Out-of-School-Time Programming for Youth in Philadelphia

A Forum — May 13, 2005

Philadelphia’s Children’s Investment Strategy (CIS) is an initiative by Mayor John F. Street to engage multiple public and private agencies as well as a variety of funding sources in addressing the needs of children and families, especially during non-school hours. Various governmental and non-profit community organizations have come together under the umbrella of CIS to help ensure access of services to children and youth and to rationalize and improve out-of-school time services. Out-of-school-time (OST) in Philadelphia is defined very broadly to include traditional after-school programs, programs for out-of-school youth, young people who are truant or in the juvenile justice system, children who are aging out of foster care and programs to engage youth in the summer including summer jobs programs.

Philadelphia Safe and Sound, established in 1996 through the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Urban Health Initiative, provides technical assistance, data and research that are the foundation of the CIS efforts. Philadelphia Safe and Sound issues an annual Children’s Report Card using 26 indicators, such as academic performance and school truancy, to measure progress toward specific quality of life goals for children. JoAnn Lawer, Philadelphia Safe and Sound President and CEO, said that this year for the first time, there will be 12 community report cards as well as the citywide report. Philadelphia Safe and Sound also prepares an annual Children’s Budget that presents spending data by funding source, by purpose and by the type of services being provided. It also provides comparisons of spending for children over time. In addition, Lawer said her organization seeks models that are working elsewhere in the country that can be replicated in Philadelphia, such as the Beacon model from New York City. Beacons are community centers in schools that become “safe havens” for children, youth and adults in a particular neighborhood. Each Beacon provides activities for all ages that are designed with the input of community residents.

David Fair, Director of Philadelphia’s Department of Human Services and Community Based Prevention Services, explained that by redirecting resources, finding new resources in community-based organizations and partnering with other systems that work with children, Philadelphia has developed a network of support for children that did not exist before. He said this allows the city to pursue some commonly shared outcomes for children, including preventive programming that focuses on families who are at high risk of involvement in children protection or the juvenile justice systems. The city has also had access to surplus Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) dollars which has supported a number of OST activities. However, sustainability of programs is an issue because the remaining TANF funds have been depleted.

Naomi Gubernick, Director of Non-School Hours Programs for the School District of Philadelphia, described the after-school programs hosted in school buildings:

• Programs to provide remediation in the basic skill areas of reading and mathematics for students in grade 1-8;
• Programs to provide credit recovery of core courses in grades 9-12;
• Programs that provide enrichment to enable youth to be successful across all domains, including art, music and social skills, and that translate into academic success as well;
• Programs to engage older out-of-school youth in the educational process; and
• Alternative programs with community partners to accelerate instruction for youth with behavioral challenges that provide supports for success.

Typical after-school programs run from 3-6 pm. Gubernick said collaboration across agencies allows the school system to use various funding sources including school district funds, state tutoring funds and supplemental educational service (SES) funds through No Child Left Behind for an hour of after-school tutoring followed by two-hours of enrichment programming funded through the Children’s Investment Strategy.

Laura Shubilla is co-founder and President of the Philadelphia Youth Network (PYN), a six year-old youth intermediary organization dedicated to building a comprehensive and coherent citywide youth workforce development system, and to helping young people gain access to Philadelphia’s growth economy. Shubilla explained that PYN oversees youth workforce programs for almost 10,000 young people annually and operated by more than 40 high-quality youth-serving community organizations and funded by approximately $15 million from government, foundation and private sources. Shubilla stressed Philadelphia’s commitment to providing both workplace competencies and academic skills development, noting that in the course of WIA and TANF-funded programming over the last five years more than 20,000 young people have earned academic credit for their projects developed during summer and year-round programming. In addition, she touted the leadership of the Philadelphia Youth Council, which PYN staffs, in developing WorkReady Philadelphia, a citywide initiative that develops high-quality employer-paid internships in private sectors workplaces. More recently, Shubilla explained that PYN and its partners have been placing major emphases on building capacity to meet the needs of out-of-school and other disconnected youth.

Issues of Coordination

Fair said it is unique for a mayor to “hold us all accountable to work in an integrated fashion, aligning our approaches and cooperating and matching outcomes.” Shubilla added that an important goal of integrating services is to enable public agencies and systems to identify multiple needs of at-risk young people and to tailor responses that address their individual circumstances. She also recounted her experience of spending a day observing juvenile court. “Young people would be given different requirements by family court or a probation officer, such as obtaining a job or a GED, but there was no systematic way of helping that young person actually do all those things.”

Fair said Mayor Street has created new programs and resources without being absolutely certain of their sustainability, especially in light of the reduced TANF funding. Nevertheless, Fair hopes community support for the programs, as well as documentation showing that the programs work, will improve the chances for sustainability in part by identifying new funding sources. Fair added that programs with multiple funding sources are more politically viable.

Shubilla praised the WIB for demonstrating that workforce investment is intrinsically connected to academic achievement. Noting that young people “don’t live in categories” she advocated for cross-system approaches that combine multiple programs and funding streams around common needs and goals. Gubernick agreed that “the best way to work with families is an integrated approach, but too often the money comes in silos. We need money that mirrors what research shows about how kids are best served. The accounting nightmare is increasingly challenging.”

Lawer added that income eligibility requirements also need to be integrated, since many agencies are duplicating effort gathering the same documentation. “We could serve lots more kids if we weren’t all certifying TANF eligibility.” Lawer further pointed out that one of the most effective collaborative activities in Philadelphia is a monthly meeting convened by the Director of Social Services for all agencies involved with OST for youth in the juvenile justice system. Fair added that this kind of collaboration “draws on the individual strengths and pieces of the system and helps connect children to resources beyond our own worlds.”

In summary, panel members addressed two key policy issues:

• The need for federal policymakers to encourage collaboration and put a premium on making connections work among and across agencies; and
• The need for flexibility and reasonable requirements for documentation for children and families to prove funding eligibility.

Discussion

In response to a question about the role of traditional community-based organizations such as Boys and Girls Clubs in OST programs, Fair said the Children’s Investment Strategy tries to manage tax money more coherently by investing in both new and traditional community-based organizations, and Fair said approximately 90% of the money from his agencies is allocated to existing community-based organizations. There was also a question about accelerated schools for young people who are over 17 but have only lower-level skills. The panelists said Philadelphia is working on a variety of models to meet the needs of these students, including evening and summer classes, credit for work experience and related activities, distance learning, and a charter school just for students who are over 17.

Additional Information

Children’s Investment Strategy
http://www.philasafesound.org/redesign3/cis.html

Children’s Budget and Report Cards - Philadelphia Safe and Sound
http://www.philasafesound.org/

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