Center for Supportive Schools

Collaborating with schools to cultivate meaningful relationships and a positive school culture to reduce chronic absenteeism

Center for Supportive Schools (CSS) partners with schools to develop student leaders and help schools become places where students want to be. Founded in New Jersey in 1988, CSS reduces chronic absenteeism through their Peer Group Connection (PGC) model, a peer mentoring program that focuses on developing students as leaders, encouraging collaboration among staff and students, and engaging full school communities. Through structured training and collaboration with faculty, upperclassmen students learn how to become peer leaders to support incoming 6th/9th graders and facilitate a smooth transition during the critical period where students enter middle/high school. 

GreenLight selected CSS for investment after chronic absenteeism was identified by local residents and leaders as a top priority, with 1 out of every 3.6 students chronically absent in Oakland (OUSD, 2026) CSS’s work will be central in reshaping school environments to support students who are chronically absent. A 2018 longitudinal study on 32 schools implementing the PGC program found that 9th grade students and upperclassmen peer leaders who participated in PGC attended school an average of 6 more days than non-participants. Students also reported caring more about graduating from high school, feeling more connected to peers, and feeling like they belong at school. Attendance rates were sustained a full year after completion of PGC.

CSS’s long-term vision for Oakland is to foster positive school cultures that will help keep students in schools. Over the next 4 years, CSS will train more than 1,100 peer leaders and connect them with over 6,100 students across Oakland schools. They have already begun their work in Oakland by partnering with local charter school networks like Education for Change, with plans to build further partnerships across the Bay Area.