NEA Research Brief: "Full-service Community Schools". "It takes a village," but, in most schools,

[ProgressiveEconomist]

in most schools, educators are left to themselves to deal with community barriers to effective schooling such as poor student health, student homelessness or near-homelessness, severe student behavioral problems, poverty issues such as lack of suitable clothing and grooming, etc.

In all the DU threads I've seen on education reform, I've never before seen an issue that has more promise for "Stop! You're both right!" coming-together.

This issue led to a dramatic recent DU thread exchange (see http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=9529942&mesg_id=9531626 and use "View All" to read the rest of the exchange).

IMO, there are things educators can and should do, and there are things that educators need a great deal of outside help getting done for students. The 5-page NEA research brief from which this snppet comes shows educators successful approaches for dealing with non-educator issues that hamper effective schooling.

WHAT'S YOUR OPINION?

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From http://www.educationvotes.nea.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/WholeChildResearchBrief.pdf :

"COMMUNITY SCHOOLS: A STRATEGY, NOT A PROGRAM
Jane Quinn, The Children's Aid Society
Research Brief--Spring 2009, volume 2

What Are Full-Service Community Schools?

School systems throughout the country are experiencing dramatic challenges. Achievement gaps are widespread, the true dropout rates are shocking, and the behavior problems of many children are enough to drive any teacher out of the classroom. The basic premise underlying community schools is that schools, by themselves, cannot address all the needs of today's students. All across the country, teachers and school administrators observe that they cannot do it alone. Partners are required to help provide the services, opportunities, and supports needed by students and their families. ...

Full-service community schools are public schools that--
-- are open most of the time (before and after school, evenings, vacations, summers);
-- operate jointly through a partnership between the school and a lead community agency or agencies;
-- provide access to health, dental, and mental health services on site through the lead agency or other service providers;

-- include space for a primary health clinic and family resource center;
-- provide opportunities for parents to be involved in the school;
-- integrate school curriculum with after-school and summer enrichment programs;

-- offer social and educational services for families and community members; and
-- build social capital within the neighborhood. ...

The community schools strategy rests on a strong theoretical base of multi-disciplinary research, which includes the following strands:

-- A very solid body of research demonstrates that children do better in school if they have access at very early ages to health and mental health services and family supports as well as to school readiness interventions. ...

-- Parents need help not only with parenting skills but also with many other aspects of their lives. Strong PARENT CENTERS IN SCHOOLS can assist families with many of the obstacles that stand in their way--for example, learning English (ESL), employment, housing, and immigration. When parents are involved in their children's school experience, everyone benefits.

-- The non-school hours represent a time of great risk as well as great opportunity to promote young people's learning and health development. ...

-- Another underlying strand of research has to do with building social capital. Drawing on the work of John McKnight, Jody Kretzmann, Robert Putnam, and others, community schools--which are often located in very disadvantaged neighborhoods--seek to build community assets through social networking and joint problem solving. ...

[ProgressiveEconomist]

1. Kick!

[ProgressiveEconomist]

7. Kick!

[ProgressiveEconomist]

15. Kick!

[ProgressiveEconomist]

16. Kick!

[ProgressiveEconomist]

19. Kick!

[Kip Humphrey]

2. absolutely! I would add only one addition: keep class sizes down to 15 students.

I was fortunate to attend mostly private schools growing up. The main difference in my experiences between public & private even during the Sixties was class size. At that time, public schools carried an average class size of 25 to 30 students each while the private schools averaged 15 students. I assert from my own experience that a teacher, even a great teacher, cannot provide sufficient individual attention to each student under public classroom sizes either then or now when the average public classroom harbors 30+ students. No one seems to address this but, IMO, CLASS SIZE IS THE ONE MOST IMPORTANT FACTOR IN ACHIEVING QUALITY RESULTS IN ANY SCHOOL.

[ProgressiveEconomist]

6. 'Class size is the one most important factor'. Definitely! Especially in grades K-3

Bill Clinton had a goal of class sizes of 18 for K-3 and spent a fair amount of money to achieve it in some states.... See http://www2.ed.gov/offices/OESE/ClassSize/class.pdf .

Unlike many educational reforms, redicing class size has substantial first-rate scientific evidence to support it--the Tennessee STAR experiment.

[donco6]

3. We applied for a Promise Neighborhoods grant to do this.

We came in 47 of 450 apps. So we'll try again.

It's difficult to get all the agencies together to provide the services. They all have their own rules/regs and policies that you have to try to coordinate. You have to have someone to DO the coordinating, and that's expensive. You have to have space available, and that's not always easy either. But with some seed money to start it up, we could make it work.

