We apply system expertise and human-centered principles to meet evolving needs of our workers, job seekers, and employers.

Afton supports local and state workforce development ecosystems to fulfill the needs of workers, job-seekers, and employers.  Our work enables alignment and integration, equitable policy and program design, and improved service delivery. We find solutions within the many contributors to workforce development, including jobseekers and workers themselves, community-based providers, education institutions, public and private funders, policymakers, intermediaries, advocates, public administrators, and state and local governments.

We help dismantle systemic barriers to education and training, increase the effectiveness of the public workforce system, and address issues of job quality to ensure all workers can thrive. Services include:

• Project and Meeting Management
• Group Facilitation & Consensus Building
• Stakeholder Engagement
• Human-Centered Design
• Workforce Strategy & Program (Re)Design
• Program Scaling & Replication
• Comparative & Best Practice Research

We bring a people-centered and analytically rigorous approach toward greater strategy and improved resource allocation so that all students have what they need to realize their full potential.

The role of the school is changing. School leaders are providing broader and deeper support to students while maintaining a robust academic experience. And all with finite resources. You’re tasked with answering the question: “How do we meet the many challenges our students and communities face and use what we have to provide the best possible education to each student?”

You don’t have to navigate the increasingly complex waters alone. As national experts in funding policy, strategic resource allocation, and financial planning, we help district and state leaders optimize resources to better serve students. We collaborate with leaders and their communities to co-create adaptable approaches and solutions that work for your unique context.

We harness the wisdom and experience of communities – including parents and families, teachers and school personnel, and school leaders – and combine it with rich local data, research and expertise, and systematic processes to create durable, context-sensitive solutions.

Examples of our services include:

• State funding policy design and implementation
• School district funding policy design and implementation
• Community engagement
• Qualitative and quantitative data collection and analysis
• Program design, implementation, and technical assistance
• Special education and inclusion cost modeling and funding studies
• School district restructuring and implementation planning

“Afton Partners has worked closely with our school district for over a decade. They have taken the time to build relationships and truly understand our local context. This deep and long standing engagement with the community has made them our most trusted partners and advisors. Recently, with a complex decision around school utilization and grade level alignment facing the district, there was no question about who to turn to to lead our decision making process with data, community input, and their own insights – it was Afton. During that process they came to the district multiple times to meet with community members, hand out surveys, and to get proximate to the challenges that we were facing. For an organization that works nationally to invest so much time locally is unique.”

We provide unmatched expertise in charter school financial planning and management so that schools can carry out their missions with strength and sustainability.

We’ve partnered with more than 80 networks of all sizes around the country. As the national leader in charter school financial planning, we know the challenges charter schools commonly face and we build your capacity to tackle them. Together we can develop agile solutions and ensure that the financial implications are clear in all of your most important organizational decisions.

We love the innovative spirit of charter schools. Our services honor that spirit, providing you with tailored support aligned to your goals and context. The solutions we design will enable your mission in financially enduring ways.

• Multi-year financial planning & forecasting
• Budgeting, reforecasting, & cash flow management
• Facility and financing affordability
• Growth planning
• Fractional CFO services
• CFO training and coaching
• Board governance training
• Financial health diagnostics

“Over the past two years, Equitable Facilities Fund has partnered with Afton Partners on a couple of strategic projects and it has been a truly remarkable experience for EFF and the charter school sector. The Afton team made the work together more impactful and seamless by bringing their deep expertise and collaborative spirit to every project. We appreciated that we could count on Afton to deliver high-quality insights and solutions that put schools, community and students first. We chose to work with Afton because we wanted a partner who could provide best-in-class service to charter schools while rooting that service in a culturally competent approach. Afton’s commitment to equity and excellence showed up in the way they approached every task with empathy, diligence and integrity. In summary, working with Afton Partners has been a transformative experience for Equitable Facilities Fund and the schools we serve, and we look forward to many more years of successful collaboration.”

We take a community-centered, structural approach to create stronger and more equitable ECE systems, programs, and policies.

ECE programs and services rely on myriad governance and accountability structures and a complex maze of funding streams from multiple public and private sources. And yet, it’s still woefully inadequate to provide the services children and families need or to recruit and retain exceptional educators. Fortunately, communities are shining a spotlight on the imperative of ECE for child development and economic capacity. But before more money enters the system, we have to ensure it can be used effectively and equitably. We help states reimagine and restructure governance and funding systems to build coherence, uplift educators and providers, and support effective programs — so that all resources are pulling in the same direction in service of children, families, and communities.

The time is now to create systems that serve children and families well, uplift the ECE workforce, support providers and encourage new entrants, and enable economically healthy communities. We walk with partners to ideate, develop, and implement change through services including:

• Task force and commission facilitation
• Community engagement
• Needs assessments and gap analyses
• Cost-modeling and funding studies (across child care, preschool, Early Intervention, early childhood special education, home visiting programs, and other services)
• Funding policy design and implementation
• Workforce compensation and benefits studies
• Service access, equity, and adequacy studies
• Program design, implementation, and technical assistance
• State and local governance planning and analysis
• Agency and program budgeting and financial planning & analysis

“With Afton, we got the very best of what a consultant can be. Beyond providing technical expertise and great process facilitation, the Afton team were true partners in the work—sharpening our thinking and communication to address the complex challenges and opportunities our state was facing in its early childhood system.”