Community Schools, Community Learning Center, Community Education Connection: Concepts to Practices for Your Programs

1
Community Schools, Community Learning Center,
Community Education Connection Concepts to
Practices for Your Programs

Presented by Dan Kuzlik,
Katy Kramer Julie
Kosher
2
What is aCommunity School?
3
Community School.
Individual community schools may offer different
program elements or teaching styles, but the
basic philosophy of the community school model is
simple Educational excellence, combined with
needed human services, delivered through school,
parent and community partnerships.
Building a Community School
4
Community Schools

• In a community school, youth, families and
  community residents work as equal partners with
  schools and other community institutions to
  develop programs and services in five areas
• Quality education Youth development
• Family support
• Family and community engagement
• Community Development

5
Key Ingredients of a Community School

• Education First
• Collaboration
• Partners not tenants
• A long term commitment
• Integrated Services

• High Level of Parent and Community Involvement
• Extended School Day
• A Focus on Community Strengths

• Starting Fresh.not a band-aid for a program
  thats broken and needs fixing

x
6
Community School

• The array of specific services that individual
  community schools offer varies extensively by
  site. An analysis by the Coalition shows activity
  in the following areas. Too many schools have
  services in these various areas but
• no plan for how to integrate those
• services to achieve specific results.
• A coherent plan is essential for
• a successful community school.

7
Comparing The Differences
Time

• Traditional School
• 5 Days per week
• 6-8 hours per day
• 180 days per year
• 50 minute classes
• Very limited after school programs if any at all.

• Community Schools
• 7 Days per week
• 10-12 hours per day
• 220 days per year
• Extended blocks of time
• Extensive after school program

8
Comparing The Differences
Space

• Community School
• Education takes place throughout the community.
• Facilities are used for a wide range of community
  activities.

• Traditional School
• Education takes place inside the four walls of
  the classroom.
• Limited community access to facilities.

9
Comparing The Differences
Family and Community Involvement

• Traditional School
• Involvement limited to parent participation in
  activities such as open houses and parent
  conferences.

• Community School
• A comprehensive process of family and community
  involvement in a wide range of programs and
  activities.
• Partners in Education

10
Developing Community

• No child can escape his community. He may not
  like his parents, or the neighbors, or the ways
  of the world. . .The life of the community flows
  about him, foul or pure he swims in it, drinks
  it, goes to sleep in it, and wakes to the new day
  to find it still about him. He belongs to it it
  nourishes him, or starves him, or poisons him it
  gives him the substance of his life. And in the
  long run, it takes its toll of him and all he is.
• Joseph K. Hart, 1913

11
Community Education is the vehicle to create a
Community School!

Community Education
12

• Community Education advocates and supports
  the creation of innovative programs and
  collaboration between all members of communities
  for the purposes of advancing community learning
  and sustainability.

13
Community Education

• DPI Recognized
• Supported by State Association--Wisconsin
  Community Education Association
• Model used by 70 districts around the state.
• Supported by National Community Education
  Association

14
Wisconsin Model of Community Education
Wisconsin Model of Community Education
Principles of Community Education

• Leadership Development
• Institutional Responsiveness
• Integrated Delivery of Services
• Decentralization

• Lifelong Learning
• Community Involvement
• Efficient Use of Resources
• Self-Determination
• Self-Help

15
Life-long Learning

• Implementing the principle that learning
  continues throughout life.
• Providing formal and informal learning
  opportunities.
• Offering programs and services for all
  community members, often in an intergenerational
  setting.

16
Community Involvement

• Promoting a sense of civic responsibility.
• Providing leadership opportunities for community
  members.
• Including diverse populations in all aspects of
  community life.
• Encouraging democratic procedures in local
  decision making.

17
Efficient Use of Resources

• Using the community's physical, financial, and
  human resources to address the community's needs.
• Reducing duplication of services by promoting
  collaborative effort.

18
Self-Determination

• Local people have a right and a responsibility to
  be involved in determining community needs and
  identifying community resources that can be used
  to address those needs.

Self-Help

• People are best served when their capacity to
  help themselves is acknowledged and developed.
  When people assume responsibility for their own
  well-being, they build independence and become
  part of the solution.

19
Institutional Responsiveness
Leadership Development

• The training of local leaders in such skills as
  problem solving, decision making, and group
  process is an essential component of successful
  self-help and improvement efforts.

• Public institutions exist to serve the public and
  are obligated to develop programs and services
  that address continuously changing public needs
  and interests.

20
Integrated Delivery of Services

• Organizations and agencies that operate for the
  public good can meet their own goals and better
  serve the public by collaborating with
  organizations and agencies with similar goals.

