Community. This panel was part of the National Afterschool summit hosted by the Arnold Schwarzenegger institute for state and local policy at the university of southern california. This is about 35 minutes. [applause] monica, im going to start with you and pick up on something we talked about. Is this just spoiling them . I always said when i was secretary of education we have high schools that when the National Decathlon and we have high schools that are like dropout factories. Unfortunately, that is by zip code. Re kids in poverty are not getting the same level of certified that they need. Let me go to you. You are at the Largest School in the country. What do you see the role of afterschool it is not what school is supposed to do, but how does it get the goal set that every School District needs to achieve . In l. A. , were all about 100 graduation. We talk about 100 attendance, engaged their ways and communities, and it absolutely relies on an afterschool plan. Ella unified has gone from 45 graduation to 75 graduation largely because we havent proved the relationship with all students. We built 131 new schools, but we focus on personalization and decentralization. Afterschool is about enhancing the services to young people. It is about somebody caring, somebody being there, but also somebody investing in you so you will learn about yourself all day long. AfterSchool Programs help others learn in a very positive way so you get role modeling, if its near peer strategy, or if its music. Etic or arts and whatever that enrichment is, were telling you we love you, we have High Expectations of you, and we believe in you. Even for the kids who participate in our Supper Program that means they get three meals a day on campus but our afterschool folks, our mentors, they are bridges. They are connectors. Onlyimes they are the person that that young person would have during that time. Program, we have 1200 programs on 600 sites serving over 100,000 kids every single day. Yes, im glad were all here because, yes, we need more. It is a strategy for academic wellness, a strategy for social, emotional learning, and we know it works. Its good for l. A. Its good for california. Its good for the usa. [applause] thank you, monica. Are also want to zoom in on english as a second language. What afterSchool Programs can do School Programs. In going to go to the oregon superintendent of the year. Helpful to the people in each state. What can they focus on . What does afterschool best focus on to help kids achieve what they need to . Afterschool helps kids dream new dreams. [applause] for kids,difficult especially in rural areas, to dream about careers that they have never seen, they have not been exposed to. Through afterSchool Programming, we are able to develop longterm mentoring the a skype and other Video Conferencing with professionals in the fields, and that allows our students to see a different future for themselves, and we support that with the classes to build the skills and the confidence so they can move forward. My favorite example is we have a great group of people that will mentor our students with blue chalk media. As our students are able to get in editing and video skills, they are able to produce stories voices. Their own the confidence that helps the students gain changes their trajectory. They no longer think of themselves as a student in poverty, but a student at a mission, a purpose, and a path. Thank you. I am going to go to you because not only are you one of the great think tankers, you actually have experience bringing education to southern states. From that perspective, similar question, what are the best uses of afterschool time to help kids achieve stay in school and on track . What can they do. First of all, it is great to be on the usc campus. I was never a student here, but i did grow up in los angeles, in the crenshaw district. In the early 1970s i learned to swim at a pool not too far away from here. I hear some laughter. They obviously know about the pool. It is good to be here. Let me go to your question. Lets be clear, afterSchool Programs are educational, not necessarily just academic. Heres the difference when i learned how to swim, that was educational, but there is no test, or standardized test for swimming. When i was in st. Louis i had a chance to speak to a number of students, most of them free, reduced price lunch students who are learning to play chess. Last i checked there was not a standardized test for chess playing. Look at florida and look at virginia. Weve got very good Public Schools in both states. You can have a great school, and a great afterSchool Program. Between 3 00 until 6 00 we are building students minds, bodies, spirits, and souls. If you speak to the teachers and students, and parents, particularly parents, who say the after School Program is more than just babysitting. Those were the cold phrases people would say, we should be paying for them. The reality is there giving parents comfort. They are going to get access to social capital skills. They are either not going to get the sevenday school hour or to complement what they learned. For me afterSchool Programs ra holistic approach to building holistic children to in fact make the country great again. [applause] eloi. I wanted to hear from k12 School District leaders. Now we are going to learn from the gentleman who knows Community Colleges. With over 2 million students. Every one in the country, you are probably be best seated to understand the gaps. What are the students getting out of high school and going to Community College, what are they lacking so that this audience can better understand, from your perspective, the areas afterschool might better focus on to help fill those gaps . Eloi thank