Studies have shown that parent engagement in schools has a positive impact including better school attendance and increased individual and classroom test scores.
Parent involvement also provides protective factors for children, including less substance abuse.
Organizations like the Parent Teacher Association (PTA) and the Parent Teacher Organization (PTO) strive to build stronger relationships between parents and the schools their children attend.
The Ohio Statewide Family Engagement Center has family engagement programs in which they teach parents how to be present in their children's education and help them create their own programs.
Many books have also been written, including a book that was published this year titled “Family Engagement in Education: Inclusive Approaches for Creating Collaborative and Equitable School Communities.”
Guests:
- Barbara Boone, Ph.D., program director for Family Engagement Programs/
director, Ohio Statewide Family Engagement Center - Holly Williams, family engagement leader, Ohio Statewide Family Engagement Center
- Maura Atwater, family engagement leader, Ohio Statewide Family Engagement Center
- Joseph Passi, PhD., assistant professor of special education at Purdue University Northwest
Transcript
This transcript is generated with AI. To ensure its accuracy, review the audio file.
Amy Juravich: Welcome to All Sides with Amy Juravich. Studies have shown that parent engagement in schools has a positive impact, including better school attendance and increased individual and classroom test scores. Parent involvement also provides protective factors for children, including less substance abuse. But many parents are unsure about how to get involved in their child's school. Through the Ohio State University's Center on Education and Training for Employment, there are family engagement programs that help bridge the gap between parents and their child's school. And here to talk with us is the program director of the family engagement program at Ohio State University, Barbara Boone. Welcome to All Sides, Barbara. Thank you. So you're the program director of the family engagement programs at OSU, but what are these programs? I mean, tell me the goal of having family engagement programs at Ohio State.
Barbara Boone, Ph.D.: Sure, so the goal is to prepare schools and families, so we work in sort of both lanes, to prepare educators at any point in the system, so teachers at any grade level, school administrators, but also school counselors, school social workers, anyone in the school system who interacts with families to really help them to have the skills and the mindsets so that they are able to really work well with families, and for families also to have the information they need that they want to have to understand their child's progress in school at any grade level, sort of how to communicate well with the school, how to get those supports, their kiddo needs. So that's why we are doing that work and why we sort of work in both of those spaces.
Juravich: The OSU Family Engagement Center says that you need different factors to help a child succeed. There's not just one thing. You need families, schools, communities, all to collaborate with each other. So tell me about this collaboration. Why is it important for everyone to care?
Boone: Sure. So, what we know is when families and schools are on the same page. So that takes really good communication back and forth. That students and our kids sort of experience less difference between home and school. There's more like, okay, everybody is sort of working in the same direction here. We also see that trust increases and that Trust for Families. And teachers sort of benefits them, but also then we see academic gains for students when the trust between home and school is increased. So there's gains for student academically, but as you mentioned at the beginning, also behaviorally, kids feel like they belong at school. Their sense of hope and their own futures and how they're gonna get there is stronger when we have this close working relationship between home in school.
Juravich: So what does it look like for a community to be involved in a school? I mean, are we talking about a parent volunteering in the classroom? Is it an after school event where everyone gets together and eats pizza? Is it guest speakers, field trips? Are you gonna tell me all of the above? Yeah.
Boone: It is, but, you know, we would say that the most impactful family engagement that's going to support a child's learning happens at home, doesn't happen in the school building. It's that valuing of education, helping their child sort of reason through problems, encouraging their child to continue trying when a subject is a struggle for them or when there's issues with friendships or maybe not. Feeling like they're getting along with their teacher. That work that families do to help their child be organized, to help them see that they can build the skills they need to be a good student. That's the most impactful. The things that we do at school are, can also communicate to kids that our families are here together, working with our schools. It doesn't need to every family, but they see that families are bringing their. Interests their skills that we have amazing families that bring all sorts of knowledge and careers and things too To education that really expands what kids can learn about through their schools and that community connection I see when our libraries are on board when our YMCA's are also supporting education They have those after-school programs. So they programs for families to maybe Understand literacy or family financial literacy things like that, and our faith-based communities as well. So when we have these community groups also sort of bringing their, the time, the effort, the resources they have, because not all family engagement happens in a school building. There's that important things that happen at home, but then also it's not just during the school day within the school walls. It's sort of learning is happening all around.
