Vallas: Work-study changes futures of Chicago’s at-risk youth

Summer jobs programs are not enough to keep Chicago’s youth out of trouble. To reach their potential, a year-round answer is needed. Paid apprenticeships or other work-study need to become part of public education.

While Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson boasts about a second year of summer job growth for youth, the fact remains the number is below where it was before the pandemic shut down much of the program.

Injecting that reality tells a very different story.

Researchers found nearly 45,000 young people and teens were both out of school and jobless. Some 17.3% of Black teens were out of school and not working, the most recent data for 2022 shows. The highest percentages of joblessness among teens in Chicago were concentrated around the South Side and Southwest Side neighborhoods of Pilsen, Bridgeport, McKinley Park, Fuller Park and Back of the Yards.

While campuses were closed for 78 weeks and jobs programs were diminished by the pandemic, there was a record increase in shootings, homicides and carjackings committed by school-aged youths who were not in school. That’s no coincidence.

A Chicago study showed a 43% decrease in arrests for violent crimes among students in summer jobs programs. Youth summer jobs programs are a critical part of the city’s public safety strategy.

But the city needs a program that goes beyond just keeping students busy in the summer. To have a far deeper and more lasting impact on crime reduction, the city needs to support a work-study program. Students need the opportunity to experience the real working world year-round.

There is an easy way to address the need by following Cristo Rey Jesuit High School’s example. The Chicago school, which serves overwhelmingly poor, minority students, was founded in 1996 and takes a paid, work-study approach to every student’s education. Through these work-study programs, every student is prepared for post-graduation success and provided work experience in addition to an education that builds financial literacy and character.

Chicago Public Schools claims approximately 15,000 students of the district’s 101,000 high school students are enrolled in some sort of career and technical education program within CPS, although data on student numbers is spotty. Numbers obtained by Chalkbeat suggest only a few students get work experience, college credit and credentials – considered the gold standard for high school career programs. This suggests a huge gap between need and opportunity.

Chicago must add more schools that follow the Cristo Rey model, for the sake of the youth as well as the health of the city.

Providing more employment opportunities for young people can significantly reduce crime rates. Having a job provides young people with a sense of purpose, financial resources, adult supervision and a constructive outlet for their time and energy that can deter criminal behavior.

The mayor can take the lead. The city has the capacity to offer thousands of diverse work-study opportunities including as first responders, in the trades, in public transportation, aviation, streets and sanitation, water and sewer, professional services and more. The city could require the unions with which it contracts to offer paid pre-apprenticeships and internships that would be paid for by CPS.

Likewise, the city’s many vendors and subsidized developers could be required to develop work-study opportunities where practical. Other private employers could be offered incentives to participate. These could run the occupational gamut and provide valuable work experiences and income-earning opportunities that are the major benefits to these students.

Work-study is not cost prohibitive. It could become a permanent part of the school schedule and staffing model with work-study offered as an alternative to irrelevant electives or offered like college dual enrollment courses. Managing some of the district’s underenrolled schools might allow CPS to re-prioritizing 3% of the operating budget, which could create tens of thousands of work-study jobs annually. In addition, the more students who remain or return to school because of work-study, the more state and federal aid will flow to the schools.

CPS should expand the number of alternative schools offering work-study and occupational training to re-enroll high school students and young adults, instead of advancing more of the Chicago Teachers Union’s failed “sustainable community schools.” There are many examples in Milwaukee, Los Angeles, New York City and here in Chicago that have successfully demonstrated how to re-enroll students who are out of school. These alternative programs let them earn a diploma and build their work skills.

In Chicago, the Youth Connection Charter School has 17 campuses. They offer job training and support programs that target young adults and older people who are dropouts, unemployed, displaced veterans and returning to society after incarceration.

More than 12 years ago the legislature authorized the creation of five new charter schools to specifically serve older, out-of-school youth, but CPS failed to award a single charter. That must change.

Of course, much would depend on the Chicago Teachers Union leadership being willing to provide the flexibility needed to allow work-study offerings and charter schools to be operated. If the union, and CPS, truly care about students, they’d work hard to support these initiatives.

Work-study can help keep young people in school and connect them to the work world. It is a critical life preserver for Chicago’s most vulnerable teenagers and young adults.

If we want to disrupt the cycle that pulls kids away from the classroom and work, Chicago needs a program that pays students to work as they learn and lasts longer than a summer.