A Mentor's Goal: Keeping At-Risk Chicago Teens Alive

David Schaper:

In Chicago last school year, 245 public school students were shot, 27 of them fatally.

It's a high toll. To try to find out who might be next, Chicago Public School officials developed a probability model by analyzing the traits of 500 shooting victims over a recent two-year period. They noted that the vast majority were poor, black and male, and had chronic absences, bad grades and serious misconduct.

Using this probability model, they identified more than 200 teenagers who have a shockingly good chance of being shot -- a better than 1 in 5 chance within the next two years.

Project Director Jonathan Moy says the probability model isn't perfect, but it's working.

Posted by Jim Zellmer at March 28, 2011 1:16 AM
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