In June 1999, Making the Grade and the National Assembly on School-Based Health Care sponsored a workshop to examine the best political and financial strategies for fostering the growth and stability of school-based health centers (SBHCs). State and local elected officials offered detailed accounts of how public support for a growing network of centers has been built in their localities. Public officials as well as private representatives from several hospital and health care systems discussed their successes and failures in designing funding strategies to sustain centers for the long term. This paper, inspired by and based in large part on the workshop proceedings, examines the political and funding strategies that have laid a foundation for continued expansion of the centers. (Author/EV)