01/07/2026
Great article from The Wallace Foundation and report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.
“They’re out-of-school-time (OST) programs, and they are a crucial component of child and youth development.
OST programs serve as a bridge between school, community, and home, whether before or after school, on weekends, or during the summer.
That growing sense of connection underscores one of the new NASEM report’s central findings: that youth development depends on alignment across systems, sectors, and supports.
‘The report makes it clear that youth learning and development does not happen in a vacuum,’ Moroney says. ‘We will only do better by young people if we coordinate supports and services in places across systems, and that was just crystal clear through the research.’”
What have we learned about youth development over the past 20 years—and where is the field headed next? In a new article, researchers Deborah Moroney and Thomas Akiva share insights on why out-of-school-time programs matter, and why their future depends on strong systems and support for the people who make them work. https://bit.ly/4qLaTWn
