In his latest book, Our Kids: The American Dream in Crisis, Harvard professor Robert Putnam describes with great clarity the starkly different experiences of kids living in the same community.

For many in the United States, the United Kingdom (UK) has been a standout among political powers because of its treatment of youth work—afterschool programming, voluntary services, job training, housing—as a public good.

We’re all for evidence-based policy making. But there are moments when the use of the “evidence” card just rings false. Brookings Senior Education Fellow Mark Dynarski’s reprised conclusion that existing research on afterschool programs does not support the current federal investment has that telltale clank.

Take a look at any set of youth issues that you hear people complain about in the news: youth mental health, youth violence, youth homelessness, you name it. Each of those issues is not squarely in the hands of any one federal, state or local agency to tackle. But because our government agencies aren’t set up to work together very well, they don’t typically tackle these issues very well.