Ed Center
February 18, 2014

Ed Center

Ed Middle

We've known for some time that children from depression-income families are less likely to succeed in school relative to their college-income peers. Many solutions to accost this achievement gap have been explored, such as greater funding, more accountability for teachers or a longer school day. Yet every bit of 2012, 70 percent of the students who did not graduate from loftier schoolhouse were living in poverty. Without a high school diploma, those students' take a chance at future success is small.

Then, is our public education system incapable of serving our low-income kids? No, but nosotros must rethink the relationship between education and poverty.

The Local Control Funding Formula is a footstep in the right direction, aiming to amend bookish outcomes by providing greater funding to schools with high-needs students. It'south also intended to give local school districts more control over the manner they distribute their education dollars.

But as Professor Sean F. Reardon of Stanford University's Graduate School of Education suggests, we need to take this work one step further. While flexibility of funding is critical, what nosotros do with those funds is fifty-fifty more so. Investment in top-notch educators is essential when serving our highest-need students, merely we must as well invest in solutions that address the complex challenges that our low-income students bring to school.

Enter community schools, which are revolutionizing the way we solve educational and poverty-related challenges. Customs schools bring fragmented services constitute in the community – such every bit food aid, health clinics and after-school programs – onto school campuses, integrating them into the core educational strategy. The challenges that students bring with them each day – hunger, homelessness, health issues, a parent in jail – are addressed by professionals offering specialized customs-based services. That fashion children can focus on school, rather than an empty tum or a nagging toothache, and teachers can focus on educational activity, instead of serving as a caseworker for their students.

Today, community schools can be establish beyond the country, and while at that place is no specific formula or prepare of requirements, they are all founded on the agreement that poverty creates barriers to learning that schools cannot ignore if all students are to have the aforementioned chance at success. The services provided past community schools vary depending on the needs and assets of the specific community. Many community schools have at least one health program (such equally dental care), i later-school program and one parent appointment program (such as ESL courses). The ideal community school has a lead nonprofit bureau with a community liaison who makes it piece of cake for families to access all of the needed services that are bachelor.

Over the concluding decade, the community schools model has been gaining traction in low-income communities, especially equally more and more data revealing their powerful bear upon emerges. For example, xiii years after the launch of Cincinnati'due south Community Learning Centers, citywide loftier school graduation rates have skyrocketed from 51% to 80% and the achievement gap between white and African American students has shrunk from 14.v% to 4%.

And superintendents looking for examples of success don't take to look far. In the Bay Area lonely we count 63 thriving customs schools, each incorporating its ain unique blend of services required for its students and families. At Hillcrest Unproblematic School in San Francisco, a local customs school, California Standardized Test scores rose beyond all grades from 2010-2013, jumping from 31% to 45% proficiency in English, 37% to 53% proficiency in math and 22% to 44% proficiency in science.

The Bay Surface area is rich in expertise in the community schools space, equally well as funders looking to support this innovative work. As principals, superintendents and district administrators determine how to allocate their Local Command Funding Formula dollars in the coming months, I encourage them to consider investing in the community schools agenda. Through this piece of work, nosotros're able to navigate the complex needs of our low-income students by providing services similar after-school programs, mental wellness services, nutrient banks and more.

Depression-income children will only get a off-white adventure at success if the connection between education and poverty is fully grasped and used every bit a launching indicate for modify. By simultaneously confronting these issues, community schools create opportunities for students to pause free from the bike of poverty and create a improve life, for themselves and for generations to come.

•••

Ed Heart is Vice President of Education at United Manner of the Bay Area and co-author of the report Leveling the Playing Field: Community Schools Confront Poverty to Improve Pupil Success.

To go more reports like this one, click here to sign upwards for EdSource's no-cost daily email on latest developments in education.