Youth Joblessness – Illinois

Illinois teen employment at new low, By Julie Wernau, January 26, 2010, Chicago Tribune: “Eighteen-year-old Gabrielle Banks braids her friends’ hair on the West Side for car fare money. The Community Christian Alternative Academy student has been looking for a job since last summer, when she worked at her high school as an ‘ambassador’ for health and fitness, back when the program was funded. ‘I don’t just think I want a job. I think I need a job,’ she said, ‘My mom, she’s the only income we get, and there’s four of us. I could help out with things like groceries, cleaning supplies, toothpaste, stuff like that.’ Banks is part of an unprecedented number of unemployed teens in the state, a fact state and local leaders say puts them at risk of falling further behind economically for years to come. A report by the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University, commissioned by the Alternative Schools Network and set to be announced Tuesday in Chicago at a Youth Hearing on Education, Jobs and Justice, says the employment rate for Illinois teens in 2009 was more than 20 percentage points below 2000, marking a new low for the state…”