In this commentary we propose a collaborative strategy for the creation of informal learning activities in after-school settings that are also shared sites of learning, re-search, and development. We briefly trace the history of a research program—“UC-Links”—whose defining feature is a form of collaboration between institutions of higher learning and local community institutions responsible for youth in the after-school hours. These collaborations thrive only to the degree that “mutual appropria-tion” can be negotiated between partners, and it is within mutual appropriation that new possibilities for creative cross-generational and cross-cultural informal learning activities are materialized.