Schools today, particularly those in our nation's inner cities, are faced with the challenge of serving an increasingly diverse student population that is academically at risk. Problems of great severity exist for many children and families; central among them are inadequate learning and low self-esteem, compounded by stressful life experiences, poor health care, and highly fragmented patterns of service delivery. Solutions to these problems require insights and expertise drawn from many disciplines and professions, and collaboration between family, school, and community. Toward this end, the Community for Learning program (formerly known as the Learning City Program) was developed to bring what is known to work to bear in efforts to achieve the learning success and competence of children and youth in inner-city schools. The Community for Learning (CFL) includes an instructionally powerful education program that is responsive to the diverse learning needs of students, and a comprehensive and coordinated school-linked related services delivery system that focuses on fostering healthy development and learning of every student. This Spotlight provides a summary of findings on the impact of the implementation of the Community for Learning program on student outcomes in an inner-city middle school. 
 

Structurally, Sunrise is organized into three houses. Students are placed randomly in one of the three vertically organized house structures, located on different floors of the school building. Within each house, teaching teams have common weekly preparatory time to facilitate cross-curricular planning and problem solving. 
 

Two types of data were collected to analyze the impact of the CFL implementation on student outcomes: (a) students' perceptions about their classroom and school learning environments, using a survey instrument designed for this purpose (CEIC, 1991); and (b) student achievement in reading and math, based on district-wide standardized test results.

Students' Perceptions of Their Classroom/School Environment  

Figure 1 (available in print copy) provides a summary of findings from the survey on students' perceptions about their classroom and school learning environments (CEIC, 1991). As shown in Figure 1, a Multiple Analysis of Variance (MANOVA) revealed significant differences in the students' overall perceptions of their classroom/school learning environments. Students enrolled in CFL classes felt that their instructional/learning environments were more multicultural, social, active, nontraditional, and interdisciplinary, and indicated that classroom environments offered more affiliation, guidance, teacher support, and participation, when compared with students not enrolled in CFL classes. Students enrolled in CFL classes also acknowledged a higher rate of constructive feedback, higher student aspirations, more positive self-concepts, and a clearer sense of the rules governing class and school learning environments. In addition, a pattern of increased attendance among CFL students was observed during program implementation.

Follow-up Study

Since high school drop out rate is a particularly severe problem among students in inner-city high schools, the enrollment status of program graduates was considered to be one of the critical indicators of program impact. A follow-up study was conducted to assess the long-term effects of the Community for Learning program on student outcomes, focusing in particular on addressing whether the significant differences in student outcomes between CFL and non-CFL students would be maintained during high school years. The Community for Learning program was not implemented in the eight high schools attended by students who graduated from Sunrise Middle School. 

Of the regular education students enrolled in CFL classes who attended a comprehensive high school or were enrolled in a vocational program, 81% remained enrolled three years after middle school graduation, in comparison to only 40% of the regular education students not enrolled in CFL classes. In addition, 100% of the special education students integrated into CFL regular education classes in middle school were still attending one of the comprehensive high schools or were enrolled in a vocational program three years after graduation, as compared to 52% of the non-CFL special education students. 

The achievement of CFL students were particularly noteworthy. Fifty percent of the CFL regular education students were able to maintain their grade level placement in high school, and 43% of the CFL special education students who were integrated in the regular education classes in middle school were able to maintain their grade level placement in regular classes in high school. In contrast, only 26% of the non-CFL regular education students, and 17% of non-CFL special education students, maintained their grade level placement.

In spite of the multitude of "special" and/or "compensatory or remedial" programs that have been instituted to improve educational achievement for students requiring "greater-than-usual" educational and related services support, many students have difficulty achieving learning success and need better help than they are now receiving. If all students are to successfully complete a basic education through equal access to a common curriculum, the way in which schools respond to the diversity of student needs must undergo major conceptual and structural changes. Improvement efforts must take into consideration the learning context and require collaboration and coordination among professionals on a scale never previously attempted. 

Program implementation must be a shared responsibility of all stakeholder groups at the grassroots level to address the multiple, co-occurring "risks" prevalent in the lives and learning of many inner-city children, who are placed further at risk because of the inadequate education they receive. The Community for Learning program represents one attempt to find ways to reduce the co-occurring risks that surround many inner-city children and families. Findings on implementation of CFL suggest the feasibility and potential for significant improvements. 

Wang, M. C. (1996). The Learning City Program: A Planning Guide for Implementation. Philadelphia: National Center on Education in the Inner Cities. 

National Center on Education in the Inner Cities. (1991). Student Survey-Elementary [survey instrument developed by the National Center on Education in the Inner Cities as part of a research project funded by the Office of Educational Research and Improvement of the U.S. Department of Education]. Philadelphia: Author. 

Wang, M. C. (1992). Adaptive Education Strategies. Baltimore: Paul H. Brooks.