New Article: A Moment of Promise for the Community Schools Movement

Posted by Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity on November 29, 2022

In this Spotlight Exclusive, Marcus Ransom, senior associate at Freedman Consulting, discusses the community schools movement and how the current academic landscape can better serve students and families, with support from government and philanthropy. In a recent article, Ransom highlighted the impact of the pandemic on educational achievement and student health and the game of catch-up schools must play in order to combat these regressive effects. “Schools remain the gateway for economic and social mobility,” Ransom notes, explaining that shortcomings of publics schools correlate to the economic and educational success of the 70% of U.S. students who attend local schools. The community schools’ approach aims to redesign the public school system in ways that would support students and families and mitigate poverty and inequality through integrated student support, collaboration, community engagement, and learning enrichment. Ransom says that “examining the education sector is a really concrete way to examine exactly what’s happening in our country and how racial and economic disparities are playing out.”

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