you, bonnie, think you for the invitation. That is hugely important for all of Higher Education. The education of our students, does not begin the day they walk into the Community College or public university, it begins their first days of lives. All the way through. Those that are successful, those they continue to be six acyl in the institutions are those children continue to be successful in those institutions are the children that were able to navigate life and learn to have a structure in place, a network in place that allows them to have a safety net, allows them to be able to progress socially. That is the biggest gaps that we have when kids come to our colleges. We know today that i High School Diploma is not the default anymore to get into the workforce. We are exacerbating the challenges they will have throughout want life, if theyre not ready for college. That readiness begins early. For us, afterSchool Programs building a social network in the communities that help students with all of the skills they need to be successful in college, not just academic preparation, the life corporation. Preparation. Those of the Biggest Challenges we face. California Community Colleges, it is our privilege to accept the top 100 of students. From all lives, all backgrounds young and old, they come to our colleges. The greatest denominator is whether or not they built a network in the life that allows them to succeed in life and to succeed in life, it allows them to succeed in college and make their life easier. Bonnie im going to follow up on that. Yes, as important as the social network is, thank you for stressing that, while afterschool cannot replace the academic teachings that regular schools should, what are where do you see the greatest areas of academic weakness that exist in the students . Math, english . Stem . What areas academically might you be seeing some deficiencies in some of the committee College Students entering . Eloi as educators we have created standards. Whether or not that makes sense, we have created them. Algebra is the primary, essentially the killing fields for students of color in Higher Education. If there is an area of emphasis, study after study shows, if a student does not master algebra two in elementary school, in high school, their chances of succeeding in Higher Education are probably less than 10 . It is literally the biggest barrier to quality credential of anything else. Certainly language skills, vocabulary, and as long as algebra is a gateway to a College Credential we need to focus on it. Bonnie i will pick up on that with you. I remember when i have the privilege of working with arnold and danny and starting out of the l. A. AfterSchool Program in middle schools, is that we also heard the importance of algebra. Especially middle school, it has to be fun or the kids will not stay. There not required to be there. I remember learning how afterSchool Programs use quote disguised learning. They would use a cooking class to teach fractions. Gerard, i will go to you first. Monica you also focus on this. From your perspective, what are the good unique ways that afterSchool Programs in school can help meet some of these academic gaps . Gerard several years ago my Foundation Sponsored a project where we interviewed 406 parents in four cities to figure out exactly what afterschool did for their children. A majority of the parents were low income. They had their children in afterSchool Programs that focused on the arts and the science. Some things they were getting in school, but it helps to supplement. What was particularly interesting, equestrian. Why . The parent with clear, we do not own a horse. Lets start with that. Number to it is learning to not only how to ride a horse, but how to feel the horse. That is understanding how to feel yourself. How to work with yourself. Number to the horse will gallop fast, do a calculation between start to finish. At the end of the day, the horse eats a lot of food. If youre not going to take care of the horse, how much would you put together every day and every week, it became math, science, kinesthetics, and otherwise. This is a kid who otherwise you would assume would never understand a horse other than maybe being a bookie. My father was a bookie and l. A. So i know how that works. The mother said, this will get him out of poverty. For me, i have seen unique programs change the lives of students, but also encourage parents to go back to school. Something we often dont talk about, the spillover effect. Bonnie monica, a similar question, you have one of the leading districts with an actual focus on afterschool. What you see, again, most of all these funds focus on the lower income populations, which does not have the same quality school, unfortunately as the wealthier children in those neighborhoods. What can they do, also can you pick up on what gerard said about Parent Involvement . Everyone in education knows the more likelihood for success is to involve parents. How does after school play a unique role in all of the above . Monica and the unified is 91 kids of color, and 84 of kids who qualify for free and reduced lunch. Kids who are English Learners in the neighborhood of 25 20 8 . All through your 28 . All through and a unified, and we are large, the afterSchool Programs are amazing. Things like cyber patriots, where kids are coming in and really exploring robotics. And then we win. Right now we have a team in baltimore participating. That is awesome. We also have an aquatics program. It brings us a whole set of pools so kids it is like what you are talking about about the horse. The experience of swimming is not something that is available everywhere. Our beyond the bell partners create the experience for our kids. That