It took one of my kindergarten students, Andrew, to help me figure out how to handle my toughest teaching challenge.

If you want to know what young people need to succeed, it turns out you should just ask them. They’ll tell you. And they’ll make it clear that neither miracles nor miracle workers are required to help more students graduate from high school and be prepared for the future.

I first experienced homelessness with my family, then on my own. I was born to a single mother and a father who was absent because of post-traumatic stress disorder he developed after the war. Throughout my childhood, my mother, two sisters and I moved from home to home, sometimes not having one at all.

This public charter school in Chicago encourages students to do two things to increase their odds of graduating from college: Raise their GPAs and attend colleges with 50 percent or higher graduation rates for underrepresented minorities.

As I have watched the news about the separation of families at the border, I can't help but think that this is a story that could have been my own. My parents both came to the United States as teenagers. My mom left El Salvador when she was 15 for the same reason most immigrants come to the United States—the American dream.

John Gomperts, president & CEO of America’s Promise Alliance, the nation’s largest network dedicated to improving the lives of children and youth, has issued the following statement in response to the forced separation of children and parents at the U.S. border

As students across the country have graduated from high school, we know that the transition into the “real world” can be a challenge. Here are 10 tips that will help make the transition a little easier.

I was diagnosed during my sophomore year of high school with dyscalculia, a disorder that prohibits those who have it from understanding arithmetic. The discovery of my disability was both a blessing and a curse. A blessing, because I finally knew why I never matched up with my peers in math classes. A curse, because my high school is focused on Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math.

In January 2018, City Year Senior Vice President of Team Leadership Stephen Spaloss was invited to speak at a Mental Health in Schools conference of social workers, guidance counselors and teachers or

To make matters worse, coaches and peers encouraged me to continue playing sports because it could pay for my education. So I spent countless hours and days training and practicing in different sports, hoping to land an athletic scholarship…which took away from any participation in extracurricular activities and volunteering experience that aligns with my current career aspirations.

When America’s Promise talks about pathways, we’re often talking about the experiences, programs, or initiatives that help prepare young people for life after high school—often while they’re still in it. Since pathways are a key part of our GradNation Action Platform, and because it’s a term we use quite a lot, we think it’s worth exploring a little more.

I’ve spent the last 40 years watching the state I love divest in its future. The cuts to education budgets just kept coming.