Building Quality, Scale and Effectiveness in After-School Programs
TASC — The After-School Corporation

A Forum — May 6, 2005

The After-School Corporation (TASC) operates after-school programs for elementary and secondary students, predominantly in New York City public schools. A multi-year evaluation of TASC was performed by Policy Studies Associates (PSA), enabling TASC to document best practices for building quality and effectiveness into large-scale after-school programs.

Lucy Friedman, President of TASC, provided a brief overview of the key elements of TASC programs. TASC started in 1998 with a $125 million multi-year challenge grant from the Open Society Institute (OSI). For every one dollar contributed by OSI, TASC raised three. To date, TASC has leveraged more than $375 million in public and private funds. TASC operates 300 programs throughout New York State, but primarily in New York City, serving 55,000 children through contracts with 130 community-based organizations. Enrollment is open and not targeted to specific populations within a school. A full time year-round site coordinator is housed in the school and the school principal is considered a partner. The staff is diverse, including certified teachers, youth workers, retirees, parents, volunteers, interns and AmeriCorps students (the ratio is 1:10 adult:child). There is a mix of activities, including educational enrichment and homework help, snack or supper, and exposure to and participation in arts, sports and community service. The programs run from 3-6pm and participants are expected to come everyday, except in high school where programs presume a lower participation rate because of sports, jobs, family or school-related activities.

Friedman explained that TASC uses scale to build quality. When 200-300 students from a single school participate in the after-school program, the program attracts the attention of the principal. Friedman also stated that by having so many different programs with varying approaches and offerings, the TASC network can almost always identify one program that has solved specific challenges or created innovative strategies, and, as a result, the programs become resources to each other. Large-scale programs also attract diverse resources, with one example being a partnership with Madison Square Garden (MSG). Given a potential audience of 30,000 young people, MSG has created its own clubs and magazines that weave math and literacy themes into sports and entertainment and makes the material available to students involved in after-school programs. MSG also provides opportunities for youth to attend MSG events, where MSG makes a concerted effort to treat students in a special manner, conveying to students that they are valued.

Elizabeth Reisner, Principal with Policy Studies Associates, then discussed the results of the PSA study, which looked at the implementation of the programs themselves, the degree of youth participation, and specific practices that lead to student success. The PSA evaluation began in 1998 and eventually looked at 96 projects involving 52,000 participants and 91,000 non-participants in New York City schools. The data showed that activities in TASC programs are different from the regular school day, and the activities that consistently attract the most participants are those in which students develop artistic, academic, cognitive or literacy skills as well as social and cultural awareness. Culminating activities often include student performances, student writing or group activities.

Staff for TASC programs, including site coordinators/program directors (the title depends on the site), are well qualified, Reisner explained: 86% of the site coordinators had a bachelor’s degree, 46% had a master’s degree, and 21% had teacher certification. In 2004, training opportunities were made available to 4,000 people, including site coordinators and front-line staff.

TASC program are large compared to many other after-school programs, with often up to 300 students, and Reisner noted that attendance grows over time. By the end of the PSA evaluation period, schools serving children in preK-8 had 85% participation rates, while the rate was only 22% in high schools programs. Reisner explained that many high school programs were not designed for daily participation and did not expect students to attend every day, due to other time commitments.

Reisner also stated that this was not a randomized study and that the control group included similar youth attending the same schools as the TASC participants. PSA found, however, that test scores and school attendance improved more for students who participated regularly in TASC after-school programs than for students who were not involved. Students who participate most regularly for the longest period of time experience the greatest academic gains and test score gains seemed to be greater in math than in reading. School attendance gains were greatest for participants at the middle school level. Principals reported that participation improves attitudes about school among both students and parents and 79% of parents said they had a better attitude about their child’s school because of the after-school program.

Reisner said the program features most likely to promote academic success for students include a focus on academics and cognitive development, a site director who is licensed to teach, opportunities for sports/recreation/fitness, a requirement for staff to develop and seek approval for activity plans, and project staff who are college graduates.

As for funding, Reisner reported that programs are increasingly able to pay on their own without TASC assistance. By the end of the evaluation period, TASC was providing 60% of the funding while each site raised the remaining 40%. Friedman said that documentation provided by the PSA study has also encouraged more private investment in after-school programs and mentioned that there is also significant funding through the 21st Century Community Learning Centers legislation.

Friedman then talked about how TASC used the results of the PSA study. She said the evaluation provided metrics to keep TASC accountable and identify popular, successful, fully-enrolled programs. If specific programs do not maintain enrollment goals and attendance, TASC reduced funds to that program. As a result, when sites realize that their funding is tied to their attendance rates, they pay more attention to improving attendance.

Information from the evaluation also helped identify new topics for training. One of the most common problems identified by participants was bullying. More staff training was provided on how to create a safe climate. The evaluation also identified the number of students with disabilities participating in after-school program was less than their representation in the school, so special programs were created to provide such services as transportation and paraprofessional aides. The degree of student interest in sports and recreation activities led to a partnership with Bally Fitness Centers, and ten TASC programs now have arrangements with Bally Fitness Centers to allow students access from 3-6 pm.

Friedman said one of the challenges confronting TASC – in part because of the successes documented in the PSA study – is that the City of New York is now launching an out-of-school initiative based on the TASC model with funding from the Youth Development and Delinquency Prevention funding stream. TASC is watching carefully to see if funds are shifted away from TASC programs and if there will be adequate quality control measures in the city programs. Another positive event is that the State of New Jersey asked TASC to help create “New Jersey After 3,” modeled after TASC and influenced by the PSA research. TASC also helped design a self-assessment tool that has since been adopted by the New York State Department of Education for extended-day programs.

Policy Implications

Elizabeth Reisner said there should be more federal support for local evaluation of after-school programs. Grant recipients should be able to pool funds to allow for regional evaluations and there should be great latitude in the selection of outcomes to be measured so that local priorities can be taken into account (e.g., improving attendance and teaching conflict resolution skills may be more important than measuring test scores in a particular community).

Lucy Friedman said policymakers need to become convinced that after-school programs are necessary, feasible and affordable, and that it is possible to provide both high quality and large-scale programs with a low per-child investment (operating costs for TASC programs average $1,500 per student per year).

Discussion

One forum attendee asked the speakers to elaborate on strategies to increase participation in after-school programs. Lucy Friedman said it is important to communicate to parents and students that high participation is the expectation. She said it is also important to create greater continuity across grades and schools so that a child aging out of a K-6 program does not go to a middle school that has no program. Friedman noted that participation levels in upper grades improve when the site coordinator is a charismatic individual whom students are able to visit during the school day and when students have a choice of appealing activities taught by equally appealing instructors.

In response to a question about the connection between after-school and day-school staff, Friedman said ideal programs hire about a third of their staff from the school where the program is located. This encourages a natural connection between curriculum and after-school activities. Sometimes the after-school staff participate in parent-teacher conferences and may be hired by the school. She said the average salary of site directors is $42,000.
Asked if homework completion is measured as an indicator of program success, Friedman said it is not a centralized requirement for TASC programs. She said parents want homework finished – especially those who don’t speak English. But she said principals see the value of arts and sports after school since these have often been pushed out of the school day.

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