Juravich: Immediately when you think of family engagement with the school, I think for most people, the PTA or the PTO is what's gonna come to mind. The Parent Teacher Association or the Parent Teacher Organization, depending on what your school belongs to. Is that a part of what you do at all? Or are you digging in way deeper than PTA, PTO?
Boone: We are going in all the directions, I hope, at the same time. So PTA and PTO are folks, there are a group of families, parents, grandparents, other people who parent kids, who are coming together saying, we want to support the school. A lot of times that might take the form of fundraising. But also other PTAs or PTOs are involved in talking with their principals about what are our school improvement goals and what can we, in organizing volunteers and resources. Bring to bear on the things that our kids need to learn. How do we help families do those important things at home? So sometimes it's fundraising, but it can also go much deeper. And for these parent groups to really get together with the school to be working towards those same goals that we might have for improving our students' math achievement scores or literacy rates or graduation rates.
Juravich: This is All Sides on 89.7 NPR News. We're talking about family engagement programs, and we're talking with program director from Ohio State University, Barbara Boone. So tell me more about the training that you provide for the schools and for these future school leaders. You call it the Leadership Academy, is that right? Am I using the right words or no? Okay, well, for.
Boone: For educators, for those school administrators, or even future educators, our students who are right now in their pre-service training, we provide a lot of professional learning opportunities. We have seminars that build on each other. So you can start with our foundations of family engagement and then move on to multi-tiered family engagement or family engagement in adolescence or family that supports mental health. So you really dig in deeply, building that sort of knowledge and skills for working with families in any of those spaces.
Juravich: You're teaching teachers how to work with family.
Boone: Yes, and administrators and those other important people school counselors are just hugely impactful in this area Yeah, so we also have and this Friday on September 18th. We have an annual summit family engagement leadership summit that is no cost and it's open to anyone to register and we will have a series of keynotes but also sessions for principles for family members We will have father speaking in a panel in the lunchtime speaking about. That their experience of interacting with schools will have students talking. We'll also have researchers from Harvard and Ohio State and Johns Hopkins University speaking about the research and family engagement. And I'm really excited for some of the focus we're going to have this year on family engagement in mathematics and family and literacy, mental health support. So that summit is open to anyone. We see people from around the country will attend and even other countries. Most folks will be from Ohio. But that's one way, that's a one day, but then we have these seminars we offer all through the year, and even an Institute for Principles in the summer at Ohio State.
Juravich: I mean, you just sparked a question for me that I didn't even consider. But it's not just moms. Oh, OK. Yeah, talk to me about that. Go ahead, yeah.
Boone: You know, I'm so glad you brought that up, because I feel like as a researcher and someone who has worked in this field that we probably shouldn't have said for a long time, family engagement, we should have said mother engagement. But that has really shifted in the research and also in our practice, recognizing that so many of our kids are being raised by their grandparents, by male figures, their fathers, and that it's everyone. And it's not just because that's nice, It's because. They have a huge impact on kids learning and their sense of belonging and their success in school. And so it's important for us to really expand out.
Juravich: Yeah. Do you feel like when you look out into the crowd of these seminars, is it increasing the number of males who attend? I mean, overall, when you think of an elementary school, like most of the teachers are going to be female too. So yeah, tell me more.
Boone: Right, it has to be intentional for sure at the school level to make sure that we are not just reaching mothers. And also I think just culturally I think as a whole we tend to when it comes to the topic of school, we ask mom, we hand the phone to mom, you know. They call mom first. There you go. Yes. And in some cases even in school forms and things there's only place to write one parent's information, and then there is the additional person.
Juravich: Dairycontent.
Boone: There you go, and so those are the sorts of things that I think we're trying to shift and think about how are we very intentionally engaging with fathers, like you said. One thing that we have done, we have a state advisory council for our work that we bring together. It's folks from agencies, but it's more than half of the people in the 55 people in our council are parents from around Ohio. And this year, I think we have about eight fathers. Now on that council, and that was really important to us to start expanding that. So we're getting their input.
Juravich: So you told us about the summit and you told about the education you're doing for teachers and administrators and guidance counselors, but you're also doing education for the actual parents, the moms and dads, the caregivers, the trusted adults in children's lives who want to get involved in schools. There are right ways and wrong ways, I'm sure, to do that, right? So are you trying to guide people who wanna be involved into the best way to insert yourself?
