State education agencies play a critical role in establishing, administering, and sustaining high-quality extended learning opportunities. This role has increased over time, largely attributable to state administration of the 21st Century Community Learning Centers (21st CCLC) Program and the Supplemental Educational Services (SES) provisions of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act. It has also increased due to a growing number of states establishing and implementing ELOs specifically designed to meet state educational goals and objectives. An ongoing challenge is ensuring that students who need them most have access to high-quality programs. To achieve program quality at scale, the Council believes that it is imperative to invest in the capacity of state education agencies that have primary responsibility at the state level for implementing ELOs.

This toolkit aims to provide chief state school officers and state education agency staffs with resources and information to support your state-level efforts to establish, implement, and sustain high-quality extended learning opportunities (ELOs).

In creating this resource, the Council seeks to utilize technology as an important tool for connecting you to relevant resources in a timely fashion; facilitating the sharing of key resources and documents across states; and connecting you with other organizations that have made significant contributions to the ELO field.

Some of the content included in this Toolkit is adapted from and builds on our Policy Statement on Extended Learning Opportunities, enacted by the Council’s Board of Directors in 2006. Related content includes: a definition of extended learning opportunities; research on student outcomes related to participation in ELOs; information regarding the characteristics of successful programs; and recommended actions that states can take to expand or deepen their efforts in this area.

A focal point of this toolkit is highlighting state-level work related to implementing high-quality ELOs. So in the toolkit you will find ELO resources related to state-level policy and legislation; evaluation; standards and assessments; and tools. The state pages section includes information on state-level initiatives, and contact information for SEA administrators implementing ELO programs. By cataloging state-level work and resources, we intend for the toolkit to serve as your primary “go-to” place to learn more about what your peers in other state education agencies are doing.

Finally, we intend to use this toolkit to help state education agencies think about the issues of time and learning more broadly, and how extended learning opportunities can provide states a critical opportunity to rethink how time can utilized more effectively to support student learning.

This online toolkit gives us the ability to continually update and expand the contents over time, particularly as new developments occur in the field. We encourage you to submit or recommend additional resources; give us feedback on how you are using the toolkit and how it might be improved; and share it with your colleagues in your state department of education.

To submit a resource for inclusion in the ELO Toolkit, please send an e-mail to elo@ccsso.org, that includes the title of the resource; the state name; and, if possible, a copy or link to the resource.

This toolkit was developed thanks to the generous support of the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation. The Council is grateful to Mott for their continued support of our work on extended learning opportunities.