Building on the 5-year success of the Chicago Roadmap between CPS and CCC, UIC has officially joined the partnership to launch Chicago Roadmap 2.0 and create new zero credit loss bachelor’s degree pathways. Moving beyond the CPS-to-CCC postsecondary transition, this session focuses on two other critical postsecondary transitions: (1) direct Early College pathways from CPS to UIC and (2) seamless transfer pipelines from CCC to UIC for recent CPS graduates.
Co-presented by CPS, CCC, and UIC, this session will provide postsecondary professionals with essential, high-impact resources needed to kick off the school year strong. Participants will gain actionable strategies to strengthen their advising, helping students save money, prevent credit loss, and utilize newly developed tools to ensure every college credit earned counts toward a 4-year degree.
Chicago Roadmap Program Specialist, Early College and Career Education (ECCE)
Over the past four years at Chicago Public Schools (CPS), Fermin Valle has led key Chicago Roadmap initiatives, collaborating closely with postsecondary counseling teams to streamline student transitions and boost enrollment from CPS to City Colleges of Chicago (CCC). He provides... Read More →
Assistant Director Academic Affairs Initiatives - Roadmap 2.0 Coordinator, University of Illinois Chicago (UICAssistant Director of Academic Affairs Initiatives
Friday September 25, 2026 9:50am - 10:40am CDT Online
This session will provide Counselors, Schedulers, Administration and those that influence the course selections of students on the benefits of joining the JROTC program. JROTC is not about recruiting for the military, but rather providing time proven leadership development and training. The briefing will dispel common held beliefs about the JROTC program, explain the benefits to students of the program and finally provide an overview of the Accredited Curriculum of JROTC.
This session is a closed meeting specifically for School Counselor Leaderhip Advisory Board. This meeting cadence serves as a vital anchor for SCL to provide critical district updates, resource sharing, and collaborative learning.
Chicago’s growing quantum ecosystem is creating new career opportunities across science, engineering, technology, manufacturing, and business. This session will provide CPS counselors with an accessible overview of the roles expected to emerge, updates on the Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park, and plans for apprenticeship pathways with IBM and other partners. Participants will also learn about programs and resources that can help students build awareness, explore career options, and develop skills for future opportunities across the quantum ecosystem.
Youth in the U.S. are experiencing a mental health crisis. Suicide is the second leading cause of death among our young people. We believe those working with our youth need to know as much about mental health and suicidal behaviors, and how to intervene to reduce risk and enhance safety, as is reasonably possible. This course is designed to provide knowledge and skills you can use to protect young people from suicidal self-directed violence.
QPR for Youth Serving Professionals is an adaptation of our original, evidence-based, and widely utilized QPR Gatekeeper Training course. This version of our QPR Gatekeeper Training focuses specifically on youth risk factors, how young people may communicate their thoughts of suicide, and how to question, persuade, and refer a youth to the help they need. This course is intended for those who teach, counsel, coach, or spend time with our young people, including parents. This training program is designed to help create a safer world not only in our schools, workplace, or community, but also in our personal lives.Taught to well over ten million people, QPR training works as a universal intervention for all people in distress. Not everyone you may ask about suicidal thoughts will have them, but many people are still in crisis and will need help and behavioral health evaluation, perhaps even treatment.
Learn how to effectively support your student-athletes through the NCAA initial eligibility process. We will explore best practices, recent rule changes and key updates to help ensure your student-athletes are on track to meet NCAA eligibility requirements.
Assitant Director of Outreach and Strategic Partnerships, NCAA
Ivorye Long is an Assistant Director of Outreach and Strategic Partnerships with the NCAA Eligibility Center. Before joining the NCAA, Ivorye was a High School Teacher for 12 years and has coached Track and Field for the past 19 years. Ivorye earned both a bachelor’s (Computer Information... Read More →
Friday September 25, 2026 9:50am - 10:40am CDT Online
The Illinois Department of Labor will cover the Child Labor Law which regaulates employment of workers under 16 years of age. We will cover important topics such as: requirement for employment certificates. The certificates confirms that a minor is old enough to work, physically capable to perform teh job and that the job will not interfere with the minor's education; prohibiting work in hazardous occupation; andlimiting working hours. All work before 7AM and after 7PM in prohibited. However, work until 9PM is allowed from June 1through Labor Day. Requiring that a child performer in an artistic or creative service hae a trust fund set up in theri name where 15% of their gross earnings will be deposited.
