How can school leaders create welcoming, inclusive P-3 environments that foster authentic family and community engagement so students and families can thrive?
Creating welcoming and inclusive environments for families is crucial for understanding each child's contexts, strengths, and needs to foster their development. Traditional family engagement strategies often focus solely on the "visible" ways families participate in their children’s learning, often leading to blame being assigned to families encountering barriers to traditional forms of participation. It is therefore imperative that we intentionally redefine what we mean by family and community engagement, taking the time to center culture and school contexts in the design of family and community engagement partnerships. Effective strategies include learning about families’ cultural assets, selecting culturally relevant classroom materials, and developing cultural competence to understand the unique needs and perspectives of families whose backgrounds differ from our own. In addition, we consider how we might engage in deep listening in order to lead alongside families to co-construct inclusive P-3 learning environments so that all students can thrive.
Fostering inclusive school environments not only benefits individual children but also enriches the entire educational community.
In this professional learning community, participants will:
- Analyze the equity implications of current family engagement practices
- Inquire into the ways in which leaders are engaged with UTK families and P-3 community partners in equity-focused early learning partnerships
- Identify meaningful ways to build authentic, reciprocal partnerships with families and implementation support needed