An Evaluation of Elev8: A Community Schools Model

RFA and McClanahan Associates, Inc. are conducting a multi-year, mixed-methods evaluation of Elev8, a community schools initiative funded by Atlantic Philanthropies in four sites across the country–Baltimore, Chicago, New Mexico and Oakland. As a Community Schools model, Elev8 schools employ a team of Out-of-School Time (OST) staff, family advocates, medical professionals, a site director, and others. Since 2008, Atlantic’s evaluation effort has focused on generating information to help create and sustain the strongest initiative possible. As a result, the first five years of the evaluation were designed to ensure that the model was robustly implemented, and to assist the local sites in utilizing evaluation information to strengthen their efforts. The evaluation conducted by RFA and McClanahan Associates seeks to document how students fare in the program, and to contribute to the literature on community schools.