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A S C D / w w w . A S C D . o r g 17

Susan Auerbach

Aprincipal needs every pos-sible resource, and we cantoverlook the resources ofthe parents, noted Prin-cipal Marie Kramer, leader

of a high-poverty, predominantly Latinoelementary school in Los Angeles. Kramersschool is known for its dedication to

meeting the needs of low-income immi-grant familiesand for the ways in whichparents give back to the school. Admin-

istrators, office staff, and most teachers(including several from the neighborhood)are bilingual; an outreach coordinatorassists parents with food, housing, andhealth care needs. Kramer pursues grantsfor social services, leads parents on learningwalks through classrooms, and works withparents and community groups to opposeexpansion of a nearby landfill.

Parents take classes not only in English

as a second language, but also in vocationalskills, such as child and elder care. Werethe community center here, Kramer said.Parents feel safe coming to the school andthus comfortable volunteering. Fathers turnout to help on school beautification days,and mothers cook hundreds of tacos andtamales for fund-raisers. We spend a lotof time showing how thankful we are to

have our lovely community through certifi-cates, ceremonies, and celebrations, Kramerexplained.

At Kramers school, parent education iskey to student progress. Rather than occa-sional parent workshops, the school offersin-depth six- and eight-session classesin family literacy and math activities,including on Saturdays when more parentsare available. Kramer welcomes parents to

classes, teaches lessons, and seeks parentsfeedback on what they learned.

Kramer exhibits many qualities of schoolleaders known for their partnerships withfamilies and community groups, withparticular sensitivity to Latino immigrantfamilies (Auerbach, 2007). Beyond beingvisible and accessible as principal, she takesa hands-on approach to parent involvement.She and her staff members know the com-munity well, generally speak Spanish,and see parents as assets. The schoolhonors parent contributions while rallying

resources for them and involving them instudent learning. Kramers approach doesnot take unusual amounts of charisma,time, or funding; more important are caring,commitment, and cultural competence onthe part of school leaders and staff.

As a researcher, Ive learned about parentengagement both from leaders like Kramerand from parents of color in urban schools.

Learning fromLatino

FamiliesWhen schoolsoffer small-scaleactivities andoutreach with apersonal touch,families respond

with moreopen participation.

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18 E d u c a t i o n a l l E a d E r s h i p / M a y 2 0 1 1

My experience as a parent activist inurban school reform, where I witnessed

a troubling divide between parents andeducators, propelled me into graduateschool and a dozen years of qualitativeresearch on family engagement in edu-cation. Ive led parent programs andstudied how parents see their role intheir childs education and how adminis-trators see their role in promoting parent

involvement. Id like to share threelessons Ive learned, in hopes of sparkingmore authentic school and familypartnerships.

Lesson 1:Validate Families Cultures

Although deficit thinking about poorand minority families is less blatant thanin the past, some educators still assumethat immigrant parents dont care abouteducation. I get angry when I hearadministrators say that in Latino house-holds, education is not that important,[because the] parents dont come toschool, said a former local districtsuperintendent in Los Angeles. You

couldnt be any more wrong. Parents docare; they just need an invitation. Theyneed an environment that is conduciveto their engagement (Auerbach, 2007).

An assistant principal agreed, describingthe low-income immigrant parents ather school as devoted parents, hard-working, trusting, compassionate, andopen to change.

Latino immigrant parents have highaspirations for their children that theyexpress at home according to their owncultural scripts. These are not always

the same as educators scripts, whichoften equate parent involvement withattendance at school events and respon-siveness to school requests.

ApoyoWhen I first began interviewing immi-grant parents, I noticed that they didntrefer to involvement; they spoke

instead ofapoyo (support) and the manyways they supported their childrens

education with verbal messages andconsejos (narrative advice). The parentis the one who plants the seed, saidthe father of a high-achieving student.I tell my son, If you study, you aregoing to accomplish what you want.

The parents job is to motivate him sohe continues his education and becomessomething (Auerbach, 2006).

Too often, educators are unaware of

the moral and emotional support forlearning that Latino parents offer behindthe scenes; such support might includechoosing better schools, reducingchores so students can study, and mod-eling the value of hard work (Auerbach,2006; Lpez, 2001). The first step in

culturally relevant parent engagement isto recognize these invisible strategiesand related parent beliefs. Leadersmight take a cue from a gifted Latinaparent liaison who begins every meetingby first acknowledging the support foreducation that parents already provideat home.

