Dallas Afterschool

Dallas Afterschool's primary objective is to continue developing high quality afterschool programs for low-income children in Dallas. Going forward, our clients are taking on more intensive and long-lasting changes. While a step in the right direction, these efforts require more time and effort from both our staff and our clients. Our goal is that at least 65% of active (receiving Quality Advisor coaching) sites will implement at least five new indicators per school year. Given the urgent need to create safe, enriching afterschool experiences for children as quickly as possible, we will strive for both the percentage of sites that improve, as well as the amount of improvement, to be larger.

On-site staff coaches and mentors, called Quality Advisors, work with each site's program director to devise a custom plan for mastering the ten elements. Throughout the year, Quality Advisors bring staff training, one-on-one coaching, student curricula, volunteers, and other resources needed to support growth and improve areas of weakness.

While Dallas Afterschool was the first intermediary organization in Texas, it was modeled after other similar organizations across the country. We offer an objective, third-party point of view, and provides consulting and tools. Our Program Quality Initiative team is a group of passionate individuals with past experience in youth education and out-of-school-time. All of our site coaches have past experience running afterschool programs, so their coaching and advice comes from a place of true knowledge and understanding. The tool we use to define and assess elements of high quality programs is based on research from the Weikart Center for Youth Program Quality and the National Institute of Out of School Time. This research synthesized best practices that programs should employ to promote a safe and meaningful environment for youth participants. It defined indicators of these best practices; what one would look for to recognize high quality policies, procedures, and activities in a program. The Program Quality Initiative's assessment tool rates the the quality and degree to which each indicator has been implemented on a four-point scale.

Dallas Afterschool has made significant improvements in the local afterschool field, but there is still much more to be done. We are still the only organization in North Texas focused on raising the level of professionalism and quality in the local afterschool field, and there are still 100,000 children in Dallas County who have no program (safe or unsafe) to go to after school. Our vision is that every child will have access to quality afterschool and summer programs that promote his or her intellectual, emotional, social, and physical development.