Community Learning Centers
Transforming Schools Into Lifelong Learning Centers

A community learning center (CLC) is a school by day—and a school by night. It’s also a year-round meeting place, a center for delivering community services, the heart of a neighborhood. At the end of the regular school day, or in some cases while it’s still under way, a community learning center operates adult education programs and other services that are needed in its neighborhood. Leadership and decision making are shared among community stakeholders.

HOW DOES A CLC LOOK IN ACTION?
A fourth-grader at Concord Elementary School, where the YMCA coordinates the community learning center, might spend after-school hours Monday and Wednesday in a drama class rehearsing “Romeo and Juliet.” On Tuesday and Thursday she gets homework help in Spanish, the language she speaks at home, followed by a martial arts class taught at the center by a community organization. On Friday after school, a center staff member takes the girl to swim lessons at a Seattle Parks Department pool. On Monday night, her mom visits the center for an ESL class; her dad is in the computer lab on Thursday night, learning to compose a résumé. The family knows that if times get bad, they can find help at the center’s food bank.

WHAT SERVICES ARE AVAILABLE?
Just to name a few: technology labs, tutoring, book clubs, food banks, and classes in yoga, ESL, photography, drama, African dance, African drumming, cooking. Services are targeted to the needs of the students, families and community served.

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WHY ARE WE CREATING CLCS?

• Children spend about 20 percent of their waking hours in school. Many hours each school day—and 185 full days a year—are free for either risk or opportunity. (The Future of Children, 1999; Miller et al., 1997)
  
• Only 38 percent of Seattle residents experience “social cohesion” in their neighborhoods, the United Way’s Community Counts 2000 reports. People with lower incomes experience even less connectedness in their neighborhoods.
  
  

WHAT BENEFITS DOES A CLC PROVIDE?
Increased academic performance by students. Better access to high quality, affordable child care for working families. Decreased academic performance gaps among students in various ethnic and socioeconomic groups. Fewer students getting into trouble after school. More opportunities for families to be involved in education. Better access to learning resources for the whole community.

WHAT DOES IT TAKE TO MAKE A CLC EFFECTIVE?
While every center is different because it is created by its own neighborhood, successful ones have a few things in common:

• Strong coordinating provider. Each center chooses its coordinating organization through an open process. The first coordinators, selected in 2000, were the YMCA of Greater Seattle, Boys & Girls Clubs of King County, and Tiny Tots Development Center. The coordinator’s first job is to furnish students with high quality before- and after-school activities that align with school learning standards. Next, the coordinator teams up with other organizations to establish classes and programs that will benefit the rest of community.
  
• Full-time site director. The site director fosters communication between the regular school staff and all the other community partners who use the building.
  
• Principal and staff readiness. A key to success for a community learning center is the participation and support of school administrators and staff.
  
• Advisory board. The board’s role is to provide guidance and direction to the center. It includes the principal, key staff, parents and family members of students, students, community volunteers, and local religious and business leaders.

WHO PAYS FOR CLCS?
Funding sources vary, much like the communities the centers represent. They include Seattle Public Schools, individual schools, the City of Seattle, the federal government, private foundations like the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and corporations like the Boeing Company.

WHO ARE THE COMMUNITY PARTNERS?
The Seattle School District’s Office for Community Learning leads the program. Primary partners are the YMCA of Greater Seattle, Seattle Parks Department, Urban Impact, Tiny Tots Development Center, Powerful Schools, School’s Out Washington, and the Evergreen Training and Evaluation.

Seattle Public Schools' list of Community Learning Centers and contacts.
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