1. Welcome to Partnering with Families in a Culturally Responsive Multi Level System of Support – Session Three Please complete the roster at this link:
Dan Slides 1 - 7
Jen Slides
Berlin
Sarah Slides
Jen Slides

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3. 3E’s Engage Empower Embrace
Dan Seaman, WI RtI Center Technical Assistance Coordinator Jennifer Grenke, WI RtI Center Technical Assistance Coordinator
Sara Summ, WI Rti Center Technical Assistance Coordinator

4. So what do schools do to engage families?
Home visits
Positive phone calls home
Fundraisers
Potlucks
Weekly data-sharing folders
Generic school newsletters
Parent resource rooms
Celebrations
Goal-setting talks
Student performances
Parent help on learning projects
Regular, personalized
communication
Parent help on administrative
tasks
Back to School Night
Home visits
Positive phone calls home
Fundraisers
Potlucks
Weekly data-sharing folders
Generic school newsletters
Parent resource rooms
Celebrations
3 3 min
We all know schools try many strategies to help families play the five roles , but, those strategies are not all created equally. We often think about whether or not our family engagement efforts are successful by how many parents show up to things. But what if the only way we judged the success of family engagement was whether or not it increased student achievement?
This is a list of some of the many strategies schools use to engage families.
Each group has an envelope filled with these strategies. (next slide)
Which strategies do you think have the most impact on student achievement?
The least impact? Why?

5. Partnering with Families
Within a Culturally Responsive Multi-Level System of Support
Lower Impact Higher Impact
Feature photos that represent families in your school
Family resource room
Positive phone call
Share academic and behavioral expectations
P-T conferences to set goals
Celebrations
Parent representative(s) on PBIS/RtI universal team
Monthly positive phone calls/contacts
Back to school nights
Potlucks
Strategies highlighted in
Communications done In home language
Modeling learning support strategies
Class parties
Acknowledgement system
Home visits
What do you notice about the activities on the higher impact side of the chart? What do they have in common?
(Prompt if they don’t say: 1) teacher-led; 2) learning-focused; 3) individualized; 4) they either build relationships or support academic partnering; 5) most of them don’t require the family to come to the school
The family engagement activities that schools often engage in are school-wide, not learning-focused, and require families to come to the school. “Numbers of participants” is what gets recognized – rather than the increase in a parent’s ability to play the five roles. If families are being asked repeatedly to come to school but are not getting anything that will help them with what they most care about – educating their individual child, then schools often see the undesired effect of families choosing NOT to attend school events because they feel like their time is wasted.
“High impact” family engagement activities may or may not bring families to your buildings, because many of the highest impact family engagement happens at home. When families do need to come to the school, proactively encourage their continued participation by only inviting them to high quality/high impact offerings.
Participants discuss how this resonates with their own experiences.
Below could be an activity:
Bolded boxes = strategies that are specifically mentioned in Promoting Excellence for All.
Ask if there is clarification needed for each item in a square; such as Feature Photos that represent families in your school. Do the families see pictures in the schools that resemble themselves.
Highlight in Green Those that are systemic throughout the school, an ongoing process
Highlight in Pink those that are done randomly
Add the things that you do regularly and are higher impact:
Shareout what it is that you do and how it is a higher impact activity
Performances
Literacy/math nights
Read with child at home
Regular, personalized communication
PBIS/RtI family brochures, website
Fundraisers
Using family surveys and feedback
Data sharing folders
Embrace
Engage
Empower
Adapted from the Class-wide Family Engagement Rubric created by Flamboyan Foundation.

6. Self Reflection
Write down all the strategies you have used to engage families in the past:
Guiding Questions:
Which practices are you spending the most time on?
What practice would your families report is the most important for them to attend?
What message is your school sending to families about their role in
10 min
Today w10 min
Today we will offer support and resources in the following areas:
•Relationship Building
•Academic Partnering
•Ongoing Communication •
Before deciding which component you would like to work on during this session take some time to assess your practices. What practices are you spending the most time on? What practice would your families report is the most important for them to attend.
e will offer support and resources in the following areas:
Relationship Building
Academic Partnering
Ongoing Communication
Before deciding which component you would like to work on during this session take some time to assess your practices. What practices are you spending the most time on? What practice would your families report is the most important for them to attend. How do they find out about

7. Assess Circle any strategy that should continue
Using what you know about the Five Roles and the High/Low Impact Continuum:
Circle any strategy that should continue
1 min

