Supporting School Success & Healthy Development in Afterschool Programs

1
Two Sides of the Youth Development Coin
Supporting School Success Healthy Development
in Afterschool Programs
21st CCLC Conference Sacramento, October 26, 2005
Bonnie Benard WestEd Oakland bbenard_at_WestEd.org
2
What Research Tells Us About Poverty Student
Achievement
1. Poverty is the 1 challenge to childrens
healthy development and school success.
Adapted from David C. Berliner Our Impoverished
View of Education Reform, Teachers College
Record, August 2005
3
Childhood Poverty Rates In Rich Countries
4
What Research Tells Us About Poverty Student
Achievement
1. Poverty is the 1 challenge to childrens
healthy development and school success.
2. Poverty is racialized.
Adapted from David C. Berliner Our Impoverished
View of Education Reform, Teachers College
Record, August 2005
5
US Poverty Rates by Ethnicity
Reprinted from David C. Berliner Our
Impoverished View of Education Reform
6
What Research Tells Us About Poverty Student
Achievement
1. Poverty is the 1 challenge to childrens
healthy development and school success.
2. Poverty is racialized.
3. Poverty affects student achievement through
segregated schooling.
Adapted from David C. Berliner Our Impoverished
View of Education Reform, Teachers College
Record, August 2005
7
US Student Test Scores World Standing by
Ethnicity
Mathematics
Literacy
Reprinted from David C. Berliner Our
Impoverished View of Education Reform
8
What Research Tells Us About Poverty Student
Achievement
1. Poverty is the 1 challenge to childrens
healthy development and school success.
2. Poverty is racialized.
3. Poverty affects student achievement through
segregated schooling.
4. Poverty limits I.Q.
Adapted from David C. Berliner Our Impoverished
View of Education Reform, Teachers College
Record, August 2005
9
The Power of One
"I am only one, but still I am one I cannot do
everything, but still I can do something and
because I cannot do everything I will not refuse
to do the something that I can do."
Edward Hale s adaptation of Rabbi Tarphon
(1st  century C.E.)
10
Conflicting Research Regarding ASPs School
Success
They work!
They dont work!
11
The Truth of the Matter

• Some do Some dont

• Its HOW we do what we do that counts!

Meredith Honig and Morva McDonald  (Fall 2005).
From Promise to Participation Afterschool
Programs through the Lens of Socio-Cultural
Learning Theory.  AFTERSCHOOL MATTERS (No.5).   
12
Youth Development Theory Practice

• The failure or success of an ASPor any other
  program or interventiondepends less on what we
  dothe activities we engage inthan on the
  processes within the program the quality of the
  relationships we create, the expectations we
  convey, and the opportunities we provide for
  young people to be active participants and
  contributors in our ASPs.

• Supporting youth development and school success
  in our ASPs are not competing goals but are
  mutually reinforcing outcomes of a quality ASP.

13
Core Practices of Youth Development Focus On

• Healthy Development

• Young Peoples Strengths

• Nurturing Environments

• Meeting Developmental Needs

• People Places

• Youth as Partners

14

• Healthy Development of the Whole Child

Physical
Cognitive
Emotional
Spiritual
Social
15

• Healthy Development of the Whole Child

• Adventure Learning
• Arts-based Learning
• Service Learning
• Cooperative Learning
• Project-based Learning

Promotes competencies/ strengths,
positive health-risk behavior, successful
learning
16

• Young Peoples Strengths

• EMOTIONAL
• (Autonomy)
• - Positive Identity
• - Self-efficacy
• Initiative
• Mastery
• Self-awareness
• Resistance

• SOCIAL
• (Social Competence)
• Responsiveness
• Flexibility
• Cross-cultural competence
• Empathy/caring
• Communication skills
• Sense of humor

• MORAL/SPIRITUAL
• (Sense of Purpose Future)
• A special interest/hobby
• Goal directedness
• Imagination
• Achievement motivation
• Educational aspiration
• Persistence
• Optimism
• Faith
• Sense of Meaning

• COGNITIVE
• (Problem-solving)
• - Planning
• Seeing alternatives
• Critical thinking
• Resourcefulness

17
Strength-Based Practice
Start with what they know. Build with what they
have.
-Lao Tsu
18
Strength-Based Practice

• Model

• Look for Listen

• Identify and Name

• Mirror Back

• Make Connections

• Provide opportunity for youth to be a helper

19

• Nurturing Environments

RESILIENTYouth
20

• Nurturing Environments

The Role of Protective Factors in Human Systems
Protective Factors
Positive Development
facilitate
Successful Outcomes
Leading to
Brain Development Human Development System
Change
Successful Individuals Healthy
Families Effective Schools Healthy
Communities Learning Organizations
Caring Relationships High Expectations Participa
tion
Positive development and successful outcomes in
any human system depend on the quality of the
relationships, beliefs, and opportunities for
participation
21

• Meeting Developmental Needs

Love
Challenge
Meaning
Power
Mastery
Belonging
Safety
Respect
22

• Meeting Developmental Needs

Four simple questions reveal the beauty and
meaning of our lives
Wayne Muller, How, Then, Shall We Live?
1. Who am I?
2. What do I love?
3. How shall I live?

