Chicago Won’t Allow High School Students to Graduate Without a Plan for the Future
Chicago Won’t Allow High School Students to Graduate Without a Plan for the Future
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Chicago Students Won't Be Allowed to Graduate Unless They Have a Plan

Students graduating high school in Chicago will now need to show that they have some sort of post-school plan.

To get their diploma, students will either have to prove they secured a job or apprenticeship or that they're going to college. Students are also able to join a "gap year" program or enlist in the military.

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This new requirement was developed and pushed by Mayor Rahm Emanuel, who wants to make sure students have some kind of plan after they graduate high school:

We are going to help kids have a plan, because theyre going to need it to succeed...You cannot have kids think that 12th grade is done.

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This new mandate, which will kick in 2020, is the first of its kind in the United States. Some education experts, however, consider this to be an empty symbolic gesture that doesn't actually improve the biggest problem with Chicago public schools: lack of money. (More than 1,000 teachers and staff members were laid off in 2016.)

The Washington Post spoke with Karen Lewis, president of the Chicago Teachers Union, and he said:

It sounds good on paper, but the problem is that when youve cut the number of counselors in schools, when youve cut the kind of services that kids need, who is going to do this work?...If youve done the work to earn a diploma, then you should get a diploma. Because if you dont, you are forcing kids into more poverty.

SOURCE: WashingtonPost

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