Boone: Oh absolutely. So we do a number of things. One is we are paying attention to what are the questions parents are asking at any grade level. Also to the new things that come about in Ohio. So when we had our changes in our dyslexia screening in the early grades. So helping families to know what is that? Why are we doing that? Can you as a parent request that? So I'm just trying to make it very plain. To families that sort of thing around the changes in literacy and why what does that look like? What are good questions you could ask your school? So Helping families to be informed so that they can be that person comes alongside the school and says How does it look like in our school? How can I as a parent be doing? Things at home that are going to support the way that now that you're doing math instruction say in school So one way is just developing those resources, but also we create workshops and ways of bringing families together, and we give those resources to schools, but also to libraries and to after school organizations. Because that's where families are, we don't necessarily try to get all of the families to come to our programs. We want families to go to their own teachers, to their in their own communities, and so that's why we share our resources around the state, helping them through their schools, through their churches, through their libraries, and... After school programs that families are going to be getting, having access to this information. Also access to a chance to sort of talk about it and learn more.
Juravich: Now, I feel like most people would think if they heard that Ohio State offers family engagement programs and you're teaching people about family engagement, I would think a lot of people would think you're training future PTA and PTO presidents. But it sounds like more than. It absolutely is. So tell me why it's more than that.
Boone: You know, it is more than that because, first of all, you know, the work of educating our kids and having a great education system is not the work just your kid's teacher, just the principal in the building. You know it's not, they don't do this alone. And you, as parents, we don't that alone either. So this, doing it together is really important. And the community as well, we all have a role to play. Everyone is important, and so that communication. Is important when we fail, when we're trying again. So that's why, so it's not just, let me go back, it's just not PTOs or PTAs when we think about particularly maybe just fundraising or those just fun events, which both can be really important in the school. But I think we want families to understand how the education system works. How do you look at this data about your school and from your school and make sense of it so that you can ask good questions. Who are the people in your school district? Who do you go to with particular questions? What school policy? How do you look at a school policy and really understand it and understand maybe how it impacts different people differently so that you can ask those questions? Because those are things that also drive our education system that are really going to change the experience for different families and different students. So families are the people who oftentimes are the ones that see that. And parents are the ones that can come to the table and expect change, ask for change, but also be a part of the change, be a of the energy and the thinking that makes great change in our schools.
Juravich: Now, pivoting back to the summit that you mentioned, I know you said that the summit would help educators, administrators, guidance counselors, learn about working with families more closely, but the summit is called Small Steps, Extraordinary Impact. So what's a small step that you're gonna teach people that's maybe like tangible that people would understand?
Boone: Sure, you know thinking about mathematics if I think about that sometimes It's really we can think of it as kind of acceptable when we see Ourselves or when we our kids struggle with mathematics to say well, you, know I'm really just not an math person our family. We're just not math people. You're like me. We just not mad people but truly Everyone is a math person. We all use math every day. And we don't say those same terms if your child is learning to swing a tennis racket. And if they're struggling on their stroke, we don't say, well, you're just not a tennis person. Right? No, we don do that if they are learning to trumpet or if they learning to run fast. It's the same thing with mathematics. We really want to change that small thing that we can do with our kids to say you're struggling right now. But this is something you can figure out. There are people who can help you. There's other ways of learning this. Those are the sorts of things that we would say about other topics that we wanna bring into the conversation around mathematics.
Juravich: And also, I think something similar can be said about reading. We all get those newsletters from the teachers and they say you should be, your child should be reading at home. Read with your child. Your child needs to be reading every night. But you gotta actually do it, right? Is that a part of the family engagement where it's not just taking the time to read the newsletter, but then actually doing what the newsletter asks you to do?
Boone: Absolutely, yeah. Yeah, actually putting some time into it, which, I mean, families are busy. And I know that every night when you could be working with your child, say, reading to them, there's a few other things that you could be doing as well. So it's figuring out, how do we make this fit in our family? And also, have some joy about it. Mathematics isn't something that your math homework is. It's something we're arguing about. And reading isn't something we're forced to do. But sort of reminding our kids and ourselves that learning is enjoyable and let's keep it enjoyable. Let's find that way that it is interesting to you, that brings life to you. Those are important things I think that families do and that we wanna encourage in that space around, also I think around adolescence. Oftentimes with adolescence, that family engagement moment is in the car and you're driving somewhere and they are now ready to talk about whatever it is. So with a lot of times with adolescents, we want families to see, you know, you're in this coaching role, you are still providing that support. You're not maybe in the classroom. It's not the same thing as elementary school. But when you have those moments, having those conversations with your kids that is helping them to see themselves as a learner, to feel strong about their ability to learn and also that they belong at school and also like you're there to support them and sort of learn how to be successful there.