is really lifechanging. The other thing i want to share is we have an academic decathlon. In the world of the best of the best in l. A. Unifi, we provide ways that our students benefit from each other in the learning experiences. We want to say Different Levels of support. If you are in english learner, the ability to spend more time speaking with people. The ability to hear more people talking in english, that is very important. If you are a poor child. A kid he was not going to like we heard before, your environment is not going to go beyond a few blocks from the house. When you get on a bus and you go visit a college, a football stadium, whatever the field trip is, that is just building desire, dream, efficacy because you are beginning to imagine that world for yourself. Our afterSchool Programs and the partners that we work with, in l. A. Unified we have so many partners. We have organizations that come and say, i have resources, i have talent. I have people who care. We went to engage in school, not just the regular teachers, we love our teachers, but not just the credential kind of learning. Adults with talent that want to invest in the next generation. I have to tell you, i have never medicare and who does not care about their kids. One thing i want to say i have never met a parent who does not care about their kids. One thing i want to say about l. A. County, kids in probation that is at an alltime low. Why is that . We have better attendance. We try to eliminate the dropout factory. We still have a long way to go. We are conscious about the preservation prevention strategy. If we can keep you in school, we absolutely change our neighborhoods. If we can figure out a way to work with our committee colleges, work with the afterschool partners, we are building that support system around you that is helping you achieve what you are. Our parents want successful and supportive schools. I have to tell you, our afterschool folks, they are relentless in investing in the young people. I just think about it as a critical, it is a musthave. It is a musthave because it helps our kids, we have a hundred 80 days of schooling. We all know we need to do more. Those afterschool experiences, whatever they are, however they come to your school, they always pay off. Bonnie thank you. Oregon, obviously different from l. A. And california. As superintendent of the year obviously you know the importance of parental involvement. In l. A. We were are lucky us lucky because we have las best. We have afterschool allstars focused on middle schools. We take the kid all the way through. In your experience in oregon, tell us a little bit about what the best afterschool providers in organ are doing right for elementary schools, middle, and pick up on the point that monica made. While we are all, especially some of the state leaders here support trying to get more funding from state, together getting more from federal. It leverages a lot of private dollars. Monica talked about the local partners. Can you address or a lumen eight or illuminates the best of what is working. Collect the parental involvement peas, one of the most positive aspects is it gives all parents something to celebrate with her children. We see parents rallying around a child. If you have a kid who has not shown a passion, how do you wrap around and support that child . After school allows every child to explore and interest. Every child to develop a passion and loop the family and. In. The best programs offer courses for the parents. We offer ged classes and english and spanish classes in the community and many of the schools throughout oregon do that as well. That gives families the opportunity to Learn Together and show that learning is a forever process and really allows parents to feel like they are modeling positive behaviors for their kids. All of those factors combined give us a more educated citizenry in a community. They give us an opportunity for informal and her actions that are more positive. Often school is so structured and parents can sometimes feel intimidated to have a conversation with a teacher. If you instead say, we have been doing horticulture, we are going to have a harvest night and celebrate with a meal, would you come join us . That is a different environment and that gets parents in the door and helps them feel welcome in a school environment. They might previously a have not been so comfortable. Bonnie eloi, two questions that i have for you. One is to pick up on this partnership notion. The horseback riding, the swimming, and the value that is, to the student, maybe not academically, but educationally. The second question is, our Community Colleges and california in california are workrelated programs, nurse degrees and other things. Part of what today is about is how afterSchool Programs help prepare kids for the workforce. Community colleges are very focused on that. The two questions, the first is, pick up on these kinds of partnerships and the value of the horseback riding and pulls as you see it pools, as you see it. What are you seeing in other committee colleges that a middle school or high school could focus on to help make the College Students more ready . Eloi just as noted, this is about communities coming together to support the children in the community. As trinity colleges we really believe in this approach. Community colleges we really believe in this approach. We are not successful without partners, partners and the nonprofit world, k12 programmers partners, public universities all coming together and focusing on the use of the community. Youth of the community. These partnerships are going. We have College Promise programs popping out throughout the entire country. Those are focused on bringing a