I’ve previously written several posts about community schools. Typically, community schools are ones that host multiple social services, as well as regular school classes. Some of them, but I suspect not most, work with parents to design and structure their efforts. But even if they’re done through the lens of looking at parents as “clients” instead of “partners,” they are an honest effort at recognizing that schools need to be pro-active at responding to the issues outside their walls that affect students.

Providence’s Bailey Elementary School combines education, community outreach is the headline of an article today about community schools in Rhode Island.

Here’s an excerpt from the article:

“In our urban districts, we know that when kids come to school, they come with a whole lot of baggage,” said Rebecca Boxx, program director at Dorcas Place, an adult literacy center in Providence. “The educational system can’t handle that on its own. This is an effort to unite community partners and school districts behind one targeted goal: to increase academic achievement by providing family support.”

Last week, Bailey was one of seven schools statewide (and the only Providence public school) to come off the state Department of Education’s sanction list — those schools that have failed to make adequate yearly progress.

Brady and others are convinced that the “wraparound” social services available at Bailey helped the school meet more than 20 academic targets two years in a row.