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Dreamstime
The Hechinger Report
Summer and after-school programs — five ways to provide for the other half of education amid the coronavirus
What districts can learn from New York City about providing youth services
By Alison Overseth and Jen Siaca Curry
June 2, 2020
It’s the largest school district in the country and at the epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic.
That’s why all eyes are on the New York City Department of Education’s next move.
What will happen to more than a million public-school students in the
fall of 2020? Will schooling resume as normal? Be fully remote? A
blended model, in which students attend school on certain days and
learn from home on others?
We simply don’t know.
What we do know is the field of youth services cannot afford to wait
for answers before preparing for what’s to come. Our field serves
approximately half of the city’s children in after-school and summer
programs, providing critical supports that contribute to academic,
social, emotional and physical development. Research has shown time and
again how critical such programs are, with outcomes that range from
academic achievement and developing resilience to readiness for college
and careers.
Our new reality will require different skills, approaches and
structures to properly provide youth development opportunities. Below
are five ways in which the field of youth services can begin to prepare
for what lies ahead.
Double down on social-emotional learning (SEL). This is what our field
does best. The social and emotional needs of children have never been
greater, and it’s time to prepare ourselves for everything from an
increased need to redirect behavior the longer that children are out of
their usual routines to the impact of trauma from illness, loss and
economic strain on families. Isolation by itself is linked to
developmental setbacks for children, and much of what they will need in
the fall will be social and emotional support. Youth-serving agencies
should ensure that staff are well-prepared both to (re)build children’s
social-emotional skills and to address more serious mental health
issues by offering high-quality staff training on SEL, hiring
professional staff such as social workers and building referral systems
with partners able to handle more severe situations.
Build an understanding of formative assessments and instructional
differentiation. We will likely face what some researchers have dubbed
the “COVID-slide,”similar to summer learning loss, in which students
may retain only 70 percent of their 2019-20 reading progress and
anywhere from half to all of their academic growth in math from the
last year. Students’ academic experiences since mid-March have varied
significantly, often due to differing levels of access to technology
and other resources. While schools will bear most of this burden,
youth-services providers can help students recover from learning loss
by learning more about how to assess children’s academic progress to
better tailor homework help, tutoring and enrichment activities to
their needs. Furthermore, youth-serving agencies and schools might find
new ways to work together to support academic growth, leveraging each
partner’s expertise to assign work and keep youth engaged in learning
through fun, hands-on activities.
Provide extra training for staff as they prepare to deliver virtual
programs. While our field has masterfully responded with virtual
after-school programs that have included everything from group dance
parties to one-on-one tutoring in online breakout rooms, we can now use
lessons learned to design virtual programs for the fall, should we need
them. Staff should be trained in leading online activities, including
how to ensure accessibility for youth of all abilities, manage behavior
remotely and maximize tools such as Google Classroom and Zoom. Leaders
should prepare to create policies that address key questions: Who is
responsible for supervising children during remote activities? How do
we ensure privacy? What does it mean to maintain equity and inclusion
in a virtual program? What are the expectations of staff? Codifying
these policies now will lead to a much smoother start-up in the fall.
Plan for a variety of schedules. If schools are open only to some
students each day, there will be groups of students who will have to
stay home — but this may not be viable when families go back to work.
Under this scenario, youth-services providers may be tapped to provide
child care and space for remote learning on days when students aren’t
in school. Alternatively, schools may need more staff during the day to
accommodate smaller group sizes, and youth-services providers may be
asked to provide staff. Getting ready for a range of realities now will
allow youth-serving organizations to hit the ground running — and
potentially take advantage of new funding and partnership opportunities.
Survey and analyze your workforce. Now is the time to consider your
staffing needs. If operations are virtual in the fall, how many staff
will be needed? What skills and competencies will they need to have?
(Hint: They are not likely the same skills and competencies you needed
last year.) For staff who are in college, what will their fall semester
look like? What about staff who are immunocompromised? Without asking
personal (or illegal!) questions of staff, opening a line of
communication will generate helpful dialogue as you sort out staffing
for the fall.
As we prepare to support the youth-services field in these areas, we
invite youth development practitioners, funders, educators, parents and
others to contact us with ideas, questions and concerns so we can best
help the field prepare for whatever we’ll need to ensure that children
have the vital services and connections they deserve in September.
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