EducacinIn my experience, preservice educatorsfind it eye-opening to learn about thetraditional concept ofeducacin among

Latino immigrants, especially low-income immigrants from small townsand villages in Mexico and Central

America. Educacin is distinct fromformal academic education, which isseen as the job of educators; instead,it refers to respectful behavior, goodmanners, and moral training, whichparents inculcate in their children as

the basis for academic learning and

for the buen camino (right path) in life

(Delgado-Gaitan, 2004; Valds, 1996).Many immigrant parents view ofeducation itself is bound up with thisconcept and with collectivistic values ofcooperation and interdependence ratherthan individualistic values of compe-

tition and independence (Rothstein-Fisch, Greenfield, & Trumbull, 1999).

Now I see why my students parentsare always asking me about theirbehavior instead of academics, aspiringadministrators often tell me. Schools canguide parents, like Kramers teachersdo, in asking different questions, suchas, Did my child complete assignments?

What did he learn today? and What canI do at home?

Bridging the GapAs the Latino population continues togrow, more schools are taking stepsto better understand Latino familiesas assets. Educators are meeting toexamine their own assumptions andbiases so they can counter deficitthinking. Theyre opening up dia-logue with immigrant parents aboutshared hopes and dreams for theirchildren. Theyre sponsoring homevisits and parent-led community walks

to learn more about students lives andneighborhood resources, as well asfamilies funds of knowledge and home-

based literacy that teachers can inte-grate with classroom learning. Theyreinvesting in bilingual parent liaisons orparent center directors who can act notonly as translators but also as culturalbridges between immigrant families and

Too often, educators are unaware of the

moral and emotional support for learning

that Latino parents offer behind the scenes.


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the school. Resources such as Involving

Latino Families in Schools (Delgado-

Gaitan, 2004) and Beyond the Bake Sale(Henderson, Mapp, Johnson, & Davies,

2007) offer many practical tips.

Lesson 2:Keep It Small

Parents contact with schools is often

marked by formality and bureaucracy,

as in one-sided teacher presentations

at back-to-school night or procedural

runarounds in the front office. These

approaches are off-putting for everyone,

especially immigrant parents who areless familiar with U.S. schools.

Schools can promote greater par-

ticipation when they are mindful of

parents comfort level. When an Oregon

district took the unusual step of asking

its growing population of Latino parents

what would make them comfortable

at meetings, they learned that parents

did not want to stand out by wearing

a translation headset or sitting with a

translator at school events; they wanted

separate meetings in Spanish. Likewise,

when researchers in Texas asked Latinoparents how they wanted to be involved

in their childrens education, they

said they preferred informal learning

activities at home and more personal

communication with teachers (Scribner,

Young, & Pedroza, 1999).

Surprisingly, I discovered the appeal

of small-scale outreach while facilitating

a parent program at a large, diverse

high school. Latino parents were under-

represented at whole-school events

like an open house or the college fair.

But they turned out for meetings of theLatino parent support organization at a

local church, led by an especially warm

and welcoming Latina parent liaison.

They were likewise receptive to personal

phone calls from the liaison and their

childrens history teacher inviting them

to small Futures and Families work-

shops on preparing students for college.

Parent involvement is known to

decline during secondary school. But I

am convinced that if you build it, theywill comeas long as you create a sup-

portive climate for parent activities and

respond to parents concerns about

adolescence, whether around college,

gangs, or family communication.

In Futures and Families, we used a

personal approach to make complex

information accessible and meaningful.

We organized informal panel discus-

sions with guest speakers from back-

grounds similar to those of our parents

who shared stories about dealing with

advanced placement courses, SAT tests,

college costs, and other issues. They

spoke passionately about struggles that

parents could relate to, like the motherwho had been afraid to have her child

leave home for college and the coun-

selor who had been steered as a student

into vocational rather than college-prep

courses. Hearing their experiences

made it easier for parents to speak up

(Auerbach, 2004).

We also built in time for parents

to chat around refreshments before

meetings and speak individually with

teachers, counselors, and the prin-cipal about navigating high school and

options for undocumented students.

The chance for interaction among often-

isolated parents and between parents

and staff not only raises comfort levels

but also enhances the social capital of

immigrant families, giving them greater

access to information and support.

