Response to Comment from WDPI

National Evaluation to Inform the 21st CCLC Program

Response to Comment Submitted by the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction

Dear Carl Bryan and Susan Piazza:

Thank you for your comments on the proposed information collection for the National Evaluation to Inform the 21st Century Community Learning Centers (21st CCLC) Program. We appreciate your perspectives on the potential contributions of the proposed study.

Thank you for the important points you raised about complexities in defining, measuring, and analyzing learning loss. In this study, we do not plan to collect data on learning loss or examine the extent to which afterschool programs have offset learning loss. Instead, the reference to learning loss in our clearance package was simply to provide context for why a new study to inform the 21st CCLC program is especially useful now. The academic and social-emotional challenges posed by the pandemic have underscored the need for up-to-date information on the strategies that 21st CCLC centers use to meet student needs. In the wake of the pandemic, these strategies may look substantially different than the strategies that centers used more than a decade ago when prior national studies were conducted. The proposed study—particularly the component focused on providing a national snapshot of afterschool centers’ strategies—will supply this much-needed information.

Please do not hesitate to contact me if you have any questions.

Sincerely,

Erica Johnson

Mathematica 1