Looking Ahead to 2016: An Interview with Jennifer Peck, ED of the Partnership for Children and Youth

By Sam Piha

Sam Piha

The Partnership for Children and Youth (PCY) has provided important leadership in California and across the country to support the growth of the expanded learning movement. 

As we begin the new year, we asked Jennifer Peck, Executive Director of PCY, to help us look ahead. 

Jennifer Pec

Q: In looking ahead to 2016, what do you see as the important emerging trends in expanded learning programs?

A: 2016 is going to be a year of even greater opportunity for the expanded learning field in California, given continuing implementation of education, finance, and accountability reform, and the great strides the expanded learning field has made in two critical and related areas:  Prioritizing the importance of program quality; and demonstrating to our K-12 partners the real value of our programs in educating young people for successful futures.  

We have new Quality Standards in California which everyone will play a role in implementing from the state to the site level.  We are also implementing a new law which places much greater focus on quality improvement, and there are systems of support all around the state that are responding to the need for training and support for programs in the interest of meeting the Quality Standards.  These are critical steps because we know quality matters to student outcomes, and these tools and policy advances support the work of practitioners in this field who are deeply committed to improving the lives of young people.  

The focus on quality also helps us demonstrate to our school day partners in the K-12 world that expanded learning programs are a necessary and critical component to the task of providing equitable and effective educational opportunities to all young people.  With our ability to demonstrate quality and impact, we are better able to firmly assert that without high quality expanded learning opportunities, the education system will never meet its goals of all students achieving success in school, higher education, and career.  

In 2016, we will capitalize on the great strides we have made in building relationships with our partners in the K-12 world such as school administrators, school board members, teachers and other leaders at the state and local levels by demonstrating how our programs keep students engaged, support Common Core skills, support Social and Emotional Learning skills, and much more.


Q: Looking ahead to 2016, what do you see as the most significant challenge facing the field of expanded learning?  

A: Our biggest challenge by far is grappling with the financing crisis our state funded programs are facing.  The state set a daily per child, per day rate of $7.50 back in 2006, and despite enormous cost of living increases and more recent increases in the state minimum wage, that daily rate remains stagnant and programs are suffering.  While program providers do everything they can to stay afloat and maintain services for students, they can only stretch so far.  
In 2015, many programs reported the need to eliminate some professional development, eliminate some enrichment services, and eliminate full time site coordinators.  In 2016, we may begin to see some programs have to shut their doors.   

In response, last winter our advocacy community came together and rapidly put together a bill and a budget request for our state legislature which was very successful – the legislature recommended a $25 million increase to ASES. However, the Governor was not convinced this was a priority and did not include this in his final budget.  

We are now gearing up for an even bigger effort in 2016 to secure additional resources for ASES so our programs can survive and thrive into the future. This Campaign to preserve California’s investment and leadership in expanded learning needs to be a priority for everyone who cares about this work – see the Campaign’s brand new website to learn how to get involved at www.saveafterschool.com. 
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Jennifer Peck was a founding staff member of the Partnership in 2001 and became its Executive Director in 2003.  Through her leadership, the Partnership has developed and implemented initiatives to finance and build after-school and summer-learning programs, and increase access to school meals and nutrition education programs in the Bay Area’s lowest-income communities. Jennifer leads a coalition of California organizations advocating for new federal policies to improve the effectiveness of after-school and summer-learning programs. To learn more about the Partnership and sign up for their e-newsletter, visit their website.

Afterschool Leaders Look to 2016

By Sam Piha

Sam Piha

We asked a number of afterschool leaders two questions:

• In looking ahead to 2016, what do you see as the important emerging trends in expanded learning programs?

• Looking ahead to 2016, what do you see as the most significant challenge facing the field of expanded learning?  

Below are their responses to our questions. 

EMERGING TRENDS IN EXPANDED LEARNING PROGRAMS

Lucy Friedman,
President of ExpandED Schools

Lucy Friedman: We see two important trends emerging in expanded learning time programs. One is striving for increased collaboration between teachers and after-school educators so that expanded learning time builds on lessons learned in core subjects and students can approach subjects from multiple learning modalities. The other trend is an increased focus on social-emotional learning. Community organizations and after-school educators have long been focused on these youth development principles. We are pleased that school leaders and education change-makers are also now giving greater attention to it. 

Alison Overseth,
Executive Director,
Partnership for After School
Education

Alison Overseth: 
Quality, quality, quality.  We cannot take our eye off the investment it takes to do this work well...and if we are not doing the work at a high quality level we will not achieve desired outcomes and will not be providing the opportunities all children deserve.

Increasingly sophisticated content areas (STEM, Global Learning, e.g.) require inquiry-based learning...more focus on how to prepare the adults in children's lives to do this well.

It's past time to break down the unnatural silos of cognitive and noncognitive learning.  Schools need to learn from youth developers and youth developers from schools -- optimally we will see increasing investment in joint professional development and professional exchanges.

Jodi Grant,
Executive Director
Afterschool Alliance

Jodi Grant: I think STEM and Physical Activity will continue to be important. I am also hopeful that there will be a growing focus on social and emotional learning/skills and professional development. I think giving the valuable youth and child development principles more importance in valuing and evaluating programs.

Jane Quinn,
Vice President,
Children's Aid Society

Jane Quinn: Important emerging trends:  More receptivity on the part of schools to social and emotional learning as a valid (and desired) goal of Expanded Learning Program; continued emphasis on, and funding for, STEM programs; increased emphasis on college prep and retention.

Bill Fennessy,
Director of Community
Engagement,
THINK Together

Bill Fennessy:  Career and Work Based Learning programs. It is important that we have different versions for Elementary School, Middle School, and High School.










MOST SIGNIFICANT CHALLENGE FACING THE FIELD OF EXPANDED LEARNING 

Lucy Friedman: One challenge facing the field of expanded learning is ensuring that people outside the field understand what is meant by the term. ‘After school’ was easily defined (though, often misperceived as simply child care.) But ‘expanded learning’ is not as ubiquitously understood. Practitioners of expanded learning time may have variations in their definition based on differences in models.

The challenge facing both the after-school and expanded learning movement is that too many educators, funders and policy makers seek a quick fix and judge the quality of a model by standardized test scores alone. But the reality is that success can come in many forms. In the desire to close the achievement gap, there's too much emphasis on test prep and not enough focus on the life-enriching activities that foster curiosity, instill confidence, and ultimately lead to a passion for learning. Research, and anyone who’s ever watched a kid grow up, tells us that these characteristics are critically important for a successful adulthood.

Alison Overseth: There is currently often a disconnect between broad policy initiatives and implementation into good practice. Practice needs to better inform policy, and policy must include the investment required to change, strengthen and sustain new or expanded programs. The best ideas in the world will work or fail based on an adult's (or community's) interaction with a child.

Jodi Grant: Funding is a constant issue. At best it is stagnant in most places, but budget cuts are rampant and costs continue to rise for programs – especially labor costs. We also need to keep educating.

Jane Quinn: Serious funding concerns, especially at the Federal level— how will the ESEA reauthorization impact the intent of the afterschool movement and the 21st Century CLC funding? 

Bill Fennessy: The rising cost of everything with 10 year old funding levels. More specifically, how will we address the rising cost of labor, given the changes in the minimum wage?