A webinar hosted by the Learning Policy Institute (LPI), “Community Schools as a Locally-Driven Strategy for Student Success,” detailed the investments states are making in the model and how strategies are paying off.
“Community schools have been around for many, many years … and there are different designs and approaches that you’ll see across the country,” said LPI President and CEO Elena Silva at the event held late last year. “The common denominator of effective community schools is their intentional focus on bringing students and families and educators and community organizations together to improve student learning and well-being.”
There is growing evidence of the positive impact of community schools, including research from LPI’s September report Community Schools Impact on Student Outcomes: Evidence From California, summarized in this CSBA blog post.
LPI Senior Policy Advisor and Researcher Anna Maier explained that key practices related to the evidence-based school transformation strategy are providing expanded and enriched learning opportunities; rigorous community-connected classroom instruction; a culture of belonging, safety and care; integrated systems of support; powerful student and family engagement; and collaborative leadership and shared power and voice. Programs are tailored to fit local needs.
Benefits that have been associated with community schools are increased attendance, academic achievement and graduation rates, better peer-adult relationships and attitudes about school and reduced racial and economic achievement gaps. “There’s a handful of studies that pointed to a cost-benefit ratio between $5 up to $15 for every dollar invested in this approach,” Maier added.
Maier shared examples of investments in community schools happening around the U.S., such as in Maryland and New York where the programming has been factored into their state funding formulas.
“Maryland has created an entitlement grant program for high-poverty schools to become community schools and the current threshold they have is that 55 percent or more of the students at the school come from low-income households in order to qualify. They provide a lump sum per site for staffing and then they have a formula they use to calculate an additional per student funding allocation to support community school services,” Maier said. “New York has created a set aside in its school funding formula for high need districts that want to use community schools as an improvement strategy. And they also provide technical assistance by funding regional [technical assistance] centers in the state.”
In California, Illinois, New Mexico and Vermont, competitive grants are offered and in Florida, Kentucky, Idaho and North Carolina, investments in capacity building are taking place.
California community schools
Results in California have included improved attendance and math and English language arts test scores in addition to reduced rates of chronic absence and suspension and reduced achievement gaps for Black, Hispanic and socioeconomically disadvantaged students and English learners.
During a panel discussion, Chief Deputy Superintendent of Public Instruction Ingrid Roberson of the California Department of Education (CDE) gave an overview of the state’s community schools initiative thus far.
In 2021, the Legislature passed the California Community Schools Partnership Act, and expanded programming in 2022 to provide more funding through 2031. Planning and implementation grants have been available to local educational agencies and, according to the CDE’s website, extension grants will be available beginning in 2026–27.
“You really do want to avoid this being a top-down approach,” Roberson said. “I think having the applications be at the district-level was really important rather than at the school-level, this allowed for districts to really best leverage community schools to assess the varying site needs, strengths that are needed to transform into a community school.”
Roberson noted that the state has a vertically aligned support system from CDE to a state technical assistance center, eight regional technical assistance centers and county offices of education eligible for technical assistance grants to support districts.
Primary programmatic features that California community schools often exhibit are integrated support services; family and community engagement; collaborative leadership and practices for educators and administrators; and extended learning time and opportunities.
Twenty-five percent of schools in the state are currently community schools, Roberson said. “I would have to say overall, not only are we seeing those academic outcomes, it has been incredible to see how these schools are able to rise to emergencies that occur such as the fires,” she added.
Roberson said that funding alignment with other agencies like the departments of social services, health and human services, and public health has also been important.
Watch the webinar here to learn more.
