When the pandemic turned the U.S. education system upside down, something unexpected happened: schools and community organizations came together to support young people and their families and address systemic gaps. What had historically been siloed, transactional efforts between school districts and out-of-school-time (OST) program providers became fast-moving, collaborative partnerships that supported the holistic development of young people.
Out-of-school-time intermediaries (OSTIs)—organizations that help coordinate and strengthen afterschool and summer programs—stepped up as critical partners. They coordinated multisector responses, from disseminating vital public health information and providing essential resources like meals and technology, to directly supporting schools by helping to get in touch with disengaged young people or staffing learning hubs. This strategic and frequent collaboration fostered a new appreciation among many school districts for their OST partners' on-the-ground knowledge and unique ability to convene community-based providers and build trust with families.
Today, as public schools continue to face steep challenges like rising mental health needs, historically high rates of chronic absenteeism, and staffing shortages, these partnerships are more relevant than ever. The agility, community trust, and collaborative spirit that OSTIs demonstrated during the pandemic are precisely what is needed to help schools navigate today's complex challenges and enhance the well-being of youth and families.
Reimagining an Approach to Learning
OSTIs working in concert with schools are now uniquely positioned to address pressing issues and help reimagine an approach to learning that truly benefits young people and their families. Here we highlight a few examples.:
- Flexible Learning Settings: OST programs can offer safe, culturally relevant, identity-affirming learning experiences that help reinforce school-day goals and bolster engagement.
- Family Engagement in School: Drawing on their strong community ties, OSTIs can help rebuild trust by bridging communication between schools and families, ensuring families' needs and hopes are heard, which is critical to school success.
- Chronic Absenteeism: Participation in OST programs is related to a child's overall engagement and sense of belonging in school. This can boost their educational participation and academic continuity.
- Rising Mental Health Needs: The relational, supportive approach taken in OST programs fosters environments where youth can build strong relationships with caring adults, which is essential for learning and can help address their social-emotional well-being.
Below we highlight how one OSTI has sustained and grown its partnership with the local school district to address these challenges, connect with OST programs, and meet families’ and young people’s needs.
Spotlight: Chattanooga 2.0 and Hamilton County Schools
Founded in 2016, Chattanooga 2.0 is a cradle-to-career backbone organization in Hamilton County, Tennessee that works to align schools, community partners, and families around shared goals in education and economic mobility. The organization monitors community data, incubates innovative strategies, and convenes cross-sector groups—such as Early Matters, the Children’s Cabinet, and the Out-of-School Time (OST) Alliance—to change systems and expand opportunities for children and young people.
When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, Chattanooga 2.0 became a hub in the county’s emergency education response. With schools shuttered and families struggling to adapt, the organization helped rapidly convene partners to address emerging needs. In partnership with Hamilton County Schools, United Way of Greater Chattanooga, faith communities, and OST providers, Chattanooga 2.0 helped coordinate the launch of virtual learning centers across the county. These sites provided safe spaces for students to access technology, receive academic support, and maintain social-emotional connections. Chattanooga 2.0 also worked with Hamilton County Schools to support community education wellness checks and helped staff learning hubs for the children of frontline workers—efforts that proved vital for keeping youth connected during a period of deep disruption.
While this work was urgent and impactful, it was also inherently reactive. As the acute crisis waned, Chattanooga 2.0 recognized that lasting change would require a more strategic and proactive approach to OST–school collaboration. In early 2023, the OST Alliance began to look to the future. It revised its purpose statement to clarify its focus on access, quality, and impact and adopted quality standards originally developed by the Tennessee Afterschool Network. Members at the time emphasized the need for ongoing coordination and alignment—certainly with each other but also with Hamilton County Schools.