Juravich: We are talking about parent involvement in schools with the program director of the family engagement programs at Ohio State, Barbara Boone and Barbara staying with us coming up. We're going to talk about how two mothers have created projects to engage with their child's school. That's when All Sides continues on 89.7 NPR News.
You're listening to All Sides. I'm your host, Amy Juravich. Sometimes it takes just one dedicated, passionate parent to make a change in their child's school. At the Family Leaders for Ohio Schools Academy at the Ohio State University, parents are given tools and mentorship needed to make valuable change. Still with us is Barbara Boone, Program Manager for Family Engagement Programs at Ohio State university. Thanks again for being here, Barbara. It's great to be here. And joining us now are two parents who are graduates of the Family Leaders for Ohio Schools Academy through the Family Engagement Center. We have Maura Atwater, who is a community building professional who has spent the past 10 years raising her two children with her husband and her kids attend Delaware City Schools. Welcome to the show, Maura.
Maura Atwater: Thanks so much, Amy.
Juravich: And we also have Holly Williams joining us. And after facing opposition when advocating for her autistic and limited speaking daughter, Holly's work focuses on helping families advocate and understand their neurodivergent children and how to advocate for them. Welcome Holly.
Holly Williams: Thank you for having me.
Juravich: So to start off, Barbara, can you tell us what the academy that these ladies graduated from, the Family Leaders for Ohio Schools Academy, what is it?
Boone: So the Family Leaders for Ohio Schools Academy is a program that helps families or parents in particular who are part of the program to understand their school system, to look at school policy, to look at school data, and to identify with their school what's an issue they can address. What's a need that they see, either from families or from teachers, something about student learning that they and the school can work together on. So it's really trying to bring families into the school as not into the classroom per se, but into the system, working with principals, working with administrators to make a change for the better for the kids in their community.
Juravich: Holly, how did you hear about this program and why did you want to join it?
Williams: Actually a church member who knows that I had gone through a difficult time getting my daughter enrolled in public school recommended it to me she's a special education coordinator at a public school just north of where I live yeah so she had told me about it and I looked it up it looked interesting kind of intimidating honestly but I was ready to learn more about the public school and just the different barriers that were there for inclusion
Juravich: Maura, how about you? What made you decide to join the Academy?
Atwater: So I had just wrapped up leading the board of our local preschool in Delaware, and my family was super involved there, but my children aged out. And there was kind of this vacuum where I wanted to continue being involved in their education, but I just wasn't really sure how. I kind of knew about our local school district as we enrolled, but the pandemic had also set in, So it was. There was a lot happening all at once. And I happened to see a flyer at our local library for this kind of OSU-backed program that looked like the perfect fit. So I applied.
Juravich: And Mara, before you started this program, I mean, what challenges did you see facing students at your child's school? I mean what sparked you to pay attention to the flyer, I guess? Well, like I said,
Atwater: I had been very involved in their early childhood, and I had actually been an early childhood educator for a time. So that was a wonderful experience for us. It was a cooperative preschool where parents were always in the classroom and leading the board and making decisions about the engagement, the terms of engagement, and the educational experience alongside the teachers. But then, you know, 2020, the pandemic happened right when my older daughter was starting. Kindergarten and it felt like a black box. I think even more so than I might have otherwise. So you were mentioning, you know, parent engagement isn't always parents being physically in a classroom as a volunteer. But during that time, certainly right after lockdown, no parents were volunteering in classrooms because we were still being quite careful. So yeah, I think I was just seeking some guidance about the terms of engagement in the district. And like I said, I had this kind of. Peripheral understanding of like who the main players and decision-makers were at our neighborhood school and then At the district level, but I really wanted to know more
Juravich: And Holly, what challenges did you see at your school? Because yours was specific for your student, but then did you see that maybe others, if you were having this issue, others maybe too.