When educators offer smaller-scale

parent activities and infuse personal

touches and authentic interaction into

outreach, immigrant parents feel less

intimidated, and they respond with

more open participation (Delgado-

Gaitan, 2004). For example, in a large

year-round elementary school in LosAngeles, Principal Art Franco was

inspired by community organizing

models to adapt house meetings for

parents to the classroom setting. Sitting

in a circle with the teacher and a few

other staff members, parents discussed

why education was important to them,

often crying as they described limited

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20 E d u c a t i o n a l l E a d E r s h i p / M a y 2 0 1 1

education opportunities intheir home countries and their

struggles to help their children;staff members also shared theireducation journeys. Parents whoattended the house meetingsbegan to approach teachers moreoften with questions and totake part more readily in parentworkshops.

Staff members at a literacyprogram at Marie Kramerselementary school likewise madesure to put parents at ease. TheLatina literacy coach shared

stories about her immigrantfamily upbringing, jokes abouther children, and updates on herfamily members in the military.Parents said that it was her sabor

(flair, enthusiasm) that madethem keep coming. The parent centerdirectors warmed up the auditoriumwith decorations, refreshments, prizes,and attentiveness to parent needs andquestions. At the culminating session,parents received certificates and pre-sented letters to their children about

their hopes for their childrens future.When schools reach out in these per-sonal ways, parents often liken theschool to a family in which people careabout and help one another.

School leaders send a message to bothstaff members and families about theimportance of family engagement whenthey interact frequently with parentsface-to-face. At a small elementaryschool in a working-class Latinoneighborhood of Los Angeles, Prin-cipal Sylvia Perez held weeklyplaticas,

or open conversations, with parents,which evolved into Parents as Authorsworkshops led by Perez and several staffmembers. Parents, many of whom hadlimited formal education, were guidedthrough the same steps of the writingprocess as their children were, frombrainstorming to publishing, to createfamily books. I hear the parents stories

and make a connection at such a humanlevel, Perez said, noting that thishelped repair relations with a previouslyangry parent. Perez considered parentsthe heartbeat of the school and timespent with them one of the high pointsof her job.

Parent outreach efforts like theseaffirm that schools care for families ashuman beings and recognize the impor-tance of relationships as the foundation

of school and family partnerships. Otherstrategies that have proven effective arepersonal telephone invitations to activ-ities, events designed to attract fathers,open-ended gatherings for coffee withthe principal, and more interactiveapproaches to back-to-school night.

Lesson 3:Nurture Parent Voice

Some well-intentioned programs imposeschool agendas on immigrant andminority parents, for example, parentingclasses that aim to fix their child-rearing practices or programs in whichparents merely receive informationand services. In contrast, some of the

most promising efforts encourageparent voice and leadership

development. These approachesare especially important with

immigrant parents who often feelmarginalized and rebuffed byurban schools.

Parents come to schools withtheir own education beliefs andpriorities, which may not alwaysmatch those of the school. Indemocratic schools, we need toelicit more parent perspectivesto jointly shape policies and pro-grams and address inequities. And

in the case of immigrant parentswhose home countries stressparent deference to educationauthorities, we need to help themfind their voice to be advocates fortheir children.

Delgado-Gaitan (2004) believesa central purpose of Latino parentinvolvement activities should be topromote ongoing dialogue betweenparents and educators for mutualunderstanding and accommodation. Aformer Los Angeles principal took this

approach in trying to co-construct theschool with mostly immigrant parentsthrough weekly discussions. Thenumber one complaint wasnt aboutacademics or their kids futures, sherecalled, it was about food and the

cafeteria. So I thought, thats where Illstart. . . . It started with cafeteria food,and by the end it was about curriculumand philosophy, so it grew into some-thing very powerful (Auerbach, 2009).

In a poor gateway neighborhoodfor immigrant families, Principal John

Zavala saw parent engagement as inter-twined with social justice and com-munity revitalization. He brought inthe Mexican American Legal Defenseand Education Fund (MALDEF) to trainparents in their rights, the U.S. schooland political systems, and leadershipskills. Then he enlisted parents andteachers in planning an annual parent

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A S C D / w w w . A S C D . o r g 21

conference on Csar Chvez Day.They chose the theme of Breaking

the Cycle of Poverty and Violencethrough Education for an event thatdrew more than 250 families on a Sat-urday, with free meals and bilingualteachers in charge of registration andchildrens activities. Parent leaderspresided over an opening session thatfeatured an inspirational poem read in

Spanish, English, and the indigenousKanjobal language of school familiesfrom Guatemala, as well as a keynote

address on crime by a city councilman.Workshops led by parents, teachers,or community experts covered topicsranging from tenant rights and immi-gration law, to charter middle schools,to talking with your preteen about sex,

to traditional academic topics like mathgames. Compared with parent activitiesdesigned to meet district needs andschool agendas, this unusual programraised parent awareness and addressedcommunity needs as a bridge to meetingschool goals.

