By Anfal Muhammad Jenkins
Effective family engagement is a cornerstone of positive student outcomes, especially for students receiving special education services. It is not easy to sustain, but is always rewarding for parents, schools, communities, and students themselves.
As a mom of a young boy with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD), my experiences have been a tale of two types of family engagement: effective and positive vs. ineffective and destructive.
In my experience with my son’s schools, components of effective and positive family engagement included honesty, a platform for two-way open communication, consideration for my child’s needs, a climate of respect, and a spirit of true partnership. Factors that have been ineffective and destructive, however, are a lack of timely and useful information from school staff and administrators, lack of respect (i.e., inappropriate language or references to students that are not person-first) and an adversarial environment.
Maintaining an environment that promotes a student-first culture requires effective family engagement. For parents of students with IEPs, this is especially important since effectiveness of IEP implementation cannot be ascertained when families are left disengaged.
What is Family Engagement?
Researchers have defined family engagement is “authentic partnership between professionals and family leaders who reflect the diversity of the communities they represent, working together at the systems level to develop and implement better policies and practices”
Family engagement can sometimes present significant challenges for those who serve parents of students receiving special education services. They must ask:
- Are parents considered partners in planning their child’s education?
- Are their voices valued and welcomed?
- If so, does family engagement end there?
- Once education planning leads to implementation, are parents encouraged to provide feedback on progress?
- Answers to such questions provide the basis for assessing and addressing the effectiveness of family engagement in various systems.
One vehicle for family engagement is the SEPAG, Special Education Advisory Council. Every New Jersey school district is required by law to have one, but the ways in which they function vary greatly. Some are “parent engagement” in name only, while others are dynamic, parent powered forums that help school districts shape policy and practice.
Want to learn more about SEPAGs? Click here.
As the chairperson of the SEPAG in New Jersey’s largest urban school district, Newark, I have a unique perspective on the types of barriers faced by families that make it difficult, if not impossible, to be actively engaged.
During focus group discussions and additional research on the matter, Newark SEPAC identified general barriers to family engagement.
- Financial Struggles
- Children with Complex Needs
- Unreceptive Professionals
- Inaccessibility
Financial Struggles
A major barrier to family engagement in urban areas across the country is the struggle many families face with the inadequacy of their finances. School districts with low levels of poverty often see higher rates of family engagement in school and at home. Perhaps less bound by pressure to make ends meet, families who are less concerned about finances tend to have more availability for school involvement.
Newark Kids Count 2019 reported that 32% of families with children in Newark, the largest city in New Jersey, live below the federal poverty level, after a 12% reduction since 2013 (Advocates for Children of New Jersey, 2019). When one in three families in the district is struggling to make ends meet, it hard to imagine robust family engagement in system change.
Children with Complex Needs
Parents indicate that the mere fact that their children have complex needs, whether it be behavioral, medical or developmental, can present significant barrier to their ability to remain engaged in their children’s education. Providing for needs that are more complex is often a costly and time-consuming effort, and many families report a lack of qualified, affordable caregivers to provide baby-sitting.
Unreceptive Professionals
When families make commitments of time, talent and financial resources in order to attend meetings and get engaged, they are sometimes met by school professionals are unreceptive to family input, or parent voice. This is one of the more distressing barriers to family engagement surfaces because it is hard to quantify and hard to address.
Inaccessibility
When accommodations are not available for diverse families, including those with students with disabilities, and those who do not speak English, meetings and other school functions lack accessibility.
A Call to Action
To bring sustainable improvements to family engagement, Newark SEPAC believes that four domains must be addressed – Parent representation, transparency, commitment, and impact.
Representation occurs when parent-leaders represent their communities in gauging needs and developing strategies to drive system change. We recommend that school districts establish and maintain appropriate representation throughout the school system. Such representation must adequately reflect the diversity of the community served by the school district
Action Steps
- Strengthen Parent-led & community-based organizational partnerships
- Be sensitive to family needs by holding meetings / functions that accommodate families’ schedules to increase participation
- Leverage technology to make important meetings more accessible
- Partner with families to reinforce education through family engagement at home
Transparency guarantees accessibility to information to ensure full, effective participation of families.
Action Steps
- Reserve at least two (2) roles for parents on each structured committee in a school district
- Ensure family leaders are partners in every step of systems change process – from brainstorming to evaluation
Commitment on the part of school districts to meaningful family engagement is demonstrated by the normalization of the concept and the prioritization of the practice of family engagement in every school.
Action Steps
- Promote Family Engagement as a district core value
- Maintain engagement at every level and area of education system
- Ensure accountability by designating appropriate engagement targets as part of all district leader Key Performance Indicators (KPI’s)
The impact of successful school based family engagement initiatives can and should be measured.
Action Step
- Ensure that district professionals’ partner with Families and Parent-Led organizations to evaluate and improve district family engagement activities
The Nellie Mae Education Foundation issued a 2017 report that demonstrates, How Family, School, and Community Engagement can Improve Student Achievement and Influence School Reform. Citing over 30 references and exhaustive studies on the subject, they asserted that, “Results revealed that engagement at home was a statistically significant predictor of grades and days missed at school. Students with more engaged parents had higher academic achievement and missed fewer days of school”
Family engagement is not just a need that must be prioritized in special education. It is essential for the well-being of all students. It is not just a mechanism to improve academic achievement. Family Engagement unifies families, educators, and community to strengthen the impact of our Public Schools in providing for the common good of society.
References
Advocates for Children of New Jersey. (2019). Newark Kids Count 2019. Newark. Retrieved from https://acnj.org/downloads/2019_03_28_Newark_Kids_Count_2019.pdf
Paladino, MSA, M., Hoover, MPH, C., Dworetzky, MS, B., & Wells, MSEd, N. (2018). A Framework for Assessing Family Engagement in Systems Change. Palo Alto, CA.
Wood, L., Bauman, E., Rudo, Z., & Dimock, V. (2017). How Family, School and Community Engagement can Improve Student Achievement and Influence School Reform. Quincy.
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