National Center on Afterschool and Summer Enrichment Resource Library

Child care providers must view their meaningful work as a business and plan and prepare for its sustainability and growth. This tip sheet will provide ideas and resources to support sustainable, quality school-age care. Readers will gain a fundamental understanding of budgeting, marketing, and staffing business practices. Additionally, this tip sheet provides a resource that aids in writing survey questions that will accurately measure the opinions, experiences, and behaviors of the communities providers serve.  

This issue brief from the Sperling Center for Research and Innovation (SCRI) explores qualitative findings from surveys with summer 2021 staff to identify strategies to help in recruiting and retaining staff. Strategies include a focus on relationships and collaboration, supportive leadership, ensuring flexibility and autonomy, opportunities for personal and professional growth, and additional support staff. A companion toolkit called the Staff Recruitment, Hiring, and Retention Guide includes tip sheets, a rubric for hiring enrichment staff, and other planning tools; it can be found here.  https://www.sperlingcenter.org/resource/staffing-toolkit-for-out-of-school-time-learning-programs/ 

This video series by the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence consists of seven staff development videos plus companion reflections and activities for both staff and youth that are being released in batches in winter/spring 2023. They teach adults the skills and tools of emotional intelligence, specifically, how to learn/improve and then teach youth RULER skills--Recognizing, Understanding, Labeling, Expressing, and Regulating emotions.

This user-friendly toolkit includes a wealth of resources and examples needed to start or grow a program. It has four sections: (1) Starting a program; (2) Running a program; (3) Sustaining a program; and (4) Getting help. Within each section there are links to existing program start-up guides, connections to curriculum and professional development, funding, marketing and media, and partnerships. This resource supports equity.  

Temescal Associates sponsored this webinar to explore the concerns being raised about youth mental health following their return to school and afterschool after the COVID shutdown. It features Dr. Gil Noam from Partnerships in Education and Resiliency (PEAR) and a panel with Eric Gurna, consultant and former President of LA's Best, and Diane Carrillo from ARC-Experience. With surveys indicating that 30 percent of youth need intervention, and the shortage of mental health clinicians, the panel explores the role out-of-school can play in supporting youth mental health through trauma-informed practice and in providing routine and structure, physical outlets, positive behavior management, and helping youth learn self-management through activities like yoga and mindfulness. This resource supports resiliency.

This professional development module addresses the benefits of, and strategies for including school-age children in home-based child care (HBCC) settings. It can be accessed via the Individualized Professional Development (iPD) Portfolio section the Early Childhood Knowledge Learning Center (ECKLC) website. Users receive three (3) contact education units (CEUs) for completing the module, knowledge check and evaluation.

This Fall 2022 issue of AfterSchool Today highlights current field efforts and promising practices to build a future that provides professionals with job quality commensurate with their contributions and impact. It includes the voices of direct care staff and what they need, and examples about compensation, leadership development, and career pathway strategies.

This webinar explores partnerships between Tribal nations and other partners to build promising practices. Examples were shared on partnerships to reduce turnover, increase language revitalization, and support workforce efforts with tribal colleges. The Tribal Early Learning Initiative (TELI) which works with partners on system-building efforts was highlighted. This resource supports equity.

With programs hiring many new staff, this resource from Temescal Associates provides “Basics” professional development resources developed by Temescal and The How Kids Learn Foundation with links for free, easy access. Also included are worksheets, discussion guides, and other resources to support programs in leading their own professional development and reflection activities on topics like youth development, social-emotional learning, relationships, self-care, grief and loss, preparing youth for the workforce, and other curriculum guides.

This webinar by the National Center on Early Childhood Quality Assurance and the National Center on Subsidy Innovation and Accountability provides an overview on the impact of improved subsidy practices on provider budgets and CCDF budgets. It includes how the Provider Cost of Quality Calculator (PCQC) can be used for a narrow cost analysis or to estimate program costs associated with various policy decisions. The focus is on the Lead Agency steps for internal use of the PCQC, and considerations for using the default values for operating costs or incorporating Lead Agency-specific data.