La Shawn understands the importance of access to quality education for children across Illinois, especially for students in disinvested communities. La Shawn is fighting for a comprehensive public high school in Austin and passed a bill to build a new comprehensive high school at the site of the closed Emmet School at Madison and Central on the West Side.
In Springfield, La Shawn has worked to close the achievement gap, sponsored legislation to provide reading and math summer programs for students performing below grade level, and led efforts for schools across the state to modernize with electronic textbooks and technological equipment.
La Shawn also supports universal child care services for working families and has sponsored efforts to increase access to early childhood education, lowering the compulsory school age to age 6, and creating the Commission to Reform Child Care in Illinois.
La Shawn has worked to increase equitable funding for schools and provided assistance to victims of domestic or sexual violence to complete high school. Additionally, he helped establish a standard student expulsion policy and is working to require schools to connect at-risk students in need of academic support to either community-based or in-school academic support.
La Shawn promotes opportunities for children in foster care through the Foster Youth Summer Internship Pilot Program, and he has supported efforts to encourage public university trustees to provide housing scholarships for college students who are without housing.
