Family Involvement in Children's Education; Tapping External Supports for Partnerships

A r c h i v e d I n f o r m a t i o n

Family Involvement in Children's Education - October 1997

Successful Local Approaches (continued)

Tapping External Supports for Partnerships

Many Title I schools have nourished and strengthened school-family partnerships by tapping the supports available in their local communities and beyond. Collaborative efforts to provide families and schools with the tools they need to support learning can ultimately benefit all those interested in and affected by the quality of children's education. Among the Title I programs we studied, successful parent involvement strategies often grew out of school-community partnerships with local businesses, agencies, and colleges and universities, as well as supports provided by school districts and states.

School-Community Partnerships That Marshal Additional Resources

Schools rarely have the funds, staff, or space for all the family involvement activities they want or need to offer. Many have forged partnerships with local businesses, agencies, and colleges or universities to provide family services. Among the schools in our study, these services included educational programming and a homework hotline, social services such as prevention of substance abuse and child abuse prevention, conferences and workshops, adult education, health services, refurbished school facilities, and refreshments for and transportation to school-sponsored events. The following examples highlight some strategies schools and communities can use together to expand opportunities for students and their families.

The Wendell Phillips Visual and Performing Arts Magnet School works with community partners to meet both the academic and basic survival needs of its students. Hairdressers come to the school to give students free hair cuts, a dental program gives uninsured students free check-ups and dental work, and a business partner provides employee volunteers for mentoring and tutoring.
Last year representatives from two community organizations, Alivaine Inc., and the Child Crisis Center offered parenting education classes at Hueco Elementary at no cost to parents. A child care worker from the local YMCA also volunteered to provide free child care during parent classes. Local businesses contributed to the Super Readers program, in which children receive awards for the number of books they read at home or have read to them; businesses also provided pizza parties for classes with the most parent volunteer hours.
A local bank and newspaper sponsor the Education Connection at Buhrer Elementary, which is a homework voice mail system that enables teachers, instructional aides, and the school psychologist to leave outgoing messages such as a daily homework assignment and to receive messages from parents who want to ask questions or set appointments. Through a partnership with Baldwin-Wallace College, Buhrer offers parents GED courses. The school has scheduled parent-teacher conferences at the local library and YMCA, which are closer to parents' homes, and the principal contacts parents' employers if necessary to request time off so parents can meet with teachers.
Ferguson Elementary offers an adult evening school in conjunction with nearby Temple University. Last year classes included computer literacy and self-esteem building and were free of charge to parents. This year, classes will include computer literacy, ESL, and Spanish. Teachers, parents, and other community members receive stipends from Temple to teach the courses, and Temple also provides stipends for child care as an incentive for parents to attend.

District and State Level Support for School-Family Partnerships

District and state supports for family involvement can include policies, funding, training, and family services that contribute to successful family involvement. With the backing of these district and state supports, school-family partnerships have a strong chance of succeeding, and schools can draw on a broad system of expertise and experience. District and state-run parent resource centers, described earlier, are one example of how schools can benefit.

A statewide effort we reviewed, the Alliance Schools Initiative, is a partnership among the Texas Education Agency (TEA), the Texas Interfaith Education Fund (TIEF), and the Texas Industrial Areas Foundation (TIAF). Its mission is to develop a strong decision-making, community-based constituency of parents, teachers, and community leaders who work to improve student achievement in low-income communities throughout Texas. The TEA provides maximum flexibility to participating campuses willing to redesign their educational programs. Teachers and principals agree to collaborate with parents, with each other, and with TIAF network organizations to design and implement reform strategies. The TIEF coordinators train parents, teachers, and principals in strategies to work together to improve their schools. Many Alliance schools receive competitive Investment Capital Fund grants from the TEA, which they use for staff development, parent and community training, curriculum improvement, and enrichment programs.

In addition, the schools we reviewed provided many examples of districtwide programs or strategies supporting school-family partnerships:

Jefferson County Public Schools, which serve Louisville, Kentucky, recently contracted with the Right Question Project to work with half of its middle schools in improving parent involvement. As part of this effort, parents of students at Western Middle School will receive training in helping their children develop critical thinking skills, evaluating their children's educational progress, and helping with homework and project assignments. One indicator of recently improved parent involvement at Western is an increase in the number of parent conferences. From fall 1995 to spring 1996 the number of conferences increased from 90-280.
The DeForest School District in Wisconsin has teamed with the local public library (which is also the local Even Start site) to sponsor a family involvement and literacy program using Epstein's framework of six types of family involvement (Epstein, 1995). It includes adult basic education and ESL as well as parenting activities. Regular participation in Even Start and Family Involvement and Literacy programs has increased by at least 25 percent over the last three years.
South Delta Elementary School offers parents district-sponsored training through the Title I office. Last year, these training sessions explained the scoring process and the results of standardized tests as well as a workshop on how parents can increase their children's vocabulary. In addition, a district tutorial liaison instructs parents and children in the use of computer equipment.
Comprehensive family services, such as those offered through the South Bay Union Elementary School District's Interagency Committee can provide the base of well-being that families need to contribute time and energy to their children's education. This committee, developed in 1990, responded to the growing need for schools and community services to collaborate to meet the increasing health, literacy, and social service needs of its many disadvantaged families. Representatives from 25 different health, social service, public and governmental agencies piloted several school-based programs, including adult literacy, family violence prevention, and support groups for students and parents.

-###-

[Bridging School-Family Differences]

[Effects on Students and Families]