to peacefully protest and equally important to take care of yourself.
It is important to keep up the pressure and run for local office!
Every phone call, letter, email, and postcard help keep the issues before our representatives.
The pressure is working, keep up the good work.
May 18, 2026
5/15/26
Western Illinois University is the most underfunded public university in Illinois.
According to Advance Illinois, WIU currently gets less than half the state funding needed to serve its students. The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, however, is funded at nearly 90% adequacy.
The gap is no accident, but the result of a funding system that has never been based on equity or student need, but only on political momentum and flat percentage increases applied equally to the well-funded and the underfunded alike.
Senate Bill 13 and House Bill 1581, the Adequate and Equitable Public University Funding Act, would change this. The bill would direct new funding to the universities furthest from adequacy first.
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