Williams: Oh, yeah, absolutely. So our experience with my daughter Caroline, she was in an ESC preschool program, which is like specialized inclusion of kids in the class. And so we had no issues enrolling her in school from the ages of three to five. But once we enrolled her in kindergarten, we faced just a pointed assumption that she could not learn. And so she was not permitted to be in the kindergarten class. And facing that as a mother, I wasn't expecting it at all. I knew very little about the public education system in terms of disability and inclusion. And I had to kind of find my way through that. But I found through connecting with other moms who had children who would even were adults now that they found themselves in a similar position and just did not know how to advocate for their child at time.
Juravich: So it wasn't that the school district said they weren't gonna educate your child. They're required by law to do that. It's just you wanted your child in a classroom setting and they were gonna do probably a one-on-one specialized learning center.
Williams: Yeah, so they had assigned her to a county run classroom in the middle school building, and I had asked specifically how often she would see kids her age, she was six years old, and they could not tell me specifically. I asked when she would learn literacy and when she would learn to read and write, and they couldn't tell me. So the curriculum schedule is It's not It's not bad that she was assigned to a multiple disabilities room. There's a lot of good things that happen there, but for Caroline, she was capable of learning. She'd had three years in preschool and knew all her shapes and colors and numbers. She just learned differently. So it was more about them believing that she was capable succeeding in a general room, which I knew as her mother. But, um, I think I kind of came across as naive at times.
Juravich: This is All Sides on 89.7 NPR News. We're talking about how parents are making change in their children's schools. And we're talking with Family Engagement Programs Director at Ohio State University, Barbara Boone. And we have two parent graduates of the Family Leaders Program, Holly Williams and Maura Atwater. So I would like you each just briefly to tell me about your specific project you did with the school. Maura, can we start with you? What did you? Absolutely.
Atwater: So in conversation with different families and then building staff and principals and all the way up to the superintendent, I realized that in our district specifically, one of the big challenges was that family engagement drops off precipitously between elementary and middle school. And that's not uncommon, I think, across districts. But we have a very fast growing population in Delaware County. And in Delaware City specifically, We have five kind of small neighborhood elementary schools that all pull into a single middle school and then a single high school and that moment between fifth and sixth grade for a variety of reasons over the past few years has become one in which again families just don't know how to engage and support their learners in a way that's most effective.
Juravich: And then Holly, tell me about your project or what were your goals? What were you trying to do?
Williams: Right, so initially, of course, I was heartbroken and at the injustice of children who have disabilities not being able to be in general education classrooms. And I'd been told by an administrator there wasn't anyone like my daughter in 20 years in their school district in the main classroom. So my first thought was, well, I know autism is here and present. So where are these children and what happened to those families? Because I knew I was privileged to have the support of her preschool teacher who really helped me understand Caroline's brain and how she learned and that she was capable of learning. So my project is focused on those families who find themselves either wondering if their child is neurodivergent or facing a diagnosis and just meeting with them one-on-one, honestly, and having a conversation about the hard parts of their day or what it's like to be raising a child that's a little different. And my hope is that by helping parents understand their child's neurodivergence and being able to connect with them more and understand the way they're experiencing the world more than when they enroll their child in school, they can partner with teachers because that was a transformative thing for Caroline was that I was able to come in and say, well, this is kind of what overwhelms her. Here's how she calms down. She does great with a visual schedule and things like that.
Juravich: Barbara, tell me more about creating these programs. So are the schools receptive to it? I mean, obviously you worked with more than just these two, right? But you brought them here as examples of what can happen from graduating from this academy. So tell me about how the schools receive the projects or do you help the schools receive their projects properly?
Boone: You know, this is something, a program really, that we do with parents. And it really, we're not asking, say, permission from the schools, but more helping families to understand their school systems and needs, and then finding how do you make change in this place. And every parent who comes to the program thinks about being a leader in a different way. They have different things that really motivate them as well. And so leaving space for that to say, this is not everyone doing the same sort of thing in your school system. But it's really listening to other parents, listening to folks in your schools, looking data and policy, and focusing on something and making change for perhaps a big change or perhaps something that's gonna be a change for a few families.
Juravich: Yeah. And so Mara, I feel like your your project, I'm not sure where you are in the process of it, but I mean, what does better engagement look like in middle school? Because I can so many ways to approach it. Yeah, I can see I can see in elementary school parents being here, there and everywhere, but in middle Go on.
