Challenge

Boston Public Schools (BPS) partners with hundreds of community-based partners to provide access to high-quality services and programs that meet the needs of all students. Yet BPS did not have a way of measuring the effectiveness of the partnerships between schools and external programs or the impact that each program was having on their students.

Overview

In 2012, Root Cause partnered with BPS to develop the Community Partnership Framework, a partnership management system to strategically organize the programs working across BPS to meet the needs of students. This system set the foundation for future work with BPS.

In 2014, Root Cause began working with the BPS Office of Institutional Advancement and Partnerships (the Office) to support its vision of ensuring equitable access to effective partnerships providing high-quality services that ensure all students achieve at high levels. BPS partnered with Root Cause to implement activities related to the Office’s work to understand student needs, provide quality services, and ensure effective partnerships. The activities Root Cause led included:

• Developing a BPS Partnership Effectiveness Framework to ensure the relationships between schools and community partners operating within them were strong
• Developing a Program Quality Framework that community partners had to fulfill in order to work with BPS students
• Creating a partnership best practices toolkit that aligned with Principal Evaluation Standards

Root Cause piloted the Partnership Effectiveness Framework in two BPS schools and the Program Quality Framework with five partners.

Based on the success of and learnings from the pilot of the Program Quality Framework, Boston Public Schools (BPS) launched the Opportunity Portfolio as a key strategy for identifying and increasing equitable access to quality learning opportunities. The Opportunity Portfolio uses a comprehensive vetting and assessment process to identify high-quality community partners and provide them with a variety of supports intended to grow their services within schools.

As of the 2018-2019 academic year, Boston Public Schools manages the effectiveness of its partnerships through The Office of School-Community Partnerships. They implemented an evaluation using seven elements (shown in the table below), which comprise 23 individual indicators to measure effectiveness of school-community partnerships. These seven elements are part of Boston Public Schools’ “Tools for Strengthening Partnership Effectiveness.”

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Coordinated ServicesProcess exists to ensure alignment both across partners and between partners and the school.Distributive LeadershipThe school leader delegates authority around partnerships to others as appropriate, including school point of contacts identified for each partner.Shared AccountabilityAgreements are in place that provide a scope of service and clearly defined roles and expectations for the school and partners.Results DrivenSchool and partners use data to continuously evaluate achievement of, or progress towards, shared, mutually set goals.Effective CommunicationThere are formal meetings throughout the school year during which the school and partners regularly talk about the overall state of the partnership.SustainabilitySchool and partners utilize blended funding sources, including non-traditional or alternative sources.