Best Practice Research and Evaluation

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America After 3PM
This updated America After 3PM study offers the most comprehensive and accurate picture in five years of what this nation’s children are doing each day after school. It provides detailed information about parent attitudes toward after school care and satisfaction with afterschool programs, and data about demand for afterschool, including the likelihood that non-participating children would join afterschool programs if they were available.

America After 3PM Special Report on Summer: Missed Opportunities, Unmet Demand
The report examines data from the 2009 America After 3PM study, sponsored by JCPenney Afterschool, and focuses specifically on summer learning program participation and its key role in keeping children engaged in learning throughout the summer months.

Partnerships for Learning: Promising Practices in Integrating School and Out-of-School Time Program supports
This report aims is to share with out of school time program leaders, decision-makers, funders, and schools lessons from successful efforts to forge partnerships between schools and out of school time programs to support children’s learning and development.

Engaging Older Youth: Program and City Level Strategies to Support Sustained Participation in Out of School Time
This study, commissioned by the Wallace Foundation, examined the program characteristics—both program practices and structural features—associated with high participation and retention that were employed by OST programs, primarily serving disadvantaged youth, in six cities that have worked toward building OST initiatives.

Structuring Out-of-School Time to Improve Academic Achievement
This guide is intended to help educators, out-of-school time (OST) program providers, and school and district administrators structure academically focused out-of-school time programs.

Supporting Student Outcomes Through Expanded Learning Opportunities
This new paper looks at the role of after school and summer learning programs in supporting student success. The paper provides information on the benefits of expanded learning, why and how schools should partner, and a warrant for future research on expanded learning and education reform.

Implementing School-Based Health and Extended Learning Services
Practitioners and policy makers from throughout New Mexico convened in Albuquerque in May 2008 for three Roundtable discussions on implementing school-based health services and extended learning opportunities in the state.

After-School Programs in Public Elementary Schools
The National Center for Education Statistics within the Institute of Education Sciences has released the report "After-School Programs in Public Elementary Schools." This study provides a national profile of various types of formal after-school programs physically located at public elementary schools in 2008.

Outcomes Linked to High-Quality Afterschool Programs: Longitudinal Findings from the Study of Promising Afterschool Programs
A new study finds that regular participation in high-quality afterschool programs is linked to significant gains in standardized test scores and work habits as well as reductions in behavior problems among disadvantages students.

After-School Programs and Academics: Implication for Policy, Practice, and Research
After-school programs are often expected to incorporate academic achievement as an important goal. This focus on acadamic achievement is producing heated debates. This report focuses on the debate using program-evaluation literature, observational studies, and commentaries.

A Community for All Children: A Guide to Inclusion for Out-of-School Time
The guide begins by describing what inclusion is and why it is important. The authors' definition of inclusion as a philosophy, process, and result, is one of the the most powerful statements in the guide.

A Decade of Results
The impact of the LA's BEST After-School Enrichment Program and subsequent student achievement and performance.

ASBJ Research Article: Learning After School
This article from the June 2004 issue of "American School Board Journal" synthesizes current research on after-school program quality.

ASBJ Research Article: Summer Programs
What Did You Learn Last Summer? For many children, summer is a time for forgetting, but good programs can help.

California's next After-School Challenge: Keeping High School Teens Off the Street and On the Right Track
This report examines research from California and across the nation showing the effectiveness of after-school programs for high school students in preventing crime and other risky behavior, as well as increasing academic achievement.

Documenting Progress and Demonstrating Results
The Finance Project produced this guide to provide practioners with techniques, tools, and strategies and to improve their programs and track their effectiveness over time.

Elements of Effective Practice
This newly revised and updated guideline provides the latest in quality mentoring research, policies, and practices.

Helping Youth Succeed Through Out-of-School Time Programs
This report reviews the current research and literature on after-school programs especially with regard to their effectiveness; explores the range of programs and activities as employed by the various youth-serving sectors; considers the untapped possibilities of after-school programs to meet the needs of young people, including academic enhancement, career and college preparation, leadership development, and civic engagement; and provides policy guidance on how to support and sustain high quality programs as part of a system of supports for older youth.

Making The Difference: Research and Practice in Community Schools
This report by the Coalition for Community Schools, synthesizes research from the fields of health, mental health, youth development, family and community engagement and community building and demonstrates the connection to student learning. By integrating existing community resources with the assets of the school, 15 community schools highlighted in the report produced remarkable improvements in efficiency and results.

Mapping, Monitoring and Research
This task brief from the Forum for Youth Investment assists cities looking to track the information relevant to out-of-school hours – children, dollars, programming and outcomes.

Moving Beyond The Barriers: Attracting and Sustaining Youth Participation in Out-of-School Time Programs
This brief culls information from several implementation and impact evaluations of out-of-school time programs to develop a set of promising strategies to attract and sustain youth participation in the programs.

Moving Towards Success: Framework for After-School Programs
The following document contain examples of how a program can move from identifying goals to implementing program elements to measuring short - and long-term outcomes. The four sections include Academic and Other Learning Goals, Social and Emotional Goals, Health and Safety Goals, and Community Engagement Goals.

Multiple Choices After School: Findings from the Extended-Service Schools Initiative
Public/Private Ventures has produced a study that aims to put policymakers on firmer ground as they make decisions regarding after-school programs.

Noteworthy Perspectives: Out of School Time: Programs for At-Risk Students
McRel's latest issue of Noteworthy is intended to bring a research-based perspective to educators who are interested in enhancing their understanding of out-of-school time programming for at-risk or low achieving students. Noteworthy Perspectives: Out-of-School Time Programs for At-Risk Students, which is based on McRel's recent research synthesis on OST strategies, highlights the characteristics of effective OST reading and mathematics programs.

Outcomes and Research in Out-of-School Time Program Design.
The Best Practices Institute suggests reasons and mechanisms for integrating outcomes and research into quality after-school program design.

Quality Standards project: For Out of School Time Programs
This guide provides research based performance standards with a focus to build capacity and ensure accountability among service providers.

People, Places and Possibilities: Integrating Mentoring and After-School
This commentary explores the relationship between mentoring and after-school, two fields that have garnered significant policy attention and momentum over the past several years.

Serving Older Youth Through a Comprehensive Out-of-School Time System: Lessons from the AYPF Philadelphia Field Trip
This short publication highlights lessons learned by participants at the May 2006 AYPF field trip to Philadelphia about the best practices the city uses to sustain its comprehensive out-of-school time system.

Study on Parental After-School Stress
This report presents the findings from a study of stress among working parents of school-age children.

WHAT HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS IN THE CHICAGO PUBLIC SCHOOLS DO IN THEIR OUT-OF-SCHOOL TIME: 2003-2005
This report provides a descriptive overview of what students in the Chicago Public Schools (CPS) do in their out-of-school time, based on responses to a questionnaire administered to ninth, tenth, and eleventh graders.