From Education Week: A profile of a Washington State town that used the community school model to co-locate services that meet the needs of whole families.
Community Schools Blunt the Impacts of Poverty in Vancouver, Wash.
Excerpt:
"In several phases, schools in the opportunity zone each set aside space for a family- and community-resource center staffed by a coordinator to help meet the needs of students and their families. Each resource center developed its own menu of services that are tailored to the specific needs of the school community, offering such help as food pantries, free clothing, referrals to mental-health services, family-literacy classes, GED prep programs for parents, and on-site dental care through mobile dental vans.
As the centers became a reality, so did the district’s projections about changing demographics and the needs of students. In the past decade, its enrollment of students who qualify for free or reduced-priced lunches, a common indicator of poverty, has grown from 39 percent to 53 percent. That rate would be considered low for some large urban districts, but it was a big change for Vancouver, particularly in schools where the proportion of low-income students climbed well above 80 percent.
But, because the district countered those demographic shifts with a strong, data-driven plan, it also saw positive changes in that time, such as an improvement in its graduation rate, higher levels of parent involvement, and more low-income students enrolling in Advanced Placement courses.
Today, there are family- and community-resource centers in 16, or nearly half, of the district’s schools, six central-office staff members who help support their efforts, and a “mobile FCRC,” a van painted with brightly colored children’s faces that provides some services at schools without designated centers."
Read the full story here.
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