Reducing the Generation Gap and Strengthening Schools.

Intergenerational contact can play an important role in strengthening schools and reducing the generation gap. Schools play a central role in American society. They are the places where our children spend the majority of their time outside the home and are the one institution through which all children pass in one form or another. Nearly go percent of children who graduate, graduate from public schools; and most attend schools located in their home communities. These institutions are locally controlled by community-selected governing bodies and maintain large facilities in virtually every community (there are nearly I6,ooo school districts in the United States). As these facts suggest, schools do not exist in a vacuum, but rather are located at the center of a complex, ever-changing web of institutions and influences. Governmental agencies and legislatures, for example, create and maintain local, state, and federal tax structures to support schools and frequently generate standards that the schools must meet. The business sector hires graduates, pressures educators for improved performance and internal reform, and appears to be entering into school-business partnerships at an increasing rate (now estimated in the tens of thousands). Civil society-- comprising nonprofit, political, civic, and social service institutions-provides a community-based infrastructure that supports (or does not support) children and families. These sectors combine to exert a powerful influence on the overall performance of schools and the success of children within them. To the extent that schools can form effective relationships with these broad sectors, there is hope that the performance and aspirations of students can be improved. Yet, while the wellbeing of schools and their students is inextricably intertwined with the world outside their doors, oftentimes the schools act as if they were wholly autonomous. For example, most schools do not open those doors to the outside until 8 a.m. and close them by 3 p.m., leaving valuable facilities and resources closed off to the community. A few progressive communities have made efforts to open schools to children before and after school, and to adult citizens for community activities and social services during nights and weekends. (The Beacon schools in New York and San Francisco are particularly noteworthy examples.) However, all too often, schools remain cut off from the community in significant ways. Even parents sometimes find it difficult to negotiate school corridors in behalf of their own children-particularly when those parents have themselves had difficult school years. For older adults looking in from the outside, schools may appear to be a significant resource drain on public money and of no direct or indirect benefit to them. In a society in which a quarter to a fifth of the population will soon be over the age of 65, the political consequences of older adults becoming further alienated from public schools could be significant. After all, we are rapidly approaching the point when 49 percent of the voting population will be sS or older. But the stakes are not just political. There is a great opportunity for schools residing in the aging society, and so far we are for the most part missing out on it. GROWING UP ALONE To understand the nature of this opportunity, we must first return to the context within which schools operate and children grow up. British childcare expert Penelope Leach warns that if we want to socialize our children, we must socialize with them. Yet, increasingly, the layers of adult caring and nurturance that help support, buffer, and shape young people in this country are being stripped away, leaving youth with few responsible adults to lean on as they attempt to navigate the often treacherous course to adulthood. Market forces, individual decisions, and public policies have all converged to forge a situation for kids that everyone decries. …