Case Study: Cultivating Social Health Through Resources, Internships, and Relationships
November 2024
Summary
Lumen High School’s comprehensive strategy for promoting social health addresses essential student needs of its population of teen parents. Lumen students face many challenges in addition to being teen parents. Among the student population in the 2023-24 school year, 59% were unaccompanied minors, 17% were involved in the juvenile justice system, and 16% were homeless. Many students have to navigate employment, court systems, and housing applications, in addition to juggling a student workload and childcare. By providing access to essential resources, Lumen gives students the ability to stabilize their lives and stay in school.
“The percentage of students we have that are unaccompanied is really high,” said Lumen’s social health coordinator. “Our students, because they are pregnant or parenting, heavily rely on community resources for education, services, or tangible things, and it takes a ton of time to identify, connect with, and mobilize those resources.”
Lumen Supports Students with Resources, Skills, and Community Relationships
Resources
The school’s social health initiative provides resources for students to address their needs both in and out of school, allowing them more time to focus on academics. “When we started planning our mission, it was like ‘How do students not have to choose between being a parent and being a student?’ Which led us to think we have to have a school that supports the whole student,” said Lumen’s founder.
In order to do that, Lumen offers extensive on-site and off-site resources that enhance students’ quality of life. Many resources assist students with teen parenthood – on-site baby clothing, free childcare, support for infant health, and parenting classes. Other resources are aimed at helping a student demographic that struggles with food insecurity and access to essential needs. The school partners with organizations to provide a food bank, medical services, and access to mental health professionals. Some organizations push in as-needed, offering services like legal assistance for students or cultural competency training for teachers.
This model benefits both Lumen and community organizations. For community organizations, the partnerships facilitate access to under-served students, allowing them to better reach their target population. Because of this mutual benefit, most community organizations offer their services to Lumen students for free.
Internships
Lumen’s internship program is also a part of its social health initiative. The program places eligible students in part-time, paid positions with local businesses one day per week during a time dedicated to electives or internships. The student-internship relationship can benefit both the intern and employer. Students accumulate work experience and find a greater sense of connection to their community. Local businesses have the opportunity to invest in the workforce, practice their values, and contribute to the health of their community.
“I'm a small business in the heart of downtown and I feel really strongly about building community and support with other organizations in proximity to my business,” said a local business owner and internship site.
Lumen has also partnered with a non-profit organization that offers career exploration programming. The non-profit visits with students to identify job interests, prepare for interviews, and network with community businesses.
Knowledge, Skills, and Relationships
Lumen uses a full-time school social worker as their social health coordinator. Her presence significantly reduces the time it would take for students to navigate resources and communicate with government agencies on their own. She meets with four to six students per day to assist them with phone calls and paperwork, while coaching them on the process so students build self-advocacy skills and confidence.
At Lumen, the social health coordinator coaches students using an “I do, we do, you do” model. For example, she might show a student how to navigate the state’s Women, Infants, Children (WIC) site and then call a provider, putting the call on speaker phone so the student can hear the conversation. Once the call is over, the coordinator discusses it with the student, making sure to speak to why she handled the conversation the way she did. In the future, she will navigate the WIC site with the student. Finally, the student will take the lead on navigating the website and making phone calls, with the coordinator present to provide support and feedback.
Community partners also help students build knowledge and skills. Said one on-site health care provider, “That has been a big piece for me, talking to them about what's gonna happen when they go to the hospital. Questions to ask when they go to the doctor. When they go to the doctor and they hear something scary, helping them understand what that actually means… The whole thing is not somebody trying to take away their autonomy and hurt them, not everyone in the healthcare system is like that.” The nurse said that students often stop by between classes and during lunch to ask questions, share concerns, or simply connect.
