Managing the Growth of Community Schools

Abstract

Essential to a community school’s success is a committed partnership among the school and school district, community organizations, and parents—a partnership that makes students’ academic success a shared responsibility and a shared goal. These partners come together to provide three key sets of supports and opportunities: (1) a strong, coherent core instructional program during the regular school day; (2) supports and services that address and seek to remove barriers to learning; and (3) enrichment opportunities during nonschool hours that build students’ motivation and capacity to succeed in school. Table 11.1 illustrates this concept through a graphic representation of supports and opportunities offered by New York community schools. After the early success of the work at Intermediate School (IS) 218 and Primary School (PS) 5 in Washington Heights, The Children’s Aid Society (CAS) received scores of requests from principals around New York City who wanted their schools to become CAS community schools. Deciding how to respond to these requests became a major issue for CAS, because our intention from the beginning was to enter into a long-term partnership with each school—which meant that the agency was committing itself to sustaining each partnership for multiple years, if not forever. The financial implications of each decision were clear: we needed to build slowly and carefully, with a view toward long-term sustainability. In our strategic plans and discussions with CAS trustees and funders, managing the growth of community schools was an explicit goal. Furthermore, we recognized that implementation of the CAS community school model must focus on adaptation, not replication. This meant that, as we added schools (at the rate of roughly one per year), we would conduct a local needs and resource assessment and make a plan that was responsive to the unique assets and needs of each school and its surrounding community. From March 1992 through June 2003, CAS worked in close partnership with the New York City public schools to develop ten community schools—five in the Washington Heights neighborhood of northern Manhattan, two in East Harlem (also in Manhattan), and three in the South Bronx.