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Public Schools in Puerto Rico with No Resources to Comply with Vocational Evaluations for students with Special Needs

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Reinalice Carrero-Guerra, a 23-year-old with Down Syndrome, is one of the thousands of special education students who never received a vocational and career evaluation from the Department of Education, despite there being a law in place for 13 years now that requires conducting such assessment. She neither received help from the Vocational Rehabilitation Administration (ARV in Spanish), an agency ascribed to the Department of Labor and Human Resources (DTRH in Spanish) that is supposed to guide citizens with functional diversity into the workforce. Her mother Alice Guerra said she unsuccessfully requested services after her daughter graduated from high school at 18.  

“They interviewed her many times. The person assigned to the case was never there, and I was redirected to anyone else who was available.

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[FACT CHECK] Ricardo Rosselló: “Puerto Rico’s Economic Activity Index grew by 3% for the first time in 12 years.”

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Gov. Ricardo Rosselló-Nevares said in his State of the Commonwealth address that “For the first time in 12 years, Puerto Rico’s Economic Activity Index grew 3%.”

La Fortaleza referred the inquiry to corroborate the data and for questions related to Rosselló-Nevares’ statement to the Economic Development Bank (EDB), after warning that the governor “offers the figures reported by his agency heads.”

EDB Economist Gladys Medina-Claudio said Puerto Rico’s Economic Activity Index did not show a monthly interannual growth of 3% since February 2004, nor did it reflect year-over-year growth of more than 3% since 1999. To reach that interannual rate, the value of a month of the year in question is compared with the value of the same month of the prior year. “It was not until 2018 that the values surpassed 3%. Now [in 2019] it reached 3.2%,” said Medina-Claudio. However, when asked how the 3.2% increase was calculated, the EDB economist answered that an average for 2018 was used and compared with the 2017 average.