In addition to meeting student needs, Lumen’s many partnerships serve to build social support and social capital for students. Explains another on-site health provider: “They pop in, they say ‘Hi,’ and they tell us about how their week is going. So, we also kind of serve as another safe person to counsel them and a safe space to talk about anything,” said the staff of an organization that provides medical services for students. “I think it’s more comfortable for them to come to us since we’ve built that connection with them and it’s more personal than just going to their pediatrician.”
Cost and Funding
Lumen’s social health initiative is relatively affordable considering the number of services it offers. The cost equates to a conservative estimate of $3,800 for each of the 30 enrolled students. Lumen’s initiative is much more expensive than it would be for most other schools because of Lumen’s internship program, intensive wrap-around support, and its small size. We estimate $735 per pupil for a typical model.
Most of these costs are covered through grants. The initiative uses the equivalent of a full-time social health coordinator and a part-time internship coordinator. The cost of these roles is offset through two federal grants and a Communities in Schools grant, which means that staffing costs do not come out of Lumen’s general operating budget. Only four of the 17 partnership organizations come at a cost to Lumen. Two of these are local, Black-led organizations that offer parenting education and teacher/staff training. Other partnerships cost money on an as-needed basis, like a GED service for students who have too few credits to earn a high school diploma.
Lumen’s model serves all enrolled students, although other schools may want to focus their initiative on a subset of students and families. A targeted approach can make social health more affordable and sustainable.
Findings
Lumen has had its social health initiative in place since its doors opened in 2020. Over time, the school has learned important lessons and adjusted its approach.
Collecting data
In the 2023–24 school year, Lumen started to collect systematic data on student needs and resource use. The social worker created an inventory to collect information from all new and returning students. Information about student needs are put into Supported School, a free MTSS (multi-tiered system of supports) app that compiles the data and helps the social health coordinator determine which interventions may be most helpful. She also uses the app for two-way communication with other school support staff. Staff can see what resources students are accessing, and they can also alert the coordinator of issues as they arise.
Incorporating Input
Lumen believes that the voice of students is critical for building a social health initiative. Over time, the school has become more intentional about seeking and integrating student input. When the school is considering adding a new community partnership, they bring students together to talk about the opportunity. The school asks students how they feel about forming certain partnerships and whether they find the proposed programs to be beneficial or not. At a small school like Lumen, they can do this during morning meetings.
“We created a safe environment so if the group is not aligned with our goals, we can act as a buffer,” said the school’s leader. “Or we can ask our students if they want a group back and want to have that partnership.”
Including Social Health in School Curriculum
Three years after launching their social health initiative, Lumen High School moved to a project-based instructional model centered around community issues. Students select projects from a list their teachers create each term. Students then work as a class on one project per semester. A recent project focused on opioid addiction. Students created proposals, like a clean needle exchange program, and then called local politicians to try to get traction for their idea.
Effects on Students
Although the change is modest, there was improvement in student perception of their local community over the 2023–24 school year. This includes the perception that their broader community is supportive and a place where they belong. In addition to its social health initiative, Lumen also rolled out a new mentoring program and revised its restorative discipline approach in the 2023–24 school year. We can’t attribute changes in social-emotional skill development to the social health initiative, but it may have contributed to improvements that occurred over the school year. (Download the case study for all graphs).
In focus groups, Lumen’s social health initiative was the first feature that students praised. When asked what they liked about school, a student said: “They help you with everything, like doctor's appointments. Just last week they took me to my son's doctor's appointment. It’s amazing.”
Students said service access was an important part of helping them stay engaged at school: “It means I don't have to worry, stress, about the money. And when I'm stressed out, that's when I tend not to do school.” Reflecting on what they had learned since coming to Lumen, another student said, “It's okay to ask for help.”
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Case Study School
The practice described in this guide is based on the experience of Lumen High School (Lumen). Lumen is located in Spokane, Washington and serves teen parents in 9th to 12th grade. The public charter school opened in September, 2020. In the 2023-24 school year, 32 students were enrolled; 88% of students were low-income, 16% were homeless, and 59% were unaccompanied minors.