Atwater: And Barbara can attest there were times throughout our kind of year in the academy that I was really overwhelmed. It's a big question. And my own children weren't yet in middle school. I just identified that as the biggest challenge in our district. So what really spoke to me was this research around this triad of like school, family, and community partnership. And so it's not just what the school does to engage families. It's not what the families do to help their kids feel prepared. It's also this huge community piece, which in Delaware is massive. I mean, we just had our horse braid yesterday, and all the families are out. And there's a lot of school pride wrapped up in our community, and I think a lot opportunity to seize on that. So my project became this set of recommendations, actually, that I called Paving the Path to facilitate that transition from fifth to sixth grade. And some of the recommendations I made now almost two years ago have been implemented. So, one thing that I mentioned, you know, family engagement necessarily fell away a bit during the pandemic. The PTO at our middle school was like defunct for a few years. And there was a lot of interest in regenerating a team of some kind, whether you call it a PTO or PTA or an action team, whatever name you give it, finding a cross section of families that are really engaged and want to make change with the support of administrators. Is so important, and that's happening now at our middle school again. So that's really, really gratifying. They also have a sixth grade camping trip in Delaware City Schools. And it had been for a few years in the springtime. But prior to the pandemic, they had it in the fall as this kind of bonding opportunity for kids that are just getting to know each other because they didn't attend elementary school together. So they've moved it now back to the fall. And I think that's a wonderful chance. These don't have to be. Huge changes, like you were saying the summit this week is like small tweaks. Like what are small steps we can make to make a big difference?
Juravich: And Holly, let's talk a little bit more about your project because obviously it started out very specific for your child, but I'm guessing that you expanded it. So tell me more. Yeah.
Williams: Yeah i had a suspicion that other families were experiencing the same thing but i also noticed through the through advocating for caroline to be in public school that there was so much pressure that teachers were under that i couldn't quite name and maybe they couldn't be as candid about with me and you know just like a conversation so when i was in the academy i learned about state report cards, school policies, just all of these barriers that teachers are facing. To keep test scores up and use certain words while they're teaching curriculum. And there are so many hoops that they have to jump through. It did help me to not see the education system or teachers as an enemy, but to see them as people who were just very overwhelmed. And so yeah, my hope was that by talking to parents, that they would be able to partner with teachers to kind of... Help them include their child in a classroom and ultimately create a movement that would prepare teachers before they enter education to just expect children with disabilities to be in a public classroom.
Juravich: Yeah, Barbara, tell me more about teaching teachers to expect children of different abilities to be in the classroom. Yeah.
Boone: Absolutely, I think that expecting children of different abilities and seeing that we don't have special education students and general education students, we have students. And we want to be able to educate them together with their peers. So starting that from our expectations before our students are even in the classroom to have that position, that all of these students are my students. And that I can teach them and that can be really hard for teachers earlier in their career. So I think having the supports of other teachers but also parents like Holly who can talk about this is what works, this is works at home, I'm here to sort of be your partner with you so we can educate these children together. And so I think that that is, another thing I think too is Making sure that failing engagement is a part of our pre-service training, because it's so much a part of every teacher's job. And so I think while a lot of us go into education thinking I just really want to work with kids of this age or to teach this subject, a reality is that every day you're going to be interacting with the adults in these kids' lives with their parents. And so really developing skills around that and getting into the mindset that these are my partners. And to dispel some of the fears also of interacting with families so that we can do it well.
Juravich: Now, I'm assuming that there's a lot of parents involved in this academy. We happen to have two examples that are from Delaware. Not that we're picking on Delaware City Schools right now, but it's just like how, yeah. So tell me about if someone listening right now wants to join the academy or learn more, like tell me about that.
Boone: So we would welcome anyone from any of Ohio's 88 counties. We currently have had parents from 15 different counties, about 36 different school districts. And so they don't have to come to Ohio State for every session. We have three sessions where you come to campus and we interact together all day. But some of the learning you do on your own in your own time, we've created online modules and then we get together online together. With each class. So they aren't always having to get in the car and drive and be away from their family and try to fit it into their schedule a little better.
Juravich: And we're out of time, but Holly or Maura, do you have anything you want to add if people are listening to maybe entice them to do something to get involved like you did? I just want to.
Atwater: Stress that you know things about your child and your community that no one else knows. And for you to show up in these spaces and advocate for what you believe is important is the most important thing.
