Abstract:
Addressing student and community needs by forming partnerships between schools, the community, and service providers via facility sharing and the offering of additional services and activities from school campuses has become increasingly common. However, despite their proliferation across the country, there is little Australian-based empirical research demonstrating the effectiveness of hubs to deliver improved social and educational outcomes. One of the main reasons for this lack of evidence is the considerable variation in models due to the necessary adaptation of each hub to the local context.This presentation demonstrates the use of the Success Case Method (SCM) (Brinkerhoff, 2003) to begin the journey to understand the impact of the different models of school-community partnerships in Australia. This paper will present the preliminary findings of a SCM study that draws on a research synthesis as well as the voice of providers to develop an impact model that describes potential outcomes and success criteria. This will provide the basis for the exploration of the impact of partnerships in Australia and the factors that enable or inhibit the achievement of intended outcomes.Brinkerhoff, R. O. (2003). The success case method: Find out quickly what's working and what's not. Berrett-Koehler Publishers.