As parents of color become moreaware of education issues throughleadership training or community orga-nizing, they often undergo personaland political transformation. Someimmigrant mothers in Chicagos Logan

Square neighborhood schools, forexample, were emboldened to pursuehigher education for teaching careersafter being trained as parent mentors(Warren, Hong, Rubin, & Uy, 2009).Latino and black parent activists inSouthgate, California, organized aboycott to protest a year-round schoolcalendar and a strike to demand ade-

quate textbooks guaranteed by lawand won (Oakes, Rogers, & Lipton,

2005). Former Miami-Dade CountySuperintendent Rudy Crew (2007)said we should welcome and cultivatedemand parents who hold urbanschools accountable.

Instead of fearing parent power, saidPrincipal Zavala, tap into it with parentsas your allies. Instead of exercisingpower overfamilies and teachers, workwith them to develop relationalpowerto accomplish goals of common interest

(Warren, Hong, Rubin, & Uy, 2009).Resolving conflict becomes much easierwhen schools have built a foundation ofrespectful relationships and dialogue.

The Essential Ingredients

There is no fail-safe recipe for parentengagement just as there is none forschool improvement. Ive suggested afew essentials that schools can adaptand combine with other elements intheir own unique mix. What mattersmost, with Latino immigrant families aswith others, is bringing parents to thetable in a true spirit of partnership tolearn and work together for the mutualbenefit of schools, families, andcommunities. EL

Authors note: All names of principals are

pseudonyms.

References

Auerbach, S. (2004). Engaging Latinoparents in supporting college pathways:Lessons from a college access program.

Journal of Hispanic Higher Education,3(2),125145.

Auerbach, S. (2006). If the student is good,let him fly: Moral support for college

among Latino immigrant parents.Journalof Latinos and Education, 5(4), 275292.

Auerbach, S. (2007). Visioning parentengagement in urban schools: Roleconstructions of Los Angeles adminis-trators.Journal of School Leadership, 17(6),699735.

Auerbach, S. (2009). Walking the walk: Por-traits in leadership for family engagementin urban schools. School Community

Journal, 19(1), 932.Crew, R. (2007). Only connect: The way to

save our schools. New York: Farrar, Straus,and Giroux.

Delgado-Gaitan, C. (2004). InvolvingLatino families in schools: Raising studentachievement through home-school partner-ships. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin.

Henderson, A. T., Mapp, K. L., Johnson,V. R., & Davies, D. (2007). Beyond thebake sale: The essential guide to family-school partnerships. New York: New Press.

Lpez, G. (2001). The value of hard work:Lessons on parent involvement from an(im)migrant household. Harvard Educa-tional Review, 71(3), 416437.

Oakes, J., Rogers, J., & Lipton, M. (2005).Learning power: Organizing for educationand justice. New York: Teachers CollegePress.

Rothstein-Fisch, C., Greenfield, P. M., &Trumbull, E. (1999). Bridging cultureswith classroom strategies. Educational

Leadership,56(7), 6467.

Scribner, J. D., Young, M. D., & Pedroza, A.(1999). Building collaborative relation-ships with parents. In P. Reyes, J. D.Scribner, & A. Paredes Scribner (Eds.),Lessons from high-performing Hispanicschools: Creating learning communities(pp. 3660). New York: Teachers CollegePress.

Valds, G. (1996). Con respeto: Bridging thedistances between culturally diverse familiesand schools: An ethnographic portrait. New

York: Teachers College Press.Warren, M., Hong, S., Rubin, C. L., & Uy,

P. S. (2009). Beyond the bake sale: Acommunity-based relational approach to

parent engagement in schools. TeachersCollege Record, 111(9), 22092254.

Susan Auerbach is associate pro-

fessor in the Department of Educa-

tional Leadership and Policy Studies at

California State University, Northridge;

[email protected].

What matters most is bringing parentsto the table in a true spirit of partnership

to learn and work together.


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