Williams: Yeah, I would say that it seemed intimidating for me at first I wondered if I belonged in an academy like this I've been a stay-at-home mom for a long time But I truly was able to see myself as an advocate and I'm able to now Allow other parents who are just like me who are still figuring out how their kid's brain works Who still are questioning? Am I naive to think that they can do this? To show them that they have a voice and they have an ability to learn about the policies and the things that go into these decisions and make a real change.
Juravich: We've been talking about family involvement in local schools, and we've been about family engagement programs with the program director at Ohio State University, Barbara Boone. Thank you for joining us today, Barbara. Thank you. And we also were talking with two parent graduates of the program, Holly Williams and Maura Atwater. Holly and Maure, thank you so much for joining. Thanks, Amy. Thank you Coming up, we're going to talk about how teachers are able to engage with families and understand their students better. That is when All Sides continues on 89.7 NPR News.
You're listening to All Sides. I'm your host, Amy Juravich. How can teachers foster a community in their classroom with families, not just the students they see every day? How could they make connections that go beyond classroom teaching? Teachers can often struggle with understanding the full picture of a student. Maybe the child is very disruptive or very shy. It can be good to know who they are and their experiences at home and how that has shaped them. Without teachers understanding a student's family and home life, the parent-student-teacher engagement cannot flourish. Joining us now is Joseph Passi, the lead editor of the book, Engagement in Education, Inclusion Approaches for Creating Collaborative and Equitable School Communities. He's also an assistant professor of special education at Purdue University Northwest. Welcome to the show, Joseph.
Joseph Passi, PhD.: Sorry, I was on mute. Welcome, how are you doing? Good to be here.
Juravich: So you're an assistant professor of special education, and you also co-wrote this book on family engagement, but I'm sure there's a connection there. Can you tell me about the connection between special education students, their parents, and being involved in schools?
Passi: Well, my history with special education goes way back. I was a high school special education teacher for 17 years. And while I was doing my dissertation, which is kind of a way back now and kind of traumatic, so I don't love talking about that period, but while I doing it, and I became really invested in this idea of inclusion and why inclusion just doesn't seem to work. You know, if you talk to teachers about inclusion, they'll universally say, we believe in inclusion. We believe in engagement. We want to talk to families more. Teachers all want these things, but yet they don't always materialize. And I really felt that families were one of those core elements that often get overlooked when we talk about. Creating more inclusive environments within schools. And so I ended up doing my dissertation with, it was like a qualitative study, with seven wonderful mothers of children with disabilities and about how they had to navigate special education processes and just a labyrinth of systems and structures within special education in order to advocate for their children. And I was just absolutely in awe. With these mothers. And we know that it's not always mothers that are the advocates, although often they are. It could be other family members, it could be fathers, it could be grandmothers, it can be sisters, brothers, uncles, aunts, or even family friends. But I was in awe at how many different things they had to juggle at the same time. And so not only were they advocating for their children, but they were dealing with things at home. With their children. And it could have been like behavioral issues. It could have had social issues. It could've been some like developmental problems. And they were trying to navigate that at the same time as getting the supports that they knew were necessary in the schools. And the thing that we find with schools as institutions and families is that there seems to be an inherent divergence in perspectives. And I think also in roles, institutions, they serve a larger system. It could be district-wide, it could be state level, it could federal level, and there's a lot of pressure on schools to perform in a certain way and to meet certain metrics. And sometimes those preferences can be inimical to family engagement and getting families involved. And so sometimes it stymies the process of engagement rather than allowing it to flourish. And so we kind of end up doing this kind of doublespeak where we really want families to engage and be included. And those are two kind of different terms, engagement and inclusion I could talk about, but. But then the systems themselves are just not very amenable to allowing that engagement to flourish in a meaningful way and one that like really connects families with schools and not in just like you're in the room, but you're a partner in the run, right? There's a difference there. And that's the difference I mean between include it. I can just send you an email and say you're invited and now you're included in the process versus engagement to me is something much deeper. It means that you're co-creating the processes and that your ideas, your perspectives, that your lived histories become a part of whatever policy or platform that the school is pursuing.
Juravich: Yeah, and I appreciate that definition, the difference between inclusion and engagement. I mean, you wrote this book that I mentioned, along with several other professors, you have several co-authors, but did you all feel that there was a gap in teaching teachers how to engage with parents and families in their classrooms and schools? Is there a gap there?