Computer science learning is for everyone, and counselors play an important role in fostering student opportunity. Choosing the right "on-ramp" for computer science can be a challenge. How do we ensure a student’s first CS experience builds confidence to launch students on their computer science journey? This session will center research from the Chicago Alliance for Equity in Computer Science to support counselors in course decision-making when placing students in their initial computer science classes. We will highlight key findings, share placement resources, and dispel common misconceptions.
Tired of your students enrolling in the same institutions every year and returning home by December? Did you know that CPS students from who enroll in selective colleges and universities persist in college at a 97% rate? This success rate is the ONLY predictive metric that does not change vary by high school type or demographic group. Unfortunately, too many of our high performing young people don't even consider selective collegs and universities, often due to the perception that the work will be too rigorous. I'm going to say this loud for the folks in the back: THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NO EVIDENCE THAT THIS IS TRUE! This session will be designed for 1.) staff new to supporting students in the selective college admissions process and 2.) school teams looking to build their selective admissions culture. It takes work and it won't happen overnight, but you can change the trajectory of your students' lives by supporting their exploration of transformational college options!
Gear up for application season with a focused dive into SchooLinks’ senior year tools designed to streamline postsecondary tracking and document submission. In this hands-on session, you will learn how to set up your college application configuration, build college lists, and guide 12th graders through setting up the College Application Manager (CAM). This will include strategies for identifying direct admission colleges and leveraging the new Direct Apply feature, which allows students to easily apply directly to certain schools with one click on SchooLinks. You will leave equipped to successfully start the school year with your seniors.
This presentation will equip high school counselors with practical strategies for supporting students from foster care on their path to college. Participants will learn about common barriers these students face, effective ways to reduce those obstacles, and the key financial aid opportunities and DCFS programs designed to support youth with lived foster care experience.
For the past 10 years, Kate has led Foster Progress with a deep commitment to ensuring youth in foster care have the support, resources, and opportunities they need to succeed in college and beyond. Under her leadership, Foster Progress has grown into a leading advocate for educational equity, providing mentorship, scholarships, and... Read More →
Friday September 25, 2026 10:50am - 11:40am CDT Online
Youth in the U.S. are experiencing a mental health crisis. Suicide is the second leading cause of death among our young people. We believe those working with our youth need to know as much about mental health and suicidal behaviors, and how to intervene to reduce risk and enhance safety, as is reasonably possible. This course is designed to provide knowledge and skills you can use to protect young people from suicidal self-directed violence.
QPR for Youth Serving Professionals is an adaptation of our original, evidence-based, and widely utilized QPR Gatekeeper Training course. This version of our QPR Gatekeeper Training focuses specifically on youth risk factors, how young people may communicate their thoughts of suicide, and how to question, persuade, and refer a youth to the help they need. This course is intended for those who teach, counsel, coach, or spend time with our young people, including parents. This training program is designed to help create a safer world not only in our schools, workplace, or community, but also in our personal lives.Taught to well over ten million people, QPR training works as a universal intervention for all people in distress. Not everyone you may ask about suicidal thoughts will have them, but many people are still in crisis and will need help and behavioral health evaluation, perhaps even treatment.
The RE:ALIZE Dual Enrollment Program serves juniors and seniors interested in pursuing dance, media, music, theatre or visual arts for college or career. In this session, learn how to support your families and students as they navigate everything from completing the initial application, preparing for their interview, successfully enrolling students in the program and programming them out each afternoon, all the way to supporting them as they successfully complete their courses and graduate with 6-12 college credits.
Expungement is the legal process of erasing a cases or arrests from a person’s background, so that they do not come up on future background checks or negatively impact future education, employment, and housing opportunities. In this session, I will provide a brief overview of expungement's processes, eligibility requirements, and importance. I will also describe how staff can help students connect to free juvenile record expungement resources with Legal Aid Chicago. (Please note I can do a 30 minute or a 50 minute presentation, depending on preference!)
For the first time this fall, all CPS employees will be getting access to the Four-Year College lens of the To&Through Milestones tool, which will allow high school counselors to see the rates of college enrollment, persistence, and completion for CPS graduates at individual four-year colleges that serve large numbers of CPS graduates. In this session, we will cover how to use the tool to find and understand these rates on the tool, as well as how to disaggregate them by student characteristics like race, gender, and high school performance.
More and more CPS graduates are going to college every year. What are they choosing to study in college, and are they completing the degree they initially enrolled in? For the first time, we have information on both the majors CPS graduates selected while enrolled in college and their eventual degree completion majors. In this presentation, we will share insights from our analysis of the patterns of college majors in which students enroll, the majors in which they complete (or do not complete) degrees, the relationship between enrollment and completion majors, and whether these patterns differ among various groups of students. This analysis provides a clearer picture of the educational pursuits of CPS students from when they begin post-secondary their eventual outcome after six years of High School graduation.
