Education Week reports on a paper just released from UCLA’s UCLA Center for Mental Health in Schools that’s fairly critical of how many community schools operate.

I’ve got to say that I was less-than-impressed by the report.

I certainly have been critical (see The Best Resources For Learning About Community Schools) of a number of community schools’ efforts, particularly what is often a lack of parent engagement (many tend to look at families as “clients” instead of “partners”), but the report doesn’t even mention that problem.

Despite that criticism, though, I’m convinced that pretty much any kind of “Community School” that offers additional services is an asset, but it doesn’t appear that the report’s authors necessarily agree. I’ve got to wonder how many, if any, community schools the authors actually visited. Their critiques tend to be a bit polemic rather than practically useful.

It does say a Community Schools effort should be schools-led, which is good, but I don’t think there’s much of a question about that point, anyway.

I’m very open to hearing other opinions, including ones that suggest I’m being too harsh in my assessment.