Case studies: Oakland's community schools in action

“Community schools” are public schools that provide support that extends beyond the traditional classroom to meet the specific needs of students and families within their neighborhoods. This may involve healthcare and mental health services, food banks, afterschool programs, and more.

When the Oakland Unified School District (OUSD) began its transition to a community school model, it engaged the Gardner Center to study and document the implementation. This series is just one of the products of that partnership.

The challenge

The Oakland Unified School District serves large numbers of socioeconomically disadvantaged students who face challenges like food and housing insecurity as well as lack of access to healthcare and mental health services. In the school setting, this led to poor student attendance, behavioral problems, high suspension rates, and challenges with teacher retention. While the district had access to many resources, there was a lack of coordination due to independent budgets, separate reporting lines, and different norms across schools.

The solution

The community school model created new support systems for OUSD students and families, but leadership from school principals and the newly hired community school managers was crucial in building trust with students, families, faculty, staff, and community partners. Success in the long term has also been driven by distributed leadership that spreads authority and responsibility among support staff, families, and even youth in the upper grades.

Some of the practical solutions included hiring full-time mental health counselors, connecting families to the county food bank and the state’s food stamps program, and bringing healthy breakfasts into the classroom. Improved test scores and decreases in suspensions are just two concrete measures that demonstrate how these changes have made a difference.

The Gardner Center documented these and other best practices so that schools interested in the model could learn from and adapt them for their own settings.

Key takeaways

Community schools provide services and supports that go well beyond the traditional classroom to create better student outcomes. Success depends upon a new understanding of school from the entire community, commitment from school leaders, and new models of leadership, including:

Principals and community school managers who devote time and effort to an intensive input process involving all stakeholders

Staff members who share a new vision of education and adapt to new roles and governance models

Parents who participate in focus groups and other activities designed to give them a voice in public education

Public agencies and nonprofits that respond in creative ways to students’ needs