As the Chicago Public Schools (CPS) American Indian Education Program (AIEP) relaunches, this session addresses a critical district-wide priority: identifying eligible Native students and connecting them with supplemental culturally responsive services.
Many educators serve Indigenous youth without realizing it due to multiracial identities and systemic invisibility. This presentation equips professionals with actionable best practices to shift mindsets, adopt respectful terminology, and understand the legal foundation of tribal sovereignty. Participants will also explore the historical legacy of the Indian Relocation Act that established Chicago’s vibrant urban Native community, gaining essential strategies to cultivate inclusive, supportive educational environments across all schools.
Participants will learn how to implement their district’s strategic vision at the school level through intentional and strategic partnerships. This interactive session will focus on using multiple data points to identify student needs, strengthen postsecondary pathways, and align partnership resources with schoolwide priorities.
Participants will have the opportunity to examine their own schoolwide data, identify areas of opportunity, and explore existing partnerships and resources that can support students in their buildings. Participants will also engage directly with selected partners to learn more about available programs, services, and opportunities that can enhance college, career, and postsecondary readiness.
The Student Story Series highlights the experiences of students of color, first-generation college, and low-income CPS alumni navigating life after high school. Alumni share their reflections on the triumphs, challenges and lessons learned while pursuing their educational careers. In this session we will do a demo lesson and offer resources on how you can bring Student Stories into your classroom to help spark conversations around post-secondary planning.
The expectation is that school counselors would have already attended or at least watched the in-depth admin training that take place on 9/3 and 9/8. Those that still have questions are welcome to come to an office hours set up where we will go through resources that are available and answer as many questions as possible in the time given.
As school counselors, you are often a student’s first point of contact during moments of crisis and disclosure. In this interactive 50-minute session, the OSP Training and Prevention team explores how counselors can effectively bridge the gap between initial student concerns, mandatory reporting, and formal OSP processes. Through real-world scenario analysis, we’ll examine how to identify red flags—such as grooming, dating violence, boundary violations, and bias-based behaviors—while addressing your vital role in supporting students before, during, and after an OSP investigation.
"CPS Counselors - Do you have students you see as the future teaching staff at CPS? Teach Chicago Tomorrow (TCT) is a postsecondary CPS initiative designed to support seniors, who will major in education, academically, socially, and finanacially in college. TCT is designed to help CPS Graduate become CPS Teachers!
Come to this session to learn how you can connect your students to this amazing opportunity. "
Step into the world of SchooLinks and discover how to streamline college and career readiness across your middle and early high school grade levels. This interactive session will walk you through the essential tools and features needed to start your school year off strong. This session is designed for 6th through 11th-grade. There is another session specifically for 12th grade.
Join us for crucial information every counselor should have! -The process for transferring high school credit for students arriving from foreign countries, including how to recover missing transcripts. -How to counsel students arriving in the 16-18 age range who have few credits- is an options school right for you? -Programming guidance: ensuring that students will meet all graduation requirements in a timely manner. -Postsecondary Supports for Students on the Immigration Spectrum.
Crisis 101 is an overview of protocols and procedures relating to common school crisis situations. This presentation discusses the use of the Crisis Hotline, the types of support that the Crisis Management Unit can provide to a school community, and how to respond to students in crisis.
This session invites school teams to explore the role and impact of emotions, both for students and adults, in the middles grades environment. Participants will: -Reflect on their lived experience and its connection to emotions; and the implications this has on classroom dynamics and school culture. -Discuss how experiencing and expressing emotions is a natural and healthy part of adolescent development and risk-taking in school for students. -Engage in practical activities that make explicit connections between emotions and adolescent development research; which can be applied and implemented in classrooms and other school spaces to support positive learning conditions."
Join Everfi for an engaging professional development session that highlights our scholarship opportunities worth over $355,000 for students in grades 6-12 for the 26-27 school year. Explore current scholarship offerings, eligibility requirements, and practical strategies for promoting these opportunities to students and families. Learn how scholarships can be paired with financial literacy, career readiness, and wellness resources to support student success. You'll walk away with ready-to-use materials and actionable ideas to help more students discover and pursue valuable funding opportunities for their future.
Darren has been with Everfi since 2023 helping schools throughout CPS with utilizing Everfi resources. He's a former CPS teacher and school counselor who last worked at Englewood STEM High School as a Senior Seminar teacher. He's passionate about equipping students with real world... Read More →
Friday September 25, 2026 2:05pm - 2:55pm CDT Online
