Gardner Center Initiative on Alternative Schools

During the Gardner Center's first decade, the Stuart Foundation provided funding that established the Gardner Center Initiative on Alternative Schools, led by the center's founder Milbrey McLaughlin and Jorge Ruiz de Velasco to understand and study efforts to improve California’s alternative schools — and ultimately develop recommendations for further improvements.

The challenge

Alternative schools were originally designed to help young immigrants in California's Central Valley learn while working agrarian jobs. Today, they serve tens of thousands of students who have fallen behind academically for reasons ranging from homelessness to language barriers. Unfortunately, these schools have been historically underresourced and the outcomes of its students poorly tracked.

“To the extent that these kids have been visible, it’s been in the most negative sense,” observed Milbrey McLaughlin. “They’re seen as dropouts, thugs, addicts, throwaways. The problem, however, isn’t the kids. Traditional schools have failed them.”

The solution

With funding to tackle this challenge, the Gardner Center launched almost two decades of work that began with tours of 40 alternative schools across the state. The center's body of work over that time, its leadership, and ongoing collaborations with educators and policymakers has made it a leading expert in the field.

The Stuart Foundation and the William & Flora Hewlett Foundation, which joined the effort, have supported this work with dedicated funding of over two million dollars, including recent grants to update the center's seminal 2012 report "Raising the Bar, Building Capacity: Driving Improvement in California’s Continuation High Schools." This effort will inform California's upcoming redesign of an accountability system for alternative schools, scheduled for 2026.

Key takeaways

Meaningful, systemic change takes time. Over the course of almost two decades, the Gardner Center has been able to bring together educators, policymakers, and researchers to develop research-informed solutions that ensure students are better off as a result of their time in alternative school settings.

That work has included:

The creation of a comprehensive picture of the largely hidden alternative school system, as well as recommendations to improve the system

The development of processes and procedures for placing students in alternative schools, as well as measuring their success

Case studies documenting best practices at alternative schools across the state, as well as the launch of a collaborative of educators who convene regularly to learn from one another.