• What is my gift to
• the family of the earth?

23

• Meeting Developmental Needs

Make time for us.
Be positive role models. Be trustworthy, honest,
fair and dependable.
Work with us in partnership. Have fun with us
and teach us what you know.
Believe in us and never, ever, give up on us.
Recognize our wisdom and treat us with respect.
Trust us to try it on our own
Listen. Value youth opinions and feelings. Be
our advocate and ally.
Provide a range of opportunities that are safe,
playful and help us make a difference.
Get to know us! Dont make Judgments or
stereotype, Based on first impressions.
Provide help, support, and guidance with
patience, care, and love.
Provide job opportunities!
Developed by the California Friday Night Live
Partnership, Teenwork 2000
24

• People Places

• Not Program Curriculum

• Its how we do what we do that counts!

25

• People Places

Kids can walk around trouble if there is
someplace to walk to and someone to walk with.
-Tito in Urban Sancturaries, 1994, Milbrey
McLaughlin et al
26

• Youth as Partners

We the children are experts on being 8, 12 or 17
years old in the societies of today. To consult
us would make your work more effective and give
better results for children. My proposal is that
you make us part of your team.
-Heidi Grande, 17 A Norwegian delegate to
the Special Session on Children United Nations,
May 2002
27

• Youth as Partners

Weve never thought of looking at the problem
from that perspective. How old did you say you
were?
-Ben Smilowitz
28
Youth Development Process
Resilience in Action
A QUALITYAFTERSCHOOL PROGRAM PROVIDES PROTECTIVE
FACTORS Caring Relationships High
Expectations Opportunities for Participation
for All Members
THAT MEET CHILDRENS DEVELOPMENTAL NEEDS Safety
Love Belonging Respect Mastery Challenge Pow
er Meaning
PROMOTING CHILDRENS POSITIVE DEVELOPMENTAL OUTCOM
ES Social Competence Problem Solving Autonomy
Purpose Future
THUS PRODUCING, POSITIVE PREVENTION EDUCATION
OUTCOMES
29
National Academy of Science/ Institute of Medicine
Features of Positive Developmental Settings

• Physical and Psychological Safety

• Appropriate Structure

• Supportive Relationships

• Opportunities to Belong

• Positive Social Norms

• Support for Efficacy and Mattering

30
Youth Development and Health-risk Behaviors
High levels of perceived external assets in
school are associated with lower levels of
involvement in health risk behaviors.
31
Youth Development and Student Achievement
STAR test scores increased more in schools where
students reported high levels of Caring
Relationships at school, High Expectations at
school, Meaningful Participation in the
community.
32
Implications
for ASP Research

• Use a youth development theory of change which
  focuses on holistic outcomes

• Design and conduct Longitudinal, qualitative,
  and theoretically grounded case studies that
  deeply probe program practices and youths
  experiences

33
Implications
for ASP Funders

• Invest more resources in fewer longitudinal,
  intensive, qualitative studies with significant,
  rigorous, and strategic case study designs

• Hold ASPs accountable for youth development
  outcomesincluding indicators of school success
  but not standardized test scores

• Fund ASPs because it is morally right to provide
  safe and nurturing environments for children in
  non-school hours

34
Implications
for ASP Practitioners

• Use core youth development practices to design
  ASP learning environments

• Translate the youth development framework into a
  diagnostic tool to help staff investigate the
  extent to which their ASPs reflect the features
  of effective learning environments

• Do not make ASPs more like school!

• Participate in professional ASP organizations

35
Implications
for All of Us as Citizens

• Hold our policymakers accountable to improving
  the lives of ALL the young people of this nation,
  especially for universal healthcare, a living
  family wage, and affordable housing

• Lobby our policymakers to sign the U.N. Rights
  of the Child

36
Im am only one, but still I am one I cannot do
everything, but still I can do something and
because I cannot do everything I will not refuse
to do something that I can do
Edward Hale s adaptation of Rabbi Tarphon
(1st  century C.E.)