Barriers to family
involvement must be addressed
Everyone
agrees that the involvement of families in their children's education
is a good idea. But there are many barriers to creating the kinds of
connections that really will improve children's learning by actively
engaging parents, grandparents, and community members.
The
primary barriers are time and money: Time off from work for parents
or time at home for schoolwork after hectic workday. Money for teacher
training and family involvement coordinates positions at school. In
developing this report, the experts consulted identified several ways
policies can more effectively promote family involvement in children's
learning. At the individual school level, they include:
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Publicizing school district wide policies and goals for family involvement.
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Making increased family involvement a priority of school site-based
management and administrators.
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Publicizing
and promoting laws protecting parent time off from work to attend
parent-teacher conferences and school events. Some advocate giving
employees paid time off for such activities; others recognize that
this would create a hardship for small businesses.
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Making it a priority during the annual budgeting process for schools
to hire family involvement coordinators and family liaisons. Extra
funding should be made available to districts that must hire translators
and special liaisons for non-English speaking families.
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Making
training available for parents, teachers and administrators on how
to involve families in their children's learning activities.
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Adding more paid teacher hours to allow for communication with families
and for attending family/school events. Recognize that allowances
should be made for home visits when needed.
At
the state level, making more affordable housing available throughout
the state would address problems of excessive mobility among low-income
families. Some schools have addressed this problem by arranging for
their most mobile students to be bused to the same school, even though
their family has moved again. But this is a stop-gap measure and does
not get at the root causes of family mobility, according to Arty Dorman
of St. Paul Public School's Office of Family and Community Involvement.
Ultimately,
state and local governments must recognize the fragile interconnections
among housing, wages, health and education - all of which contribute
not only to opportunities for family involvement in schools, but raising
healthy, well-educated children and families, says Dorman.
Involving
families is one of state's highest priorities
Whether
or not families participate in their children's education can't be legislated,
but government can play an active role in promoting family involvement
in schools. "The role of state government is to support families' rights
and responsibilities to be involved in their children's school," says
Tammy Pust, assistant commissioner - public affairs and policy development
for Minnesota's Department of Children, Families & Learning (DCFL).
Regulate,
fund, and support schools are ways Pust describes the state's role in
public education. Sharing best practices is another way to her department
is getting the work out. In fact, DCFL Commissioner Christine
Jax has sent postcards to educators inviting dialogue on this and
other school topics. She's set up a special e-mail address, and jazschat@state.mn.us,
just for this purpose, and the department posts frequently raised issues
on the department's Web site at http://cfl.state.mn.us.
Family
involvement is one of the department's highest priorities. "There's
an immediate need to increase family involvement in our schools," says
Pust. "A significant number of kids are not on track to pass the state's
basic skills test. Schools are exhausted the traditional ways of raising
scores."
We
have to reach beyond schools if we are going to turn this around, suggests
Pust. To going to turn this around, suggests Pust. To help the kids
who are failing, we need to involve families and communities, she ads.
To get a better handle on which groups of kids are having the most trouble,
DCFL is doing a demographic study.
The
biggest challenge to family involvement is reaching families who didn't
have active parents as a role models, according to Pust. She says those
families who start their children's education process with Early Childhood
Family Education (ECFE) make up a large percentage of active PTA participation
throughout the state. There's not a lot of structured support for families
once their children turn 5, since ECFE only serves families of children
ages 0-5. Some would like to see this type of programming for families
through age 18, but for now Pust doesn't believe that the political
will exist to take this expensive step.
Businesses
have a role to play in family involvement, as well, Pust points out.
Due to the tight labor market, proactive employers who want to attract
and retain a stable workforce will encourage parents to take time off
for school involvement and recognize their needs to check in with their
kids who are home alone after school.
"We
need to change our rhetoric," she concludes. "We say we value children,
but as a society we often don't make children and their families a funding
priority, even though we know that any investment in kids will pay off
in sager communities, a more prepared workforce and healthier society.
It will take entire communities to make those investments. This must
be recognized as a responsibility and privilege."
