Hey, Chicago parents: Are you ready for a bunch of government officials to decide whether your teen has appropriate post-high-school plans?If you're not, too bad. Your city's school district is pushing forward with its plan to demand—as a requirement to graduate—that seniors prove to the school that they have a plan for the future. What's more, this plan has to match what school administrators think your kid's future should look like.Reason previously warned that this order was in the works and that Mayor Rahm Emanuel was fully supporting it. It is now officially in place, and it will start applying to students graduating in 2020. Here is a list of options that graduating seniors will be allowed to pursue:College acceptance letter received and returnedMilitary acceptance/enlistment letterAcceptance into a job program (i.e., coding boot camp)Acceptance into a trades pre-apprenticeship/apprenticeshipAcceptance into a "gap year" programCurrent job/job offer letterThe original version was less hospitable to the idea of teens entering directly into the workforce, so at least there's an improvement there. And it says waivers "will be developed" for students with "extenuating circumstances," however the district might eventually define them.But note the insistent attitude here that moving forward into adulthood and being "successful" at it is assumed to involve putting one's self right back under the control or authority of others. Personal entrepreneurship is not an option. If your kid is a wunderkind in crafts or 3D printing and is making bank on Etsy, that doesn't satisfy the Chicago school system. Will administrators see private contract work as a "job" under this system?Read the full piece at Reason.
- Date Published:07/05/2017
- Original Publication:Reason