<p>"CHICAGO - Cecilia Reyes stepped onto the auditorium stage, a bit unsteadily. Her legs were tired. She was so nervous, she hardly smiled.</p>
<p>She carried with her all the months spent in the hospital or holed up in her parents’ Chicago bungalow, an intravenous line hooked into her arm as she tried to do her college work.</p>
<p>Now this 26-year-old woman with multiple sclerosis was about to take a careful but determined walk across a stage to receive her diploma…</p>
<p>In another era, or even at another university, the illness that afflicts Reyes might have prevented her from taking this walk across the stage. Faced with the rigors of college, chronically ill students often end up having to take incompletes when they get sick, forfeit tuition and drop out. Others never even enroll.</p>
<p>But DePaul University has responded to the needs of Reyes and others like her with a program designed to help these students the only one of its kind, according to school officials.</p>
<p>Through DePaul’s School for New Learning, these students can take courses in the classroom or online. They also can take time off, even abruptly, when the symptoms of their illnesses hit, and finish coursework later with no penalty or tuition loss…"
[School</a> gives chronically ill students a chance - More health news- msnbc.com](<a href=“http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32863895/ns/health-more_health_news/]School”>http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32863895/ns/health-more_health_news/)</p>