By Karen Rivedal, Office of Research & Scholarship Communications

UW–Madison Assistant Professor of Education Finance and Leadership Christopher Saldaña is part of a team that has been awarded a $75,000 Vision Grant from the Spencer Foundation to develop a major research initiative focused on improving how K–12 schools, districts, and community organizations coordinate resources to support students. Saldaña will co-lead the planning project alongside Louis Gomez, distinguished professor at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), and Tammie Causey-Konaté, educational research consultant and CEO of ImpactEd Enterprises.

Although work on the 12-month planning grant will begin in Wisconsin, the team aims to create a scalable national model for resource coordination that can be adapted by school systems across the country.

Public school districts in the United States collectively spend nearly $1 trillion each year on education, including not only classroom instruction but also youth development programs, mental health services, and other student supports. As districts increasingly partner with nonprofit and community-based organizations to expand these services, coordinating resources across multiple agencies has become both more important and more challenging. Fragmented systems can limit the effectiveness of available resources and reduce their impact on the students who need them most.

Saldaña describes coordination as a critical but often overlooked aspect of education systems and improvement.

“Coordination is a particularly important process to focus on, but one that does not receive as much attention as it should,” Saldaña said. “Attention is often paid to how school districts spend — for example, through teacher compensation or educational programming — but far less attention is devoted to the budgeting, resource allocation, and coordination processes that undergird educational programs in supporting student success.”

The project seeks to better understand how educational systems can organize resources and partnerships to provide more comprehensive support for students.

“Our goal is to ensure that the organizations and resources students need work in concert with one another so that all students have access to the high-quality educational opportunities they deserve,” Saldaña said.