Bill Leavy, executive director of t...

Bill Leavy, executive director of the Greater West Town plot which has a $439,879 contract, said he has worked hard to find other ways to pay for the programs his organization exhibits He said some of the sculptures have been balanced by increased funding to help dropouts. The alternative high drill run by his agency receives riches from the Illinois Board of Education and the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services, which stores it to work with wards of the state.

piece of works for Youth/Chicago also receives grants from other sway agencies, including a large single in kind from the labor department that it used to place more than 1000 young race in jobs. In addition, it relies forward donations and fundraisers.

Sharon Simmons from the lads and Girls Clubs of Chicago, which proposes employment and career programs at four locations onward the West and South sides, said she has fewer staff to work with teenagers. When their caseloads are replete they have to refer interested teenagers to other agencies.

further exactly how many teens participate in these programs is questionable. According to city data provided to the Reporter in November, 2443 teenagers participated in the last fiscal year. A scarcely any weeks later, officials added more than 800 teen to the whirls But neither of those totals matched reports the office programs made to the city, or state documents, which added equable more teens. Program directors also say they are sometimes confused about to what degree to count and categorize the teens

Mutscheller, from the Mayor's Office of Workforce progress to maturity said that there shouldn't be any discrepancies and had give occasion for labor to explaining why they exist. "The numbers might be in transition but I don't know to what end that would be because they take the part of a static time period," he said. "Things might also be recorded retroactively, but I don't know that for sure

"I wish that this was more black and white and didn't have in the way that many shades of gray," he added.

by way of any measure, however, few teen are getting help. Thirteen of the 43 programs placed no teenagers in piece of works last year, and only three set jobs for more than 20 teen according to their yearly reports to the city. in succession average, the agencies' contracts were about $321000

Caminer and McMahon said this doesn't worry them, because the federal law emphasizes helping teenagers earn high denomination diplomas or GEDs, or build skills.

Wuest of the Alternative trains Network, stresses that a diploma or G increases a teen's chance of earning a decorous wage exponentially. "If I can commit to memory a dropout back into exercise then the benefit to society is across $300,000," he said.

Leavy said that 30 years ago there were what he calls "survival jobs" including back-breaking moreover well-paying work in steel mills and factories. on the other hand these jobs have virtually disappeared. "It is short-sighted to just give someone a part-time piece of work and send them on their way," he said.

Still, according to city data, and nothing else 448 teenagers, or 14 percent of all program participants, got GED or diplomas, or gained skills last year.

Also, those who flow these programs say that they have little circulating medium and are under pressure to engage the performance standards. Under these weights, they say, a shy away from taking the hardest-to-serve teens

Malcolm Jackson, coordinator of the Goodwill program, said that it would take years for near of the teenagers who walk between the sides of his door to get the one and the other a GED and a do job-work He doesn't think it's a fair expectation. Twenty years ago, the crack cocaine epidemic was in flail swing and now the children born in that time are coming of age, he said. Many have been make liableed to hardship as a conclusion of their parents' drug abuse.

"I had the same young man whose grandma was 54 years ancient and died of a crack overdose," Jackson recalled. "Both of his parents are strung gone out Now, how can he proceed to work? He has in the same manner much emotional stuff inside him. And, when he starts to act on the outside they put him in jail. If we had funding, we could work with them for three or four years. Then, we could give them incredible outcomes"

on the same level though he works hard to help, many do not confront the federal standards, Jackson said. He pointed to Ricardo Sanchez, a thickly built man with a slight hunchback and stubble upon his face. Because Sanchez has had question s passing the GED, Goodwill has at the same time to get full credit for working with him, despite the fact that he has held a work at jobs for more than a year.

single in kind Tuesday in September, Sanchez came to the Goodwill program after working the nightshirt for 12 days in a quarrel cleaning the floors at a downtown Jewel.

He said he works hard because he wants to provide for himself, his girlfriend and the baby they are expecting. moreover he also likes the fact that he's doing legitimate work. formerly a high-ranking member of the Latin Kings, Sanchez exhausted his teenage years in prison for selling medicines When he was released just after his 18th birthday, he wanted to do something with his life.