This renewed clarity of purpose not only spurred the growth of the network to nearly 50 organizations but also laid the groundwork for a deeper partnership with Hamilton County Schools. Today, the relationship between Hamilton County Schools and the OST Alliance extends well beyond crisis coordination. It is embedded in the school district’s strategic plan, which identifies collaboration with community partners as a key priority. In fact, Hamilton County Schools now tracks attendance at OST Alliance meetings as a leading indicator of its community engagement—formal recognition of the network’s role in supporting student success.
Since 2023, Chattanooga 2.0’s OST Alliance and Hamilton County Schools have partnered on several strategic initiatives to improve support and outcomes for young people—in school and outside of school. In order to improve access to OST programs, Chattanooga 2.0 launched an online program locator that has been integrated in Hamilton County Schools’ Student Success Planning system and is now actively used by school counselors and staff to match students with enrichment opportunities that align with their needs and interests.
Chattanooga 2.0 developed an OST K-2 Literacy Toolkit that features read alouds, foundational literacy protocols, and hands-on lab activities curated from Hamilton County Schools’ elementary literacy curriculum and “right-sized” for the afterschool setting. Members of the OST Alliance are using this toolkit to directly align their literacy programming with the scope and sequence followed by K-2 teachers in Hamilton County Schools.
Another recent example is the creation of a Chronic Absenteeism Toolkit1 , which was released at the beginning of 2025 as a joint effort between Chattanooga 2.0, the Children’s Cabinet, and Hamilton County Schools. Designed specifically for OST providers, the toolkit equips frontline staff with practical strategies to support young people’s school attendance, such as creating welcoming environments, using empathy interviews to identify root causes, and connecting families with local resources. The toolkit exemplifies how OST providers, with support from intermediaries like Chattanooga 2.0’s OST Alliance, can be empowered as true partners with school districts.
- 1 We’ve removed the contact information of the district personnel; however, their names and emails are an integral component of this resource.
Lessons for Successful Partnerships
The experience of Chattanooga 2.0 and Hamilton County Schools offers clear lessons for OST intermediaries across the country seeking to move from a crisis response to an enduring, strategic partnership with local school districts.
Develop a Shared Vision—and Give Schools Cover to Embrace It
Schools alone cannot shoulder the full weight of young people’s success. But it can be politically or publicly risky for school leaders to say that out loud. OSTIs are uniquely positioned to advocate for a broader, whole-child ecosystem—one where learning happens not just during the school day but after school, on the weekends, and during the summer. By publicly reinforcing this message and linking arms with districts, OSTIs offer school leaders support and credibility to articulate a shared vision that centers youths’ needs both in and out of school.
Build the Infrastructure for Partnership
Effective partnership doesn’t happen by chance. It requires time, structure, and trust. Chattanooga 2.0’s OST Alliance exemplifies how to build backbone infrastructure: convening regularly, adopting shared quality standards, maintaining communication channels, and ensuring collaboration leads to tangible results. The launch of successful initiatives, like program locators and toolkits, reinforces the benefits of partnership, and little wins lead to deeper collaboration and sustainable infrastructure. OSTIs can build this infrastructure by maintaining regular meeting rhythms, sharing data to identify gaps, and following through on the development of cross-sector strategies to promote young people’s success.
Invest in Two-Way Collaboration that Centers Youth
Too often, schools and OST systems operate in parallel or communicate in one direction—school districts requesting outreach support, or OST programs asking for data. True partnership happens when both parties come together to solve shared problems. Chattanooga’s Chronic Absenteeism Toolkit is one such example. It wasn’t a school directive or a community ask—it was a co-created solution that empowers OST providers to play an active role in addressing a systemic challenge.
With pandemic-era ESSER funding ending, communities face a risk of backsliding. But Hamilton County shows that durable cross-sector partnerships between OSTIs and local school districts do not require a crisis to sustain. The experience of Chattanooga 2.0 and Hamilton County Schools underscores a critical opportunity for the field. Moving forward, sustaining and deepening strategic school–OST partnerships will help schools support the holistic development and well-being of young people and their families.
