21st CCLC: State Education Agency

Sustainability Information Shared by Your Peers: New York

1. What is your sustainability requirement for your grantees?
   • The request for proposal required grantees to provide initial plans for sustainability.
   • There is no guarantee for continued funding beyond the initial grant, and all grantees are aware of this fact.
2. What is your strategy for helping your programs with sustainability?
   • All 21st CCLC grantees in New York are required to utilize the Program Quality Self-Assessment tool developed by the New York State Afterschool Network (NYSAN). The tool includes a section specifically on sustainability as well as a number of items that conform directly with the Finance Project's keys to sustainability.
   • Training on developing a sustainability plan has been provided at statewide trainings, including a keynote presentation by the Finance Project.
   • Several advisory board members have been trained as sustainability trainers and are making themselves available to grantees for technical assistance.
   • Training on sustainability planning is being provided to grantees through regionally developed events. To date, this has included a three-part series on sustainability components in the Hudson Valley region, a grant-writing training in the Capital District, and a sustainability-planning process in the Rochester area. Additional regional trainings will be offered in the coming year.
   • Regional representatives meet quarterly and have been planning additional efforts for sustainability for afterschool programs in their area.
3. What resources do you use and provide to grantees for sustainability? Can you share these resources?
   • We utilize a Program Quality Self-Assessment tool (Adobe^® Reader^® PDF 416KB) that directly relates to sustainability.
   • All grantees receive a newsletter called After School News from the New York State Center for School Safety. The newsletter uses the Program Quality Self-Assessment tool as a framework and includes sustainability tips as well as funding resources for every issue. All previous issues of the newsletter can be accessed at www.mhric.org/scss/21stcclc.html.
   • We recommend that programs use materials from the Finance Project's sustainability-planning process. We have provided grantees with links to the Finance Project's website, www.financeproject.org, on a number of occasions as well as pointed them to specific resources on that site through our newsletter by including printed resources in packets at statewide trainings. We also have recommended and distributed materials from the Afterschool Alliance and the Coalition for Community Schools.
4. At the state level, what type of leveraging are you doing to sustain 21st CCLC programs?

   New York engaged afterschool arena stakeholders as advisory board members as soon as the state was given the responsibility of administering the grant. That advisory board formally developed into NYSAN in 2003. Currently consisting of 12 organizations at the steering-committee level, NYSAN's objectives specifically include building local and state public and private support for expanding and sustaining high-quality afterschool opportunities.

   NYSAN activities supporting sustainability for afterschool programs statewide include the following:

   • Communication and Networking
     To create high-quality, accessible communication structures that will support programs on a regional basis, NYSAN will create a clearinghouse, website, database, and LISTSERV to link all afterschool providers to information, including current research, best practices, policy changes, funding opportunities, and each other.
   • Building Capacity and Supporting Quality Programs
     Through training, technical assistance, and the development of common program-quality standards, NYSAN will support quality programs through a common set of self-assessment quality indicators, statewide trainings and institutes, and a catalog of training and technical assistance produced on a regional basis.
   • Statewide Policy Development
     NYSAN will develop a common message to conduct briefings of elected and appointed educational policymakers, with the goal of having a positive impact on state regulations, developing common quality standards, building support for afterschool programs, and securing additional state resources. Up-to-date research will be shared readily throughout the network, allowing partners to be responsive quickly to changing fiscal environments and documenting existing unmet needs in the state.

   Additional information about NYSAN can be accessed on through the After-School Corporation Web at www.nysan.org.

5. What are your suggestions for sustainability?

   The following pages currently are under development for publication as part of our Program Quality Self-Assessment users' guide and represent suggestions for sustainability that will be provided to all grantees.