A Holistic Approach to Understanding the Effectiveness of Community Schools: A Multiple-Measures Framework

• In Event: Community Schools Research: Advancing Equity and Collaboration Through a Holistic Approach

Abstract

Community schools are experiencing a new and unprecedented era of support and expansion. Districts and states nationwide are investing in community schools as a strategy to recover from the pandemic’s devastating and inequitable toll on students’ well-being and learning. California is leading the charge with a historic investment of $4.1 billion to create community schools in low-income neighborhoods. This paper introduces a multiple-measures framework for measuring the growth and development of community schools and describes exemplary measures that schools and districts are using to understand outcomes. We argue that a holistic view of outcomes is fundamental to understand the effectiveness of community schools and we demonstrate how a multiple-measures framework—one that combines locally-developed measures with state-mandated measures—can serve this purpose.
Our multiple-measures framework is grounded in implementation and improvement science (Bryk, 2011; Eccles et al., 2006). By harnessing these two fields of inquiry, we underscore the importance of enabling contexts to effect long-term change and continuous improvement (Fixsen et al., 2013, 2015; Metz & Albers, 2014). To describe the implementation process for a multiple-measures framework, our paper defines the framework as a “usable innovation” that helps overcome an “adaptive challenge” within community schools. To be usable “an innovation must not only demonstrate the feasibility of improving outcomes, but it also must be well operationalized so that it is teachable, learnable, doable, and able to be assessed in classrooms and schools” (Fixsen et al., 2013, p. 219). We demonstrate how locally developed measures—aligned with values and practices of the school community—increase its “usability” within school communities. The multiple-measures framework also relates to an adaptive challenge regarding educational measurement. Understanding the implementation and the overall effectiveness of community schools comprises an adaptive challenge because it “requires revising and rethinking values, beliefs, and current ways of work” in school systems (Blase et al., 2014, p. 3).
Our paper also draws on an analysis of the measurement work of schools and districts within California. The authors, utilizing case study analysis and an extensive literature review, document school and district level measures aimed at measuring various dimensions of students’ development that align with a whole-child approach and are defined in California’s Community School Partnership Program framework (California Department of Education, 2022). Authors provide an extensive overview, description, and rationale for each local measure and cite existing evidence on use. For example, we explore the use of a locally developed bilingual “Reader Identity Self-assessment (RISA)” that seeks to provide both teachers and student with formative data to inform reading instruction and learning in multiple languages. RISA also measures students’ self-regulating learning skills. We share how RISA was developed by the school community to elevate the linguistic assets in the community and, through its “usability” plays a large role in assessing the growth and development of the community.
Based on these analyses, our paper highlights both practice- and research-grounded lessons for community school implementation and measurement, drawing from the emerging experiences of schools and districts committed to community schooling.

Authors

• Marisa Saunders, University of California - Los Angeles
  Presenting Author

• Nadia M. Sabat Bass, University of California - Los Angeles
  Presenting Author

• Karen Hunter Quartz, University of California - Los Angeles
  Non-Presenting Author