8. Parents Help Students Succeed!
10 min10 min
What you know from your experience is borne out by research. There is a robust body of research showing that, if parents play these five roles, their children have better educational outcomes. So, if we know what it is parents do that make a difference for kids’ success, then…
The role of schools in family engagement should be to equip families to play those five roles.
For example, it is important for parents to communicate to their children that they have high expectations and that they value education. One very simple but effective way parents do that is by asking children what they learned in school that day. Many of you are parents; when you ask your children what they learned at school today, what do they say?
But…
If your teacher sends home an describing that they’re studying ancient Rome that week and suggests a list of three questions, like “ask your child who was his favorite emperor”, then you can have the conversation and do your job communicating the value of learning.
If you get info about how your son or daughter did on the last quiz or test – you can be monitoring and holding kids accountable, but if you don’t find out that they didn’t hand in any homework until the end of the grading period, then you can’t help;
In order for a parent/family to guide their child's education and advocate for their child, families need information and support from teachers. They need to know what their child is learning, where their child is academically, where the child needs to be, and how they can support learning at home. Ongoing, individualized communication to provide each family the information they need to help their child is essential.
Research has been done in a variety of contexts (in the workplace, in marriages, etc.) on the proportion of positive to negative interactions that are required to keep a relationship healthy. It’s 5:1. For every negative interaction you have with a parent, you need to have 5 positive interactions to maintain a healthy relationship. That’s why ongoing, positive communication is a key ingredient of effective family engagement.
Once trusting relationships are in place, families and teachers can begin to work together effectively to accelerate children’s learning.
Then parents are equipped to support learning at home, they may need a refresher on how to do certain operations. For example, some schools teach lattice multiplication but most of our parents didn’t learn it that way, so when they try to help their child, it’s just frustrating. “Mommy, that’s not the way we do it”. But, if their teacher does a quick mini-lesson for parents about lattice multiplication, then they can do their job supporting learning at home ;
Parents’ ability to play these roles that we know will benefit their kids is highly dependent on information that they receive from their child’s teacher. So, as teachers and schools think about their FE efforts, focus on EQUIPPING PARENTS SO THAT THEY CAN PLAY THEIR PART.

9. Academic Partnerships
Where is the gap?
Academic Partnerships
Ongoing Communication
Ongoing Communication
Weekly data sharing folders, data sharing talks, modeling learning activities
Trusting Relationships .
Thinking about the previous slide and those 5 areas that parents can help their children be successful, we as educators need to help bridge the gaps. How do we do this? By building trusting relationships (embrace families where they are at and celebrate what they bring), ongoing communication (engage with them in bidirectional communication) and academic partnerships (empower them to have the skills and strategies to support their children - such as a program like Ready 4K)
•Relationship Building
•Academic Partnering
•Ongoing Communication
Relationship Building
Academic Partnering
Ongoing Communication
Welcome phone calls, positive phone calls/texts, proactive communication

10. Family and School Connections at Berlin Area School District
April 28th, 2017

11. BASD Demographics
City of Berlin has 5500 citizens, BASD covers a number of small rural communities spanning 3 counties
1655 Students over 3 Buildings (1 Elementary, 1 Middle, and 1 High)
55% Students Eligible for Free and Reduced Lunch
16% Students with an Identified Disability
7% Students with Limited English Proficiency
7% Students Designated as Children of Migrant Workers
3% Students Designated as Homeless According to McKinny-Vento

12. Racial demographics

13. PBIS Fidelity Clay Lamberton (ES) Achieves Tier I Fidelity (2012)
Berlin Middle School Achieves Tier I Fidelity (2015)
Clay Lamberton (ES) Achieves Tier II Fidelity (2015)
Clay Lamberton (ES) Begins Tier III Implementation (2016)
Berlin Middle School Achieves Tier II Fidelity (2016)
Berlin Middle School Begins Tier III Implementation (2017)

14. The why?
School Climate Transformation Grant provided the funding and staffing to look at Family Engagement in a systematic way
To Address Long Held Beliefs
“Students can’t achieve because they come from THAT family”
“If only parents would create and enforce rules at home, students would be more successful at school”
“No one comes to the parent nights, and the ones that do come aren’t the ones that need the information”
“Johnny has missed 15 assignments, you need to help him get the work done” – teacher speaking to a parent
Teachers were only ing about a student’s behavior to parents they felt might be confrontational despite survey results that fewer than 10% of parents check on a regular basis.
Teachers were assigning homework using a one-to-one technology, only to find out that parents don’t have Wi-Fi at home rendering the homework unable to be completed.
Placement decisions for at-risk students were being made without parental collaboration.
Parent communications were often sent home only in English despite the large number of non-English speaking parents.

