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Illinois State Board of Education Nita M. Lowey 21st Century Community Learning Centers Program Statewide Program Evaluation FY24
Year Published: 2025
A 2025 evaluation of Illinois’ 21st CCLC programs during the 2023-2024 school year found positive impacts on student attendance, behavior, engagement, and academic outcomes. Of chronically absent students, 61% improved their attendance, with stronger gains among higher-attending participants, and 40% of students with prior in-school suspensions reduced suspensions. Teacher surveys reported improvements in class participation, homework completion, motivation, attentiveness, behavior, and peer relationships across elementary and middle/high school students. Regarding academic performance, over half of middle/high school students with GPAs below 3.0 demonstrated growth, and a higher percentage of participants made progress on their statewide reading test compared to the previous year.
Program Description:
Illinois’ 21st Century Community Learning Centers (21st CCLC) program, which receives federal funding through the 21st CCLC initiative, provides afterschool and summer academic enrichment opportunities for children at high-poverty and low-performing schools throughout the state. During the 2023-24 school year, 161 grant organizations operated 503 centers, serving 53,714 students.
Scope of the Evaluation: Statewide
Program Type: Afterschool
Grade level: Elementary School, Middle School, High School
Program Demographics:
During the 2023-2024 program year, 37% of participants were Hispanic or Latino, 31% were Black, 14% were White, and 2% were Asian. For 14% of participants, race/ethnicity data were not available. Additionally, 38% of students were from low-income families, 18% were multilingual learners, and 7% had IEPs.
Evaluator: Goodyear, L., Mansori, S., Cox, J., Rodriguez, S., & van Wassenaer, N. EDC.
Evaluation Methods:
This evaluation uses data available during the 2024 Fiscal Year (FY 2024). Multiple sources of data were analyzed, including EDC’s Annual Evaluation Survey administered to all grantees, local evaluation reports completed by each grantee, and Illinois Report Card data, which includes student attendance and academic records for the 2023-2024 school year.
Evaluation Type: Non-experimental
Summary of Outcomes:
This evaluation of Illinois’ 21st CCLC programs during the 2023-2024 school year revealed positive outcomes related to participants' school-day attendance, behavior, engagement, and academic performance.
Regarding school-day attendance, 61% of students with a prior-year attendance rate below 90% improved their attendance, with even greater improvements among students attending programs more frequently. For instance, 74% of students participating in programs for 270 hours or more improved their school-day attendance, compared to 53% of those attending programs for fewer than 15 hours.
Teacher surveys indicate that participation in programs had a positive impact on students' in-class engagement and behavior. Elementary and middle/high school students identified as needing improvement demonstrated gains in several areas, including class participation (74% and 67%), homework completion (71% and 70%), motivation to learn (63%, all), and academic performance (58% and 71%). Likewise, both elementary and middle/high school students improved their attentiveness in class (64%, all), in-class behavior (68% and 58%), and ability to get along with other students (61% and 62%), according to teacher surveys. Moreover, 40% of participants with a prior-year in-school suspension reduced their number of in-school suspensions during the 2023-2024 school year.
Lastly, programs helped support students' academic performance. More than half (51%) of 7-8 and 10-12 grade students with a prior year GPA below 3.0 demonstrated GPA growth, with students attending the program more frequently showing the greatest improvements. For example, 43% of students attending the program less than 15 hours improved their GPA compared to 62% of students who attended at least 90 hours. Regarding test scores, during FY 2024, a higher percentage of 4th-8th grade students made reading progress than during FY 2023 (12.2% vs. 10%) on average.
