Credit: PBS

Growing up in Compton, California, Kimberly Cervantes, an 18-year-old freshman at American Career College in Long Beach, has witnessed far more violence than the typical high-school grad.

There’s the time she and her brother were walking home from school and nearly collided with a group of armed men mid-shootout with an opposing gang. And the time two of her classmates were gunned down just outside the school gate. And the time she was sexually harassed and physically attacked while riding the bus. After she started missing classes because she was too anxious to show up, she was ultimately placed in an alternative school for students the district is otherwise either unwilling or unable to teach.

None of these experiences, of course, were particularly conducive to Cervantes’ learning. “It’s hard to concentrate on class when you’re thinking about how someone you knew just died,” she says.

Cervantes’ experiences are far from unique. A recent study by the RAND Corporation suggests that as many as nine out of 10 middle schoolers in the area have […]