The Harvard Family Research Project separated from the Harvard Graduate School of Education to become the Global Family Research Project as of January 1, 2017. It is no longer affiliated with Harvard University.
Who is the Afterschool Workforce?
Beth Miller, senior research advisor to the National Institute for Out-of-School Time (NIOST), and Ellen Gannett, codirector of NIOST, discuss the characteristics of the after school workforce.
Whole Children, Whole Families, Whole Communities
Jonathan Zaff and Danielle Butler from America’s Promise Alliance look at how winners of the 100 Best Communities for Young People employ family involvement strategies.
Why evaluate after school programs?
Olatokunbo (Toks) Fashola, Associate Research Scientist at the Johns Hopkins University Center for Research on the Education of Students Placed at Risk (CRESPAR), reveals the steps new programs can take to initiate evaluation.
Why Facebook Matters for Nonprofits
Katie Chun of HFRP discusses the growing momentum and collateral challenges of Facebook as the next major vehicle for nonprofits.
Why Thinking of Family Engagement as Continuous Across Time Matters
A key principle in the definition of family engagement is that it is continuous across time. In this commentary, we explore why thinking of family engagement in this way matters, and we learn about tools educators can use to develop the skills to promote it.
Why We Need a Human Centered Approach to Family Engagement
Cultivating empathy can inspire educators to respond with more inclusive and equitable practices to engage families.
Why We Need to Slow Down When It Comes to Evaluation
Read about lessons HFRP has learned from supporting evaluation efforts in the field. This commentary highlights the value of investing time to carefully consider the theory behind a program for evaluation to yield usable and actionable information.
Why, When, and How to Use Evaluation: Experts Speak Out
This brief offers expert commentary on the implications of the first-year report of the national evaluation of the 21st Century Community Learning Centers program for future evaluation and research. It includes a methodological critique of that study, written by Deborah Vandell.
Free. 8 Pages.
WIDE: Using Networked Technologies to Promote Professional Development
Stone Wiske and David Eddy Spicer, from the Harvard Graduate School of Education, describe the school's Wide-Scale Interactive Development for Educators program
Working It Out: The Chronicle of a Mixed-Method Analysis
Chapter in Discovering Successful Pathways in Children's Development: Mixed Methods in the Study of Childhood and Family Life. Edited by Thomas S. Weisner. Published by University of Chicago Press. This chapter chronicles a mixed-method analysis of family involvement in children's learning, drawing observations about the process and added value of combining methods.
Working With Families in the Rural South: Findings From the REA-Funded Promising Readers Program
In an elementary school in the rural south, parents, preservice teachers, and others come together to strengthen children's literacy and learn from their experiences with children and one another.
Free. Available online only.
Working With Logic Models to Evaluate a Policy and Advocacy Program
Authors from the Institute for Health Policy Studies at the University of California, San Francisco describe how they used both macro-level and individual grantee logic models to drive the evaluation design of the Clinic Consortia Policy and Advocacy Program.
Xavier de Souza Briggs on Community Building
Xavier de Souza Briggs, founder of the Art and Science of Community Problem-Solving Project at Harvard University, discusses the limitations and possibilities of using evaluation to improve community building.
Xavier de Souza Briggs on Community Building: Expanded Web Only Version
Xavier de Souza Briggs, founder of the Art and Science of Community Problem-Solving Project at Harvard University, discusses the limitations and possibilities of using evaluation to improve community building in an expanded web only version of the printed article.
Year-Round Learning: Continuity in Education Across Settings and Time Through Expanded Learning Opportunities
This brief provides examples of year-round learning programs along with recommendations for policymakers looking for ways to increase youth engagement in learning,
Free. Available online only.
Year-Round Learning: Linking School, Afterschool, and Summer Learning to Support Student Success
There is growing national discussion about the need to create a more expansive definition of learning to include all the ways that youth can access educational opportunities—not just through the traditional school model, but also through afterschool activities, time spent with the family, and increasingly, through interaction with digital media. This brief introduces and analyzes one approach to expanded learning that provides students—often in distressed areas—with access to quality learning environments across the year.
Young Latino Infants and Families: Parental Involvement Implications from a Recent National Study
This study provides a deeper understanding of how cultural practices combine with other factors to shape parenting behaviors among families in the United States in the first year of children's lives. Several findings provide information about ways in which practitioners and Latino families can more effectively engage with young Latino children to influence their cognitive, social, language, and literacy development—and therefore facilitate their school readiness.
Free. Available online only.
Youth Civic Engagement: Emerging Theory and Practice
Margaret Post from HFRP examines the emerging practice of youth civic engagement and describes current efforts to promote quality in this area.
Youth Empowerment Evaluation
Kristen Zimmerman and Nancy Erbstein, Co-Directors of Community LORE, reveal how their organization promotes and supports youth participation in research, evaluation, and planning.
Youth Involvement in Evaluation & Research
This brief draws on information collected from focus group interviews with representatives of 14 programs that are involving youth in their evaluation and research efforts. It examines the elements of successful youth involved research projects and offers short profiles of the 14 organizations included in the study.
Hard copy out of stock. Available online only.
Youth Out-of-School Time Participation: Multiple Risks and Developmental Differences
This paper examines whether youth who are at risk, according to child-, family-, school-, and neighborhood-level factors, are less likely to participate in out-of-school time activities, and whether the predictors depend on youth's age or socioeconomic status. Findings reveal that child- and family-level risks are most consistently related to youth's OST participation. However, these relationships emerge only in early and late adolescence, when youth have more autonomy in their decisions about non-school time use. For certain types of activities, namely those that require fees and financial commitments, contextual risks are more strongly associated with OST participation for higher SES families than for lower SES families.
Youth Reframe Questions of Educational Justice Through Participatory Action Research
María Elena Torre and Michelle Fine describe the process and potential of participatory action research with youth researchers to investigate race, ethnicity, class, and opportunity gaps in education.
YouthLearn: Using Technology to Create Meaningful Learning Experiences for Youth
Tony Streit, from Education Development Center, discusses the challenges and potential rewards of using technology to enhance learning in both formal and informal settings.
“As Long as I Got Breath, I'll Fight”: Participatory Action Research for Educational Justice
A participatory action project in the South Bronx explores how young people, their parents, and community members have mobilized for educational resources, opportunities, and the fulfillment of their dreams.
Free. Available online only.
“Cooking With Data” to Target Education Gaps
Craig Jerald of the Education Trust describes several basic ways of analyzing data to reveal a more complete picture of what education offers different groups of students.