Maryland After-School Community Grant Program

Maryland After-School Community Grant Program

OVERVIEW

The Maryland After-School Community Grant Program is a school-based after-school program that combines academic assistance, attendance incentives, and the All Stars curriculum with traditional after-school program activities. It is designed to reduce unsupervised socializing and conduct problems, and increase positive peer influence, school bonding, academic performance, social competence, prosocial attitudes and beliefs, and school attendance. Positive impacts were found for unsupervised socializing, but not for any of the other outcomes.

DESCRIPTION OF PROGRAM

Target population: Children in grades 4 through 8

The Maryland After-School Community Grant Program is an enhanced after-school program that aims to reduce unsupervised socializing and conduct problems, and increase positive peer influence, school bonding, academic performance, social competence, prosocial attitudes and beliefs, and school attendance. Children attend the program for three hours after the regular school day, three days a week, for thirty weeks. Six hours a week are spent on traditional after-school program activities, such as snack, sports, board games, movies, field trips, computer time, and crafts. The remaining three hours are spent on academic assistance, an attendance incentive system, and the All Stars curriculum. Academic assistance is group-based and mostly involves supervised homework assistance. Reading and math workbook activities are available to students who do not have homework, and books are available for independent reading. The attendance incentive system includes a weekly ceremony to give praise and award points to students for good attendance and improvements in attendance. Points can then be used to purchase prizes. The All Stars curriculum is completed in groups. It teaches skills necessary for healthy decisions and helps children develop attitudes and beliefs that are inconsistent with substance use other risk behaviors. The cost per student is about $2,500.

EVALUATIONS OF PROGRAM

Gottfredson, D.C., Cross, A.B., Wilson, D.M., Rorie, M., & Connel, N. (2010). A randomized trial of the effects of an enhanced after-school program for middle school students. Final report submitted to the U.S. Department of Education Institute for Educational Sciences.

Evaluated population: 447 students in grades 6 through 8 from five public middle schools in Baltimore County. The average age of participants was 12 years, and 54 percent were male. Seventy percent of the sample was African American, and 59 percent received free or reduced meals at school. The program was open to all students, but principals were asked to encourage high-risk students to participate.

Approach: Students were randomly assigned to the treatment or to a control condition, which represented “treatment as usual,” and involved one after-school activity each month, such as a special event or party. However, only 48 percent of the control group attended the activities. Students in the control group were allowed to participate in other after-school activities, and 96 percent participated in an organized after-school activity. Data were collected through student surveys and school records before and after the intervention, and through teacher ratings at post-test only on the outcomes of unsupervised socializing, positive peer influence, school bonding, social competence, prosocial/antidrug attitudes, school attendance, academic performance, and conduct problems.

Results: There was a positive impact on unsupervised socializing. There were no post-test differences between the students who received the intervention and those in the control group on measures of conduct problems, academic performance, school attendance, prosocial/antidrug attitudes, social competence, school bonding, or positive peer influence.

Cross, A.B., Gottfredson, D.C., Wilson, D.M., Rorie, M., & Connel, N. (2009). The impact of after-school programs on the routine activities of middle-school students: Results from a randomized, controlled trial. Criminology & Public Policy, 8, 391-412.

Evaluated population: 416 students from five middle schools in an urban school district. The sample was 52 percent male, and 58 percent received subsidized meals. The sample was 71 percent African American, 17 percent Caucasian, 8 percent multiracial, and 4 percent other. The average age was 12 years.

Approach: Students were randomly assigned to the treatment or the control condition, which was the same as in the previous study. Data were collected from self-report surveys of the students at baseline and following the intervention on unsupervised socializing, delinquency, and drug use (alcohol, cigarettes, or marijuana) in the previous month.

Results: A positive impact was found for unsupervised socializing, but there was no impact on delinquency or drug use.

SOURCES FOR MORE INFORMATION

References

Gottfredson, D.C., Cross, A.B., Wilson, D.M., Rorie, M., & Connel, N. (2010). A randomized trial of the effects of an enhanced after-school program for middle-school students. Final report submitted to the U.S. Department of Education Institute for Educational Sciences.

KEYWORDS: Children (3-11), Adolescents (12-17), Middle School, Males and Females (Co-ed), High-Risk, Urban, School-based, Cost, After-School Program, Attendance, Academic Achievement/Grades, Other Education, Substance Use, Social Skills/Life Skills, Aggression/Bullying, Delinquency

Program information last updated on 12/15/10.

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