15. The How?
We at Berlin Area School District believe…
Therefore…
All students can and want to learn
We invest in professional development to provide high quality instruction delivered through highly engaging teaching strategies.
All families want their children to succeed
We help parents recognize and leverage their child’s strengths first before and while addressing areas for student growth.
Our students are more likely to succeed when their families feel connected to school
We place a high value on authentic family engagement, with its three pillars of extensive multi-modal communication, family partnership and advocacy.
Some families may not understand how the systems of school work
We strive to provide as much information as possible to parents in as many different areas as possible, including everything from “how to pay for fees”, “how do I report my child’s absences” to “how do I request special help if I feel my child is struggling?” and beyond.
Our families are our consumers and they have a choice as to where they send their child to school
We provide each and every one of our families with the utmost respect and unconditional care. Every interaction they have with our staff is driven by our joint wish for their child to succeed and a deep understanding that the school-family partnership is the cornerstone to that success.
Labeling, using fixed-mindset or deficit-based language when referring to students or their families has shown to alienate students and their families from school
We use strengths-based person-centered language when referring to students and families (i.e. John Smith is a student receiving special education services under the Emotional Behavior Disorder classification as opposed to John Smith is an EBD student).
Many of our families feel more comfortable speaking and reading in languages other than English
We provide communications, supports and signage in as many different languages as possible. We provide interpretation services whenever possible and regularly instruct our staff how to interact with families when using interpretation services.
Families are their child’s first teacher but that doesn’t mean they are experts in Berlin Area School District’s academic content
We do not expect our parents to help their students with homework. At the Elementary level, very little homework is required as it has shown to have little effect on student performance and in some studies, has shown to have a detrimental effect as it can disrupt evening routines and the amount of sleep a young child receives which is directly correlated with academic performance. If an older child is required to do homework, they can ask a teacher the following day as they are provided with plenty of time for academic support.
Not all families feel comfortable coming to school, have the time to come to school or are available during traditional school hours
We provide communications and support via phone, , web so that parents can access these supports on their own schedules.
Some families enjoy coming to school to volunteer and observe their student’s learning.
We welcome all family members who have completed volunteer forms to visit during arranged times during the school day. All families, regardless of their volunteer status are welcome to attend performances, class parties, parades, and classroom “show and share” events.
Parents are their child’s life-long advocate
We ensure that parents fully understand their role as their child’s life-long advocate and expert on their child and their family. We strive to do more listening than talking in all parent meetings. We ensure that families have all of the tools they need to help them and their child successfully transition between the different levels of Berlin Area School District and beyond to ensure that every graduate is college and career ready.
Creation and publication of the Family Engagement Protocol. A set of 11 belief statements and actions discussed by the District Administrative team.

16. The How? Using those belief statements
to address non-family centered stereotypes at all levels (i.e. help staff understand the family’s viewpoint when decision making)
clearly delineate staff behaviors in dealing with families (i.e. all staff must call home with a positive comment about a student prior to calling home for negative reason).
to become inclusive (i.e. changing school signage and art so that all students and families are reflected in their school)

17. The how Using those belief statements
to drive authentic family engagement and involvement in their child’s educational experience (i.e. making sure parents are invited to Student Success Team Meetings which are held at a time convenient for the family)
to incorporate Tier III Wrap principle of using “Family Voice and Choice” whenever possible (i.e. asking families about needed resources on an individual basis, instead of hosting a large “educational event” that families might not want to attend due to language barriers, prior experiences with school, and lack of time or interest through the use of registration home visits.)
to reach out individually to families with volunteer opportunities, making sure to have multiple “low risk” opportunities delivered in the family’s preferred language.

18. The Now Current Challenges/Areas for Growth
Ongoing effort to keep the family at the center of all discussions
Sustainability of efforts as new staff are hired and grant funding goes away
Changing staff attitudes is an ongoing effort
Encouraging all staff members to accept their role in family engagement

20. Each year letting know parents know what our expectations are within the building. Schoolwide and classroom

23. Strengths and Areas of Improvement
In the Question Box, please enter one strength of your system and one area of improvement.
In the chat box please list share out one strength and one area of improvement as it pertains the to the line items from the BOQ, TFI or SIR.

25. Resource Activity: Flamboyan Foundation Family Engagement Assessment Rubric
See Handouts!

26. Moving Forward http://fewebinar.questionpro.com/
As a result of the webinars, what is next in your school or district in regards to engaging families? What celebrations have occurred and what work still needs to be done? How can we support your efforts?
Please watch your inbox for our evaluation later this week. We would appreciate if you would complete the evaluation.
Remember to complete the roster! goo.gl/bh0q1I