After-School
Programs: Lively Exchange at Open Society Institute
By
Joan Baum
The
After-School Corporation (TASC), in just four brief years has
moved to the forefront of one of the country's most concerted
efforts to reform public school supplementary education. Since
its initial funding in the form of a challenge grant by George
Soros' Open Society Institute, TASC, has managed to attract public
and private money, wide parental and community involvement, and
the increasing attention of education administrators and lawmakers
across the state. In New York City alone TASC is already part
of 150 schools. The goal, says TASC president Lucy Friedman, is
to expand “in the shortest time possible” into every public elementary,
middle and high school district, and sustain “high quality” programs.
This first Conference on Supplementary Education, which took place
recently and was co-sponsored by Teachers College at Columbia
University and The College Board, drew an impressive array of
prominent educators, researchers, and political leaders. It could
not have come at a more timely juncture for the city. As keynote
speaker Alan Gartner, the Mayor's Director of Policy Research
told Education Update, “we don't have many more turns at
bat.” He noted that his title has no adjective or parenthesis.
“Research” for the Mayor means research into education, which
is “at the top of his agenda” and is directly related to welfare
reform and a “whole range of other serious issues” before the
new administration.
The Associate Commissioner of Education for the State of New York,
Sheila Evans-Tranum, tapped the same theme. This is a “critical
time,” she told conference participants, “an age of
accountability.” If we cannot show improvement in the performance
of children, we will not get funding, we will not be able to move
ahead. In effect, she was saying that without demonstrated progress
in students' academic performance, public schools would not be
able to compete with the growing number of private and alternative
schools. As Lucy Friedman pointed out in her welcoming address,
parents are choosing to send their students to schools that have
after-school programs, increasingly seen as central in efforts
to improve academic performance. Putting considerations about
the presidential message aside, Gartner told Education Update,
President Bush's message “leave no child behind,”
was a significant statement, an expression of commitment to education
“that has not been heard since the days of Lyndon Johnson.”
Like others around the conference table, the Commissioner defended
the use of the term, “supplementary education,” recognizing its
vagueness and even unfortunate connotation as something less than
essential (some participants said they preferred the term “continuous”
or “seamless” day). It was Edmund W. Gordon, Director of the Institute
for Urban and Minority Education, and Professor Emeritus of Teachers
College and Yale, whose “vision” it was that there be such a conference,
who, with measured passion, distinguished the term. “We don't
want to supplant public schools but supplement them.”
But how? Refreshingly, participants, who had read the conference
papers in advance, were respectfully frank and critical. There
was no disagreement, however, on why supplementary education was
important. After-school programs function typically from 3-6 p.m.,
a time that coincides with two dire facts: a) this is a high-crime
period for kids, “the kids themselves say this,” Lucy Friedman
noted; they're alone, hanging out, without supervision at home;
and b) for disadvantaged kids particularly, a typical school day
has wasted hours. As Irving Hamer, Manhattan member of the Board
of Education and its technology czar pointed out, students are
in school 12 percent of the day and sleeping 33 percent. So, what's
going on with that remaining 55 percent? What might go on? And
what should go on that will not compete with what the Internet
or private corporations such as Kaplan have been providing for
years?
Semantics aside, participants agreed, the substantive disagreement
over the meaning of “supplemental education” turns on how one
defines need. The poorest schools the Comm-issioner noted, are
not necessarily those whose students have the poorest academic
performance. Still, there is no denying the connection and the
“severe gap” in New York State between rich and poor in all senses
and the extent to which richer schools can afford supplemental
education. Enter TASC. But money isn't everything. As Jeanne Pryor,
Assistant Superintendent for the Montclair Public Schools observed,
well trained teachers and tutors are critical to the success of
any after-school program which includes, not just supplemental
instruction in reading and math, but engagement witý those aspects
of a child's life that are rarely dealt with any more in the schools
or at home: art, sports, citizenship. Teacher turnover, however,
in after-school programs, is about 50 percent” staff cannot stay
after 3:00 pm; many of them are in school themselves.
It was the district Superintendent Carmen Fari“a who prompted
some of the headiest discussion. Once students leave, after their
5th or 6th period, she pointed out, they won't come back. How
will an extended 9 or 10-period day have value if it continues
what has gone before? Case in point: if language acquisition is
key, how do we model an after-school program if we provide those
in need only with the company of others with the same need? Like
groups of disadvantaged students preclude peer mentors and role
models. Case in point #2 was made in effect by Gartner as he wondered
what difference could be made if a seamless day merely fused inadequate
onto inadequate? The core structure may need to be changed more
than the length of the day, he told Education Update.
Other
participants, other questions followed. What constitutes an acceptable
after-school site? What if church-related facilities do not want
to provide sex education? As Ed Gordon challenged, what partners
should TASC have, how do we engage them, what are the benefits,
the drawbacks? The research is coming in. The second TASC Conference
is bound to be as lively as the first.#
Education
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