[ProgressiveEconomist]

5. "We'll try again". Definitely! Do you know the website foundationcenter.org?

IMO your competitive problem may have been in the budgeting section of your proposal--that's what really trips up newcomers to fundraising.

http://fconline.foundationcenter.org/ costs some money to try for a month, but can be well worth the investment.

A better strategy to get started with them: have any of your people attended any Foundationcenter seminars? They can help find all potential funders and help tailor rewrites of your proposal / budget to each funder: They even may give you $100 scholarships for half the cost.

[donco6]

10. I'll check it out, thanks.

We had grantwriting help from our partner, Mile High United Way. So, though we may be newbies, they sure weren't. They were a huge help and we've reviewed the comments. There was one section where we lost one point from each reviewer and that was enough to sink us! Grr.

[uncommon]

4. Schools like this would make all the difference in my community -

we have a very high rate of poverty (90% of my daughter's elementary school is low income) and the ability to be at school instead of out running wild or being home alone and the ability to get medical treatment when you are sick... these are things a lot of these kids don't get on a regular basis.

[ProgressiveEconomist]

8. I like the way these initiatives can transform schools from outposts of outsiders into

into true community resources where everyone goes for help.

In some "full-service community schools", in-building lavish Parent Centers have

--computers, job databases, printers, and fax machines to help jobseekers;
--exercise classes for stressed-out Moms;
--English classes for parents, taught by elementary-school teachers; and

--Spanish classes for Anglo teachers, taught by parents.

Not your ordinary inner-city school by any means.

[LWolf]

9. I'm seeing small steps in this direction.

I think that the value in community schools is recognized, but that the infrastructure, especially the $$$$$$$$$, is not there. In my state and district, we have a FAN coordinator who works with community agencies to supply students with school supplies, coats, shoes, glasses, dental care, health care, sometimes food and childcare, for those who qualify. I'd like to see these things expanded to ALL (supplies, coats, and shoes ARE offered to all who ask or show need.)

My district has a few schools, including mine, who have gotten grants for before and after-school programming. It's limited programming for a few reasons:

1. Overall budgetary limitations.

2. Requirements about what kinds of programming can be offered when and to whom; for example, the first block after school MUST be tutoring offered to students who need to improve test scores.

3. Availability of people to run those programs; every academic support has to be run by a licensed teacher. With the already long days and many extra duties, not enough teachers want to add more hours to their work day to run those programs for the hourly wage that equals a tiny fraction of their normal wage.

Still, it's a step in the right direction. I run 2 hours of after school programming at my school 3 days a week. After our pilot year in '09/10, we're supposed to be looking at expanding our offerings to adults as well. It's all a matter of being able to find people who have the time and desire to do so. Before and after school programming is an extra duty, not a primary job. I think we'd get a lot more buy-in and be able to offer a lot more if we expanded school hours, gave teachers (and students, maybe,) more flexible work schedules, and were able to include before, after, and weekend hours within a regular work period.

I would LOVE to see a full-time parent center in schools, open evenings and weekends when parents can participate or get help without losing time at work.

[ProgressiveEconomist]

13. Thanks for sharing all of that. Sounds as though you and donco6 have a lot in common--

see posts #3, #5, and #10 above.

Doues your district have full-time grantwriters who will help individual schools seek outside funds, especially planning grants and seed money?

[LWolf]

17. Donco and I DO have a lot in common, even though

we work in different branches of the profession and we're several large states apart. We both care about the students we serve, we both have great ideas about how to serve them, we both work hard to serve them, and we're both proud of our efforts. You'll find that in every school and district across the nation. Structure, format, geography, demographics, policies, and funding might be different, but teachers, regardless of the wide variety of skills and experiences, want their students to do well, and strive to do the things they believe will help those students achieve success within the limits placed upon them by time, space, resources, and mandated systemic structures.

My district is small. We don't have full time professional grant writers. As a matter of fact, our superintendent cut district office staff pretty drastically last year, knowing he was going to have to ask us to take a 4th pay cut in 18 months to meet budget shortfalls from the state. Grant writing and reform efforts are taken on as extra duties by district staff. As a matter of fact, I spent 5 hours TODAY, on a national holiday, in a work group working on one facet of our reform efforts.

[lightningandsnow]

11. Full-service community schools were a big issue in our recent local election.

I plan to run for school trustee in the next one (2014), and I will definitely be making it an issue again.

[ProgressiveEconomist]

14. "I plan to run for school trustee" Fantastic! What's your platform going to be?

[WinkyDink]

12. Can we perhaps look to European schools as models? Those students seem to learn quite well.

[LWolf]

18. Like Finland.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x9246683