Powerful parents transform schools

Parents aren't just sitting on the sidelines anymore. They're actively involved in schools and it's paying off in surprising ways.

By GreatSchools Staff

Schools across the nation are discovering a powerful force for school improvement: parents.

Parents aren't just volunteering to help with teacher luncheons and fund-raising campaigns; they're helping to raise the academic achievement level of children at their schools. An added bonus is that children of involved parents tend to do better in school.

How big a difference can parents make in schools? Here are some examples:

Armies of involved parents

Tapping new sources of data and federal funding earmarked for parent involvement, community groups of all stripes are organizing efforts for education reform. The Charles Stewart Mott Foundation estimates that about 150 such groups have formed during the past decade to improve student learning in inner-city districts alone. The foundation has spent $10.6 million on 65 grants targeting school reform since 1999, and it plans to spend $6.4 million more through 2008 to document, evaluate and disseminate information about community-driven school improvement projects.

Parent involvement takes many forms. The Parent Institute for Quality Education (PIQE) has taught more than 325,000 California parents how to navigate the school system and keep their children on track. "We are not asking parents to go in and tell teachers and counselors how to do their job. We emphasize that parents should go to school monthly and work with the teacher to design a plan for their child," explained David Valladolid, president and CEO.

At the other extreme is the Commonwealth Institute for Parent Leadership (CIPL), which trains parents to push schools to higher levels of achievement by all students. More than 1,000 parents in 176 school districts in Kentucky have completed its six-day parent training course, which teaches them how to interpret school data, understand learning standards and initiate school improvement projects. Graduates work with a coach for 18 months following the training.

This army of parents trained by CIPL has championed many projects, including "Science Wizards" family events that caused one school's science scores to rise 14 points on state tests, a booklet that demystifies special education regulations and workshops that improved students' writing.

How children and schools benefit

Parent involvement definitely pays off for the children of those who get involved. In A New Wave of Evidence, a review of 51 studies published between 1995 and 2002, Anne T. Henderson and Karen L. Mapp found that students with involved parents are more likely to:

There's also plenty of proof that school-wide parent involvement efforts translate into academic gains. For example:

Convincing parents to get involved

Once parents understand the positive benefits of participation, CIPL teaches them how to decipher their school's data to get a realistic picture of school performance. Examining indicators like test scores, graduation rates and teacher experience levels helps counter the natural tendency of parents to overestimate the quality of the education their children are receiving.

CIPL convinces parents of the need for schoolwide improvement by showing parents how many students at their school failed to demonstrate rudimentary skills on a standardized test, such as how many fourth graders at their school couldn't figure out the area of a rectangle - information that is available from National Assessment of Educational Progress's Nation's Report Card or their state department of education. When parents realize how poorly students are performing, there's often an audible gasp in the room.

Kerry Zack, manager of CIPL, said, "A lot of parents start out thinking only about their child's needs, but by the second day of training, they're thinking about what benefits the whole school because they realize that what benefits all students also benefits their child."

Working with administrators

Convincing administrators of the need for school improvement is another challenge, particularly those who feel that they're under siege because of budget cuts and expanded standardized testing requirements. John Murphy, former superintendent of the Charlotte Mecklenburg District in North Carolina observed, "School systems, just like most large organizations, don't change because they see the light. They change because they feel the heat."

CPIL suggests that PTAs invite parents and teachers to a three-hour session (with food and child care available) to discuss goals for their children and ideas on how to achieve them. Ideally, an impartial facilitator runs the meeting. The principal is usually asked to leave the room during brainstorming so participants feel free to speak frankly.

Not all principals welcome parent participation. "I got booted out of my school," said Deborah Stallworth, a CPIL graduate who later organized a lecture series for parents about the achievement gap at the main library in Louisville, Kentucky.

On the other hand, Cassidy Elementary School in Lexington, Kentucky, recently became the first school in Kentucky to receive a "Certification of Excellence" for parent involvement from the National PTA. Principal Richard Day explained, "I use parent involvement to promote excellence in the school. If you've got a lot of parents involved in the school, if they are knowledgeable about what you're trying to do, then you've got better reporters on what's going on in the school. Teachers know they have to be on the ball. I don't shield teachers from parents and I don't shield parents from teachers."

If enough parents indicate interest in school improvement, administrators are usually willing to listen. CIPL parent trainers like to use this example, called "Collaboration Counts":

1 parent = a fruitcake
2 parents = fruitcake and friend
3 parents = troublemakers
5 parents = let's have a meeting
10 parents = we'd better listen
25 parents = our dear friends
50 parents = a powerful organization

What the law requires

Parent involvement is one of the main tenets of the No Child Left Behind Act, which authorizes federal funds for this purpose. U.S. Secretary of Education Rod Paige said, "Parents must be full partners in their child's education. Parents have a right to know whether their child is learning, and local schools and districts must be sure that parents have that information. No Child Left Behind provides a lifeline to parents by giving them information regarding not only how their child is achieving academically, but also how their school and school district are performing as well."

The law requires schools that receive Title I funds (58% of all public schools in the U.S.) to develop a written parent involvement policy and to have a school-parent compact that describes how the school will work with parents to improve achievement. In addition, every school district that receives Title I money (90% of all school districts) must have a written Title I parent involvement policy that is evaluated each year. (Title I schools are determined by the number of students who receive free and reduced-price lunches.)

Under No Child Left Behind, each school district must reserve at least 1% of its total Title I grant for parent involvement. Some spend these funds on salaries of employees who are supposed to help engage parents in schools; others use them to pay for parent training programs.

Other potential sources of funding for school improvement efforts by parents are foundations, large businesses, and state and federal agencies that have funds designated for academic improvement and parent involvement (such as federal "Gear Up" programs designed to increase the number of low-income students going to college and Parent Information and Resource Centers).

Growing momentum

Colleges that train teachers are beginning to wake up to the need to incorporate parent involvement in their courses and may invite participation by local parents. Joyce Epstein, a professor at Johns Hopkins University who serves as director of the Center on School, Family and Community Partnerships, said deans and chairs of departments of schools that grant education degrees were "brutally honest" in admitting during a 2001 survey that their graduates were not prepared to invite parent involvement in schools.

A recent poll of 161 institutions found that one-third of graduates receiving advanced degrees in education had written their master's or doctoral thesis on the topic of parent or community involvement. "Professors are becoming more aware of the need for training in this area," said Epstein.

She is working with schools, districts and state departments of education to build programs that foster partnerships between schools, families and communities. Her National Network of Partnership Schools currently has 900 schools and 100 school district members, along with some PTAs and the National PTA.

Epstein wants all children to benefit from parent involvement. "It's a question of equity," she said. "Studies show that students who have families that are involved tend to do better in many ways, including achievement, aspirations and postsecondary plans. That's been the case with individual parents who have made it their choice to be involved. What we're trying to do is make that process more inclusive - to take responsibility for conducting programs that will inform and involve parents of all economic, ethnic, racial and cultural groups, in all parts of the country and in all school levels: elementary, middle and high school."