Community Schools: a Promising Model for the New Administration to Promote

Geoffrey Canada founder of HCZ

The incoming Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona is an advocate of wrap around programs and full-service community schools.  As promised, this blog will take a deeper dive into full-service community schools. 

The current USDOE discretionary grants program for Full-Service Community Schools may see expansion during the Biden Administration.  These schools provide comprehensive academic, social, and health services for students, students’ family members, and community members that will result in improved educational outcomes for children.

The idea of full-service community schools is not new.  In the early 20th century, education reformers like John Dewey and institutions like the Hull House in Chicago were dedicated to providing holistic support and wraparound social services to families through the education system.  Schools became civic spaces, recreation centers and primary units of social capital at the neighborhood level.  The model proved to be very effective, but political and business interests ended up nixing the idea before it the approach grew. 

In the age of school choice, the "new-old" approach of neighborhood schools are making a comeback.  Tacking on the full-service community model is a natural extension.  There are currently over 8,000 public schools in the U.S. that have adopted this model.  Research from the Rand Corporation found how successful community schools can be as more and more open. Not only can they improve student educational outcomes, but community schools can also reduce racial and economic achievement gaps.

The services provided by these schools have been especially important during the pandemic.  Community schools in Cincinnati have migrated support online, including teletherapy, telemedicine, legal services, and early childhood education.  Perhaps the most famous model using this approach is the Harlem Children's Zone.  They have had success in virtually eliminating the white-black achievement gap using the holistic approach to open pathways for upward mobility for poor children. 

The Full Service Community School model is part of an emerging field of practice centered on "place" (where a child grows up) and championing the use of comprehensive "cradle to career" services to effectively combat poverty.  This is perhaps the best model that exists to deal with the achievement gaps that plague P-12 education. 

Kids don't live in schools, they live in communities.  The best school reform is community reform.  Healthy communities and healthy neighborhoods almost never have bad schools.  Researchers such as Raj Chetty at Harvard have made it clear that the neighborhood where a child grows up is perhaps the chief determinant of that child's social and economic future.  While the quality of the school the child attends is important, the neighborhood social capital, family stability and the level of poverty in the surrounding neighborhood are most important. 

I join others in the education policy space in calling on the new secretary to make this model a significant goal of the USDOE during the Biden Administration.