city connects

What city connects does

City Connects is an evidence-based integrated student support program operating within Boston College's Lynch School of Education and Human Development, founded in 2000. The program addresses non-academic barriers to learning — including hunger, homelessness, family stress, and emotional distress — for K-12 students attending high-poverty urban school districts. Service delivery centers on school-based coordinators who conduct individualized student needs assessments and refer students and families to appropriate community-based resources, with the MyConnects platform used to track assessments, referrals, and outcomes at the student level. In the 2024-25 academic year, City Connects served 40,817 students and coordinated 402,603 discrete services. The program is funded through institutional grants and philanthropic donations as part of Boston College; it charges no fees to participating schools, students, or families. The model is supported by 25 years of peer-reviewed research claiming a 50% reduction in dropout rates and 20% improvement in student achievement, with a 96% principal recommendation rate among participating schools.

Name

city connects

Legal name

City Connects (A Program of Boston College, Lynch School of Education and Human Development)

Website

https://cityconnects.org

Company type

Private

Founded year

2000

Operating status

Operating

Short description

City Connects is a non-profit program within Boston College that provides evidence-based integrated student support services to K-12 students in high-poverty urban school districts, using school-based coordinators and the MyConnects platform to connect students and families with community resources.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

K-12 Integrated Student Support Services

NAICS

Educational Support Services (611710), Elementary and Secondary Schools (611110)

SIC

Services-Social Services (8300)

akta.pro primary industry

Public K–12 Combined Schools (EDAJAAAE)

Keywords

• Integrated student support
• K-12 school services
• Community school partnerships
• Student wellbeing programs
• Education support services

Headquarters

HQ city

Chestnut Hill

HQ country

United States

HQ region

North America

Offices1 record

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Operations, Technology or R&D, Marketing or Sales

Revenue model

1. Grants and Donations: City Connects is funded through institutional grants and donor contributions as part of Boston College's Lynch School of Education and Human Development. The program does not charge schools for participation.

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels1 record

Marketing channels4 records

Core offering

City Connects is an evidence-based integrated student support program operated within Boston College's Lynch School of Education and Human Development. It provides a systematic model for K-12 schools in high-poverty urban districts to assess student needs and connect students and families with appropriate community-based services and resources, using a dedicated site coordinator and a technology platform (MyConnects) to track services and outcomes.

Product overview

City Connects is a single core program—an evidence-based integrated student support model operated by Boston College's Lynch School of Education and Human Development. The program centers on matching existing community services to each student's out-of-school needs through school-based coordinators. Key supporting offerings include MyConnects (a tracking/matchmaking tool for coordinators) and The Weekly Connect (a blog/newsletter). The portfolio is not a platform-plus-modules architecture; it is one program with ancillary resources.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Brands

• MyConnects: A digital platform used within the City Connects approach to track student support services.

Quantifiable outcome

• Students are 50% less likely to drop out of high school
• +3 more outcomes

Named customers2 records

Segments1 record

Ideal customer profiles1 record

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Feature1 record

Partnerships

One partnership is on record.

• Boston College Lynch School of Education and Human DevelopmentcoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerCity Connects is housed within and operated by Boston College's Lynch School of Education and Human Development. The program is part of the Mary E. Walsh Center for Thriving Children, providing institutional support, research infrastructure, and academic credibility to the program.

Scale indicators5 records

Recent moves5 records

Expansion highlights3 records

Direct peers

• Communities In Schools: Communities In Schools is the largest U.S. provider of integrated student supports, placing site coordinators inside K-12 schools to connect students to community resources. It is the most direct functional and operational peer to City Connects, operating a near-identical coordinator-in-school model at significantly greater national scale.
• Say Yes to Education: Say Yes to Education combines wraparound academic, social, and health supports with scholarship and post-secondary access in partner school districts. Like City Connects, it pairs district-wide integrated student support with college outcomes and a research-driven impact narrative.
• City Year: City Year places AmeriCorps members inside K-12 schools to deliver attendance, behavior, and course-performance support, with measurable impact on graduation and dropout outcomes. It is directly comparable to City Connects as an embedded-in-school, evidence-driven student support organization with similar target districts and outcome metrics.

Broad incumbents

• United Way: United Way funds and coordinates community-based social services across health, education, and financial stability, often serving as the local backbone agency that City Connects coordinators tap into. It is a broader incumbent in the same community-support ecosystem but does not specialize in the school-embedded integrated student support niche.
• National Urban League: The National Urban League delivers a portfolio of education, workforce, health, and social services to urban communities through a national affiliate network. It is a broader incumbent serving overlapping populations with multi-service programming, comparable in mission and target demographics but operating a much wider scope than City Connects' school-specific support model.

Others

• Boys & Girls Clubs of America: Boys & Girls Clubs of America operates out-of-school-time programs that address many of the same out-of-school barriers (hunger, safety, family stress) that City Connects targets. It is thematically adjacent — providing youth and family supports — but delivers services primarily at club locations rather than embedded in K-12 schools.
• Big Brothers Big Sisters of America: Big Brothers Big Sisters delivers mentoring and youth development programs that complement many of the social-emotional and family supports City Connects coordinates. It serves overlapping student populations and addresses similar non-academic barriers to learning, but through one-to-one mentoring rather than school-embedded service coordination.
• Children's Aid Society: Children's Aid delivers integrated programs in education, health, and social services to children and families, including in-school community schools programming. It shares City Connects' wraparound-support philosophy and K-12 in-school delivery model, but operates as a direct multi-service provider rather than as a coordinator of existing community resources.

Emerging players

• Reading Partners: Reading Partners places volunteer tutors inside under-resourced K-12 schools to deliver literacy intervention with measurable reading outcomes. It addresses one component of the broader integrated student support City Connects coordinates, focusing on academic intervention rather than full wraparound service matching.
• KIPP Foundation: KIPP operates a national network of public charter schools serving predominantly low-income students, with a strong emphasis on college persistence and wraparound supports. It is comparable to City Connects in student demographics and outcome orientation, but delivers support as a charter operator rather than as a service layered into existing district schools.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat4 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights7 records

Customer concentration

• Xx.com/CityConnects
• YouTubeyoutube.com/user/CityConnects
• Facebookfacebook.com/CityConnectsThrivingChild
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/showcase/city-connects
• Instagraminstagram.com/cityconnectsthrivingchild

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about city connects