This bill mandates the swift re-establishment of the Charting My Path for Future Success Project to train educators in helping students with disabilities set and achieve post-secondary goals through personalized action plans.
Lucy McBath
Representative
GA-6
The Charting My Path for Future Success Act mandates the immediate restart and re-award of a contract for the "Charting My Path for Future Success Project." This project focuses on training high school teachers to help students with disabilities develop clear post-secondary goals and create actionable success plans. The legislation ensures the project maintains its established scope of supporting 1,600 students across numerous schools and protects the newly awarded contract from cancellation without Congressional approval.
Mandate to Restart Special Education Project Within 90 Days: Contract Cancellation Now Requires Congressional Approval
The “Charting My Path for Future Success Act” is essentially a legislative reboot for a critical educational program. This bill mandates the Secretary of Education to immediately restart a project designed to help high school students with disabilities set concrete goals for success both during and after graduation. Think of it as Congress stepping in to hit the ‘reset’ button on a program that clearly needed to get moving again.
The 90-Day Clock and the Scope of Work
Section 2 of the Act sets a hard deadline: the Secretary of Education must issue a new request for proposals and award a contract for this project within 90 days of the bill becoming law. The bill specifies that the process must be handled “as if the contract hadn’t already been given out before,” which is a clear instruction to run a clean, fast race to get the right nonprofit organization in place. This isn't just a general instruction, either; the bill locks in the exact scope of the program's previous iteration: 61 educators will be trained to support 1,600 high school students across 62 schools. For parents and educators, this means the resources and support they were expecting are now mandated to be delivered quickly and at a specific scale.
Teacher Training for Real-World Impact
The core of the project is training teachers to become expert goal-setters and action planners for students with disabilities. Instead of just general guidance, these educators will help students create structured action plans based on clear future goals, followed by regular check-ins to make sure the plan is still working. If you’re a parent of a student who needs a clear path to college or a trade after high school, this is the kind of structured support that can make the difference between drifting and thriving. It aims to ensure that post-high school success isn't just a wish, but a documented, measurable plan.
Securing the Program’s Future
Perhaps the most unusual and stabilizing part of this bill is the provision in Section 2 that protects the contract. Once the new contract is awarded, it “can’t be canceled unless Congress approves it.” This is a significant procedural move. Normally, the Department of Education has administrative flexibility to terminate a contract if a contractor performs poorly or if priorities shift. This clause removes that administrative flexibility, locking the program in place. While this ensures stability—meaning the program won’t suddenly vanish due to an administrative decision—it also means that if the awarded nonprofit isn't performing up to par, Congress would have to pass a new law or resolution just to fire them. It’s a trade-off between guaranteed continuity and administrative accountability, clearly prioritizing the stability of services for those 1,600 students.