Partnerships between schools and out-of-school, private, and civil society actors have been gaining importance for some time and are supported by educational policy reforms and funding programs. Expectations for such partnerships are high. They range from better support for children and youth to strengthening the regional educational infrastructure and modernizing education and learning processes. However, such far-reaching and desirable outcomes are often based on specific conditions such as trusting, reciprocity-oriented social relations.
Therefore, there are some serious limitations to overcome when working together in partnerships, particularly in partnerships between organizations. According to social capital approaches (Putnam 1993, Coleman 1988), building partnerships is based on intensive interactions and a constant investment is necessary to maintain the supportive and useful character of such relations, networks, and communities. In particular, restrictions in the autonomy and equality of those involved and in the expectation of reciprocity reduce the beneficial potential of social relationships and social networks or change their character. This is particularly important because equality and autonomy are important prerequisites for a partnership. Thus, the network becomes a negotiating network that can also lead to the development of an (in)formal rule set to prevent the emergence of negative externalities such as mistrust or the exploitation of specific actors (Dhillon 2009). However, this makes partnerships and networks more exclusive, which makes it difficult to accept or work together with new partners.
This paper looks at the specific case of the so-called "Summer of Welcoming" in Germany in 2015 and 2016, when not only the number of volunteers supporting refugees increased significantly (Ahrens 2017), but many new private initiatives and local support centers were built as well. As available surveys show, the focus of the volunteers' work with the migrants and refugees was in the area of education. They organized language courses and leisure activities, offered extra lessons, or helped in finding training opportunities. Many initiatives and volunteers worked together with schools, or schools themselves initiated projects with volunteers.
Given that, the paper discusses the following questions: Did schools extend their existing partnership networks in a time when newly immigrated children and youth were in particular need of support or did they rely on the already established partnerships? Did the potential risks of such partnerships become more visible at such times?