Passi: Oh, yes. And I think everybody, so I had three wonderful co-editors, Alt Thayer, Janice Littlebearer, and Michelle Parker-Katz, who is actually my doctoral advisor. So I've known her for like 20 years. And we write a lot together. And then we had another, I think it's 10 or 11 contributing authors to the book. And these were all, these were, some of them were parents, some of them were other professors or experts in the field or activists. And I think all of them, and I don't wanna speak for everybody, but I think everybody would say, yes, there is a huge gap in the desire to engage families and then the actual materiality of it happening. And... In our teacher education classes, for your question, we talk broadly often about family engagement, but it's often in an aspirational sense that you should be engaging families, that families have histories and a core knowledge and assets that we should be drawing from, and we should use this assets-based mindset. We should approach families with. Cultural humility, we talk about all of these things. And I think our students, these are students in either undergraduate or graduate programs that are going into teaching. Like I said, they all believe that. I think they all leave with that aspiration, encode it in their own sense of what it means to be a teacher. But it's like activating that and actualizing it, like actually doing it. There's where the gap becomes, right? It becomes, you know, there's the cognitive piece and that like we have these ideals, we have this philosophies about the way families should be engaged and our students should be included. But then there's lived reality of what that actually looks like in schools. And sometimes those two things just don't always talk together. And so how do you reify these concepts within the classroom so that it actually becomes part of the institution, it becomes part in the classroom daily experience.
Juravich: Thank you. Um, This is All Sides on 89.7 NPR News. We're talking about parent engagement with Joe Passi, an assistant professor of special education at Purdue University Northwest, lead editor of the book, Engagement in Education, Inclusive Approaches for Creating Collaborative and Equitable School Communities. So talk to me a little bit about how creating collaboration makes schools more equitable, because that's what a public school is supposed to be doing, to be equitable, to be teaching everyone. But. How does collaborative communities do that?
Passi: Well, it's hard to be equitable when you don't know the community you're working with, right? And so the first step toward achieving anything that looks like equity. Is understanding the community, and so gathering their knowledge. And there's a term used in the field. It's funds of knowledge. And the idea of funds of knowledge is that a lot of working class communities have these different funds, these different knowledge bases in which they use to navigate their daily experiences. Often schools are And I'm talking like schools, like they're like their own subjectivity, but you know, humans inhabit schools. So the people who work in schools.
Juravich: Yeah.
Passi: Are not aware of those funds of knowledge, of those assets that families might have. And by doing so, I think we end up in this kind of weird paradox where we at once value families, but also unfortunately, as we know, Amy, and I'm sure you've heard, a lot of blame is placed on families. So a child is misbehaving, a child isn't just right. The child is always hungry. The family is always the first place that the blame is placed. I think that that closes off our curiosity about what is actually going on. Because I think we do all have to, we have to operate in good faith. And so the child of misbehaving in my class, my first thought should be not, it should not be, oh geez, what did the family do to them? My first thought, should be much more curious. Like I wonder what they're trying to communicate. Behaviors are a form of communication. That child is trying to to communicate something to me. And so what are they trying to communicate? What need are they tying to communicate, and how can I figure that out? Well, looking at their home life would be really one of the first places you want to look to. What is going on? What is happening? And unfortunately, because there's such historic levels of distrust between families and larger institutions and not just schools, I think institutions broadly, there's a lot of distrust, Families might not be. Really prepared to share some potentially sensitive information with schools and information that could really help us incorporate some kind of system of supports that would help remediate or ameliorate that behavior that we're seeing. And so there's this lack of mistrust. And so in the book, we talk about this idea of epistemic trust, epistemology just and how we get knowledge. And I came across it because my wife is a clinical psychologist and while I was writing this book I was blah blah blah I was talking and ranting about something we were on like on a walk and she's like oh it reminds me of epistemic trust I was like oh what's that and so we started talking about it we actually wrote she co-wrote a chapter I think chapter 22 about epistomic trust.
Juravich: I'm sorry, unfortunately, we are out of time, but I could talk to you about this more. So we're gonna have to invite you back. We've been talking about family engagement in local schools with Joe Passi, an assistant professor of special education at Purdue University Northwest, lead editor of the book, Engagement in Education. Joe, thank you so much for your time today. I'm Sorry, we ran out of times.
Passi: No worries. Great talking to you, Amy. Thank you.
Juravich: And this has been All Sides on 89.7 NPR News. Thanks for joining us. I'm Amy Juravich.