Summer learning programs have the potential to help children and youth improve their academic and other outcomes. This is especially true for children from low-income families who might not have access to educational resources throughout the summer months and for low-achieving students who need additional time to master academic content. However, summer learning programs are often an afterthought of school districts or not offered at all, especially in restrictive funding environments. To focus attention on the potential of such programs, this monograph reviews the literature on summer learning loss and the effectiveness of summer learning programs, determines key cost drivers of and available funds for summer programs, and gathers information about how such programs operate in district and city contexts, including facilitators and challenges. The findings should be of interest to policymakers and practitioners involved in improving the performance of and expanding opportunities for low-income and lowachieving students, including school district and city leaders, the National Summer Learning Association, the Council of the Great City Schools, the U.S. Department of Education, funders of summer learning programs, state departments of education, state legislators, and the education research community. This research was conducted by RAND Education, a unit of the RAND Corporation, and sponsored by The Wallace Foundation, which seeks to support and share effective ideas and practices to improve learning and enrichment opportunities for children. Its current objectives are to improve the quality of schools, primarily by developing and placing effective principals in high-need schools; improve the quality of and access to out-of-school-time programs through coordinated city systems and by strengthening the financial management skills of providers; integrate in-and out-ofschool learning by supporting efforts to reimagine and expand learning time during the traditional school day and year as well as during the summer months, helping to expand access to arts learning, and using technology as a tool for teaching and promoting creativity and imagination. For more information about research on these and other related topics, please visit The Wallace Foundation Knowledge Center at www.
Data collected during an evaluation of a multi-site trial of an enhanced after-school program were used to relate quality of program implementation to student experiences after school. The enhanced after-school program incorporated a drug use and violence prevention component that was shown to be effective in previous research. Building on Durlak and Dupre's (Am J Community Psychol 41:327-350, 2008) dimensions of implementation, we assessed the level of dosage, quality of management and climate, participant responsiveness, and staffing quality achieved at the five program sites. We evaluated how these characteristics co-varied with self-reported positive experiences after-school. The study illustrates how multiple dimensions of program implementation can be measured, and shows that some but not all dimensions of implementation are related to the quality of student after-school experiences. Measures of quality of management and climate, participant responsiveness, and staffing stability were most clearly associated with youth experiences. The importance of measuring multiple dimensions of program implementation in intervention research is discussed.
Research Summary: Using multi‐level modeling techniques, this study explores characteristics of 35 after‐school programs (ASPs) that criminological research and theory predict should be related to problem behavior outcomes. Controlling for individual‐level predictors of problem behavior and for the composition of the participating ASPs, several ASP characteristics were found to be related, as predicted, to victimization, substance use, and delinquent behavior. Policy Implications: This study extended previous findings that providing structured programming and small program size are important for reducing problem behavior through ASPs. Our study also found that two characteristics of the program staff are related to reductions in problem behavior: More highly educated staff and a higher percentage male staff were related to reductions in levels of both delinquent behavior and victimization. The study concludes that program structure, staffing, and size are important in producing more positive behavioral outcomes.
Research Summary Unsupervised after‐school time for adolescents is a concern for parents and policymakers alike. Evidence linking unsupervised adolescent socializing to problem behavior outcomes heightens this concern among criminologists. Routine activities theory suggests that, when youth peer groups congregate away from adult authority, both opportunity for and motivation to engage in deviant acts increase. After‐school programs are a possible solution to unsupervised teen socializing during afternoon hours and are much in demand. However, empirical research has yet to test the relationship between the availability of after‐school programs and youth routine activities. This study presents evidence from a multisite, randomized, controlled trial of an after‐school program for middle‐school students in an urban school district. Policy Implications Youth in the treatment group engaged in less unsupervised socializing after school than youth in the control group but not as much less as would be expected if the after‐school program was providing consistent supervision to youth who would otherwise be unsupervised. Additional analyses examined why the influence of the after‐school program was not more pronounced. We found that, although program attendance was related to decreases in unsupervised socializing, the program did not attract many delinquency‐prone youths who were unsupervised, which suggests that the students most in need of the program did not benefit. Furthermore, data obtained from a mid‐year activity survey revealed that youth in the study were highly engaged in a variety of after‐school activities. The addition of the after‐school program into the mixture of available activities had little effect on the frequency with which students participated in organized activities after school.
Evidence regarding the effectiveness of after‐school programs (ASPs) for reducing problem behaviors is mixed. Unstructured ASPs may increase antisocial behavior by increasing “deviancy training” opportunities, when peers reinforce deviant attitudes and behaviors. This research analyses approximately 3000 five‐minute intervals from 398 observations of activities delivered as part of an ASP in five public middle schools. Analyses of peer and group leader responses to deviant behavior in the context of ASP activities indicated that while peer responses are generally reinforcing, group leaders typically do not respond to deviance. Multi‐level analyses of the association between activity structure and deviant behavior indicate that higher levels of structure in the activity as a whole decrease levels of violence and counternormative behavior. As the level of structure in five‐minute intervals within the activity increases, the level of violent behavior declines, but violent talk (e.g., threats to commit violence) increases. Implications for after‐school programming are discussed.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
hi@scite.ai
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.