Decentralization

• Services, programs, and other community
  involvement opportunities that are closest to
  people's homes have the greatest potential for
  high levels of public participation. Whenever
  possible, these activities should be available in
  locations with easy public access.

21
Research Shows

• In Community Schools. . .
• Schools have greater community support.
• Parents and other community members trust
  schools, school boards and superintendents.
• Communities support referenda.
• Community members are more informed about their
  schools.

22
The Research Study
Measurable Impacts of Community Education on
K-12 By Bill Morris, Decision Resources, Ltd.
23
Community Education program users rate the
quality of education provided by their school
district higher than non-users.
24
Community Education program users have more
favorable impressions of both the Superintendent
/ Administration and School Board than non-users.
In the case of the School Districts
Superintendent and Administration, Community
Education program users post an average increase
of 9 in the favorable rating. For School
Boards, the average increase is 8.
25
Community Education program users are more
positive than non-users about their School
Districts financial management.
The fiscal credibility of a School District
receives a boost of 15 among Community
Education program users when compared with
program non-users.
26
Community Education program users are stronger
supporters of referendum proposals.
Community Education program users are 14 more
supportive of referendum proposals than
non-users. These gains are also realized among
all age groups and household types. More
striking, though, Community Education program
users are three times more likely to be
strongly supportive of referendum efforts. In
fact, among seniors over the age of 65, a solid
majority of program users support referenda
among non-users, seniors oppose referenda by a
two-to-one majority. Community Education program
users are stronger supporters of referendum
proposals.
27
Community Education program users are better
informed about their School District than
non-users.
By an almost 20 margin, Community Education
program participants feel well informed about
their School District.
28
How could Community Education be funded?
29
Fund 80
30
Fund 80 Statutory Authority
Statutory Authority 120.13(19) Community
Programs and Services - "A school board may
establish and maintain community education,
training, recreational, cultural or athletic
programs and services, outside the regular
curricular and extracurricular programs
for pupils, under such terms and conditions as
the school board prescribes. The school board
may establish and collect fees to cover all or
part of the costs of such programs and services.
Costs associated with such programs and services
shall not be included in the school district's
shared cost under 121.07(6)."
31
Potential Uses for Fund 80
This fund is used to account for activities such
as adult education, community recreation programs
such as evening swimming pool operation and
softball leagues, elderly food service programs,
non-special education preschool, day care
services, and other programs which are not
elementary and secondary educational programs but
have the primary function of serving the
community. Expenditures for these activities,
including cost allocations for salaries,
benefits, travel, purchased services, etc., are
to be included in this Fund to the
extent feasible. The district may adopt a
separate tax levy for this Fund.
32
The definition of Community Education is
uniquely dependent upon where the program and/or
process is based.
33
WHAT COLUMBUS COMMUNITY LEARNING CENTER OFFERS

• Youth Services--tutoring, after school
  services-homework help, lab and IMC open.
• Youth Outreach and Enrichment--Early Release day
  activities, Art and Chess Club, Arts Night, Tae
  Kwon Do

34
WHAT WE OFFER cont.d

• Adult/Community Learning Opportunities-- Adult
  Enrichment classes-art, computers, knitting,
  yoga, Spanish, I-Safe, CPI
• Family Activities and Outreach--Early Learning
  Celebration, Parenting Education, C-Fin webpage
  and lending library, Playgroup

35
Cornell/Lake Holcombe 21st Century CLC
36
Cornell/Lake Holcombe 21st Century CLC
SFP
FIRST
21st
Community Education
Century
CLC
37
Schools as an Island
Many schools are like islands, set apart from the
mainland of life by a deep moat of convention and
tradition. A drawbridge is lowered at certain
points of the day in order that the part-time
inhabitants may cross over to the island in the
morning and back to the mainland at night. Why
do these young people go out to the islands? To
learn how to live on the mainland. When they
reach the island they are provided with excellent
books that tell about life on the mainland.
38
Schools as an Island - continued
Once in a while as a special treat, a bus takes a
few of the young people off the island during the
day to look at what happens on the
mainland. When everyone on the island has left
in the afternoon, the drawbridge is raised.
Janitors clean up the island and the lights go
out. No one is left except perhaps a watchman
keeping a vigil along the shoreland.
The island is lifeless.
39
Schools as an Island - continued
Once a year people from the mainland visit the
island to watch graduation, after which some
islanders depart never to set foot on the island
again. After graduates leave the island for the
last time, they are bombarded by problems of life
on the mainland. Occasionally one of them can be
heard to say to another I remember reading
something about that when we were on the island.
Linking Schools With Life - William Carr -
USA - 1942
40
Thank You
Dan, Katy and Julie