Learning Opportunities for Children and Youth: Expanding Commitments, Blurring the Lines

This publication shares the argument that communities should "blur the lines" between learning that happens inside the school and out in the community, during and outside of the school day. Important reform and system-building efforts are focused on 1) building more connected and aligned learning experiences inside schools; 2) creating extended learning opportunities -- often in the form of after-school programs, on school grounds; 3) strengthening community-based supports and learning opportunities for young people, both structured and informal; and 4) bringing community resources into the school day, and bringing young people out into the community to learn as part of their everyday school experience. It is time that these four efforts to improve learning are connected into a larger, more coherent whole.