This Week's News: Youth in Transition

Education

Heart of West Michigan United Way sets goal of decreasing dropout rate 50 percent by 2020
MLive.com, Grand Rapids, MI – December 5, 2012
A child who isn't proficient in reading by third grade is four times more likely to drop out of high school than a proficient reader, according to a 2011 report by the Annie E. Casey Foundation. Last year, nearly 2,000 Kent County high school students dropped out before graduating with their class.

Solving Utah's dismal graduation rate: Two schools may have the answer
Deseret News, Utah – December 8, 2012
Utah is the fourth-worst state in the nation for graduating Latino students, with just 57 percent of seniors collecting a diploma each year.  But at least two programs both inside and outside the state of Utah could provide a template for how to increase the number of high school graduates, particularly in the minority communities that lag far behind other states.

Kids Count Youth And Work Report: Number Of Young Adults Out Of School, Work Hits Half-Century High
Huffington Post – December 4, 2012
Nearly 6.5 million U.S. teens and young adults are neither in school nor working, according to a new report from the Annie E. Casey Foundation. The report warns of a future of chronic unemployment due to a continuing failure to educate and train America's youth in needed skills.

Juvenile Justice

Foundation Strives to Create Legacy for Juvenile Justice Reform
Juvenile Justice Information Exchange, Washington, D.C. – December 6, 2012
The nonprofit MacArthur Foundation has spent more than $100 million since 2004 on developing blueprints for reform within the juvenile justice systems of 16 states. Earlier this week, its reform initiative, Models for Change, brought together nearly 400 judges, advocates, probation officers and other juvenile justice professionals for two days of workshops in Washington, D.C.

Putting wayward youth on right road
Orlando Sentinel, Miami-Dade County, Florida – December 7, 2012
While leading Miami-Dade's Juvenile Services Department, Wansley Walters slashed arrests and confinements by de emphasizing detention and focusing on juvenile-offender services.  Turns out that her Miami experience laid the groundwork for the path she intends to take as secretary of the state Department of Juvenile Justice. She's barnstorming Florida, promoting the Roadmap to System Excellence, the blueprint that emphasizes prevention over detention, with a focus on front-end services.

Foster Care

Eliada School of Trade Arts helps former foster kids
Citizen-Times, Asheville, NC – December 4, 2012
The odds were good that one or all five of the young men in chef’s jackets standing proudly over a luncheon buffet would end up unemployed, homeless or in prison by the time they were 19 or 20.  Instead, the inaugural class of the Eliada School of Trade Arts has been offered an opportunity to turn those odds upside down, learning personal and professional skills that will open doors to futures they could only have dreamed of a year ago.


Teen Pregnancy

TIPS aims to empower, support teen parents
Anson Record, North Carolina – December 6, 2012
With Anson County ranking 12 out of 100 counties for teen pregnancies in 2011, Teen Information and Parenting Services (TIPS) is working to educate teen parents and help prevent future adolescent pregnancies.  TIPS, a service offered by the Anson County Partnership for Children, “serves adolescents who are pregnant or parenting their first child and their children,” according to its website.