217 Today: Schools suffer shortage of psychologists during youth mental health crisis

Wednesday, May 3, 2023

Today’s headlines:

• Two dozen employees in the Illinois House Speaker’s office are demanding voluntary union recognition, but the Speaker’s office isn’t giving it.
• Some Chicago-area gun shop owners said sales are up after Illinois’ ban on assault-style firearms was blocked by a southern district judge last week.
• On Tuesday, a Chicago jury convicted four former ComEd executives and lobbyists who were on trial for bribing ex-Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan.
• Environmental activists were in Springfield on Tuesday to lobby against the development of carbon dioxide pipelines in Illinois.

In today’s deep dive, we’ll hear about the important work of school psychologists and the limitations of their jobs during a time experts are calling a youth mental health crisis.

217 Today is produced by Sydney Wood.  Reporting today contributed by Alex Degman, Clare Lane, Dave McKinney, Mawa Iqbal and Maria Gardner Lara.