August 16, 2012

The educational achievement and attainment of young people in the United States, especially disadvantaged children, has been a longstanding concern. As the nation continues to debate education reforms, one approach has gained some momentum in recent years, that of extending learning time for students - for example, through a longer school day or year, or through academic services offered during out-of-school time. Evidence regarding the effectiveness of extended learning time approaches may be useful to schools, communities, and funders considering investments in extending learning opportunities. The Wallace Foundation commissioned Child Trends to conduct an extensive review of the evidence on the effectiveness of school-based and community-based extended learning time approaches. Child Trends latest report, Expanding Time for Learning Both Inside and Outside the Classroom: A Review of the Evidence Base, synthesizes the results of more than 80 evaluations of extended learning time approaches.  

The evidence suggests that extended learning time approaches, including extended school day (ESD) and extended school year (ESY) models as well as expanded learning opportunities (ELO) programs that provide academic supports during non-school hours, can be effective in improving educational outcomes for students. Findings also suggest that well-implemented extended learning time programs may be more advantageous for low-income, low-performing or otherwise disadvantaged students. It is worth noting that the research clearly indicates that adding more time does not seem to matter much if that time is not used well. Many of the programs that were found not to work suffered from low participation levels and poor implementation.

Although initial findings are promising, they are limited by a lack of rigorous, random assignment evaluations of ESD and ESY approaches and a small number of random assignment studies examining the impacts of ELO programs on educational outcomes. More rigorous research is needed to build a stronger evidence base to inform education reform efforts.