Performance Partnership Pilots for Disconnected Youth (P3): Sustaining Systems Change Efforts and Coordinated Services for Youth

In this paper, the Performance Partnership Pilots for Disconnected Youth (P3) study team assesses the efforts of the initially awarded pilots to sustain systems change in their communities by placing the pilots along a continuum. At one end of this continuum, two pilots approached P3 as a platform to facilitate systems change in their communities. Next along the continuum was a pilot that took initial steps toward systems change by the end of its P3 grant. Next, two pilots reported that through P3 they had strengthened partnerships and broken down silos but that the systems for serving disconnected youth did not experience much change as a result of P3. Lastly, staff at three pilots reported that no systems change work occurred as part of their participation in P3. These pilots did not view P3 through a systems change lens and instead focused on programming for disconnected youth. The two pilots that identified systems change as a primary goal of their P3 pilots at the outset were able to sustain their efforts beyond the pilot. The paper examines their efforts.