Can these Chicago high schools survive?

Between classes, Theron Averett Jr. walks past rooms stacked with empty desks and an off-limits area where he's heard there's an empty swimming pool. "I've never seen it," he says. He climbs a stairwell where a rainbow-colored mural carries a two-word message for Tilden High School's students: "Dream Big."

Averett was one of 250 students enrolled this year at the South Side campus, which Chicago Public Schools says has room for about 1,900 students...