I am always both delighted and mystified by schools and districts that subscribe to various programs and trainings within the field of family engagement. I applaud the efforts of any district willing to take this step. Certainly any attention to families is delightful to me! With that said though, there still is a part of me that is baffled by the idea that incorporating one strategy will bring about the needed change of culture so that all children can learn and that family engagement is a driving force in the support of learning outcomes.

Many schools have upgraded technology so that parents can view grades and other information on line. Further, teacher websites and blogs are becoming more and more popular. I also read recently that many schools are training their teachers to make home visits. I think that is fantastic. We have known for years that outreach is the key to engaging disengaged families. Our battle cry of “before they will come to you-you must go to them” should be familiar with anyone who has hung around an FFS workshop or Workshop. Two-way communication is paramount to lasting success with families.

My concern centers on the idea of systemic implementation. Web sites and home visits, like any other strategy in a comprehensive family engagement process, are beneficial if all teachers and staff participate and believe by doing so they can make an academic difference in the lives of the children who need it most. I often use the following scenario in workshops to illustrate my point.

You are a parent. Your child is placed in a classroom of a teacher who believes in the power of family engagement and as a result, works tirelessly to build strong relationships with families. This teacher makes home visits, sends weekly newsletters, keeps website information timely, and is in constant telephone communication about progress, balancing positive and negative information to parents and families. Parents and families quickly understand the passion this teacher exhibits and are extremely appreciative of the efforts. At the end of the school year, neither the child nor their family wants to leave this teacher.

The following year, your child is placed in another classroom with a teacher of equal academic skill and compassion for learning, but one who does not fully subscribe to the tenants of family engagement. Communication is sparse and the teacher chooses not to make home visits, chooses not to use the web as a communication tool, and only uses telephone communication to share negative news. Families equate this to a rug being pulled from under them. They now have negative feelings toward this teacher and soon those feelings are translated toward the school. The mere fact of the inconsistent use of strategies to engage families itself becomes a catalyst for disengagement.

In the midst of writing this article, I did a mini-study. I visited the websites of twenty school districts, randomly selected from various state departments of education websites. Within each of the districts, I visited one elementary site, one middle school site and one high school site. That means that I visited 60 individual school websites. Of the sixty websites, 36 of them featured teacher web pages. Of the 36 sites that use individual teacher website technology, none of them-not one-had all of the teachers using this technology. When parents and families visit the site, and see that their child’s teacher does not use the technology, the message they receive is that the school or the teachers don’t care enough to supply this information. The blank sites do more harm than good.

All or nothing. I have believed for years that the correct approach to family engagement is to understand that it is a process to which all must subscribe and one that has the ability to change the culture of an organization so that the efforts are sustained and produce lasting and measurable results. Strategies employed devoid of a process are sporadic and temporary at best. We have spent too many years wasting resources and the valuable time of teachers by parading endless programs of sure-fire strategies without connecting those strategies to a complete system of reform. Let’s watch and see how many schools that have employed these strategies are still doing them in a year; or two years; or five years.