In Dayton, Ohio, transformative change is creating more opportunities for young people. StriveTogether Cradle to Career Network member Learn to Earn Dayton is using data, collaborating across the community, and shifting power and resources to get better, more equitable outcomes.
Learn to Earn Dayton has developed the region’s civic infrastructure — the connections between people, organizations, ideas and initiatives that make transformation possible. This strong foundation has helped the community recover from the pandemic.
Now, Learn to Earn Dayton has achieved the Systems Transformation designation along the StriveTogether Theory of Action™, our guiding framework for developing effective civic infrastructure. The Cradle to Career Network member has met benchmarks in each of the four pillars of the Theory of Action™:
- Shared community vision
- Evidence-based decision making
- Collaborative action
- Investment and sustainability
Creating a shared community vision across Dayton
Learn to Earn Dayton brings together partners from across the community. Leaders from businesses, civic organizations, health care, philanthropy, nonprofits, education and more align their work to put more kids on the path to economic mobility.
In 2019, Learn to Earn Dayton, The Dayton Foundation and the Miami Valley Regional Planning Commission (MVRPC) convened partners to align efforts for racial equity, leading to the formation of the Institute for Livable and Equitable Communities at MVRPC. The Institute brings together elected officials, government partners, community organizations, funders and more, joining forces to address structural racism and promote economic mobility.
Using data to make decisions
Learn to Earn Dayton supports partners to use data to guide work, track progress and improve strategies. One initiative using data to get better outcomes for kids is Preschool Promise, an organization that grew out of work initiated by Learn to Earn Dayton. Preschool Promise works to make sure every child has a strong start.
Thanks to this initiative, the kindergarten readiness rate for Dayton and Montgomery County students has improved over gains seen statewide — the county saw a 4.7% increase in readiness for all students, while the state of Ohio saw just a .7% increase.
Preschool Promise’s focus on data is key to its success. The work involves regularly measuring targets to make informed decisions and test new strategies. The Preschool Promise team tracks the number of students enrolled in preschool, with a focus on students in neighborhoods with higher numbers of children of color and children experiencing poverty. Learn to Earn Dayton started the initiative in one district in 2014, and it now is a stand-alone organization with voter approved public investment to support young learners across the region.
Qualitative data and the lived experiences of community members also informed a policy that’s breaking down barriers to postsecondary success. This policy addresses “stranded credits” — course credits that a student can’t access because of an unpaid balance to the institution. This obstacle can prevent students with college debt from finishing their education.
Learn to Earn Dayton partnered with other cradle-to-career organizations, higher education institutions and the Ohio Department of Higher Education to build a solution. They developed policy recommendations with insights from a study that shared students’ experiences, including how debt kept them from accessing transcripts, applying for scholarships or verifying their degrees for employment.
These policy recommendations, driven by data, resulted in the new Ohio College Comeback Compact, which offers debt forgiveness and transcript release for students who re-enroll at participating public colleges and universities in Northeast Ohio.
This strategy is designed to reduce the disproportionate debt and lack of college completion among students of color and students experiencing poverty. Learn to Earn Dayton, the Ohio Department of Higher Education and other regional partners will use what they learn to expand the pilot and present more recommendations for policy changes.
Collaborating for better outcomes
Across the Dayton region, partners test new strategies and expand on what works to get more equitable outcomes for kids.
During the 2020-2021 academic year, student growth on reading and math scores slowed because of the challenges of remote learning and COVID-19. After examining the data, Dayton Public Schools implemented high-dosage tutoring across elementary schools, placing a second teacher in all classrooms focusing on numeracy and literacy. The results were clear. In 2021-2022, average kindergarten math scores increased 22 points more than the year before. In second and third grade, scores went up, and average growth was higher than the projected growth based on national norms. Because of this success, the initiative is expanding. In the 2022-2023 academic year, schools added blocks for tutoring fourth, fifth and sixth graders.
Early education milestones like math and reading are critical for postsecondary success, another focus of Learn to Earn Dayton. The Cradle to Career Network member is part of the Accelerate ED – 13th Year Pathway to Career Success design initiative, supported by an investment from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Learn to Earn Dayton’s design team includes the Ohio Department of Education, the Ohio Department of Higher Education, higher education institutions, two school districts, community partners, the Ohio Mayors Alliance and more. This team worked together over the course of a year to design a career pathways system to expand opportunities, improve connectivity and accelerate attainment of postsecondary degrees. Student and family empathy interviews were a critical element of the process, with resulting feedback influencing the program design.
Investing in the community and sustaining the work
Learn to Earn Dayton is securing resources for the community and making sure that staff, partners and community leaders have the skills and opportunities they need to keep making change.
Learn to Earn Dayton and The Dayton Foundation are changing the culture of philanthropy in the region. Through a process called proximate grantmaking, community members took the lead on allocating $1.5 million in grant funding to community-rooted nonprofits in and serving Northwest Dayton.
Community members created the request for proposals, reviewed applications and determined what would be funded. The process has influenced the way local funders are thinking about future funding, transforming local philanthropy and making sure resources are directed by community priorities.
These changes are becoming embedded in the way the region works together. The civic infrastructure built by Learn to Earn Dayton is getting better, more equitable outcomes — meaning more young people have more opportunities to succeed.
“We have students across the Dayton region with so much promise and so much potential, and they will make such a difference,” says Stacy Wall Schweikhart, Learn to Earn Dayton’s CEO. “They don’t all have the same opportunity, and it takes organizations like Learn to Earn Dayton and all of our partners to make that opportunity possible.”