What are best practices other school districts use for collaborating with the community, including parents?
(List your source and use bullet points to summarize ideas)
Kelly found this article on service learning projects. Please click on the article [[file/view/Service Learning.pdf|Service Learning.pdf]]
Defines service-learning
Discusses how to build community partnerships through service-learning
Discusses the benefits of service-learning
Gives a few examples of service-learning projects from other communities
Hello Team!
This afternoon I met with one of my teachers from high school, Jim Arey, who ran the Public Service Practicum (PSP) program at Elk Grove High School in District 214 (The program is much smaller than in the past and will not be around much longer because of a stronger focus on the core subjects and because of budget cuts). He had a lot of information to share. He wanted to know which direction we wanted to go with collaboration; he was asking if our goal was to create stronger partnerships in order to integrate community with curriculum (fulfilling learning standards) or was it more in the direction of just generally teaching students civil behavior/citizenship. I have attached a link that takes you to a curriculum guide he created for a high school community program. If you read the table of contents, you will see all the topics he discusses including the need for public service and how to develop a public service/community program. There is also a lot of information about internships in the community, but that is definitely geared toward older, high school aged students. The end of the document is about Service Learning, which is more relevant to our goals. What I would like you to look at: Scroll down to the bottom of the document, the last ten pages or so is the Annual Report for his PSP program at Elk Grove High School. This Annual Report lists all the activities the students were involved in in the community and the results they got. It is pretty interesting; there might be some ideas we could use.
In addition, here is a link to the Elk Grove Community Character Coalition which is a community organization that supports events based on the six pillars of character (trustworthiness, respect, responsibility, fairness, caring, citizenship): Character Coalition
I have a question: Jim Arey's job was to communicate and collaborate with the Elk Grove partnership, he built relationships with the community and coordinated all of this for Elk Grove High School, so, are classroom teachers/administrators in District 64 going to be individually responsible for being "Community Outreach Liaisons" in each building to make sure the community is involved at their schools? Or is that something that we are going to decide in our plan?
Julia
Kevin found a recent article from the Daily Herald about District 214.
*Having an updated, "fresh" web page is a critical to communicate with the community and parents.
National & Community Service- Service Learning Resources Intro: "An effective service-learning project provides a meaningful experience for students, volunteers, or national service participants; includes opportunities for reflection on service; fosters positive attitudes about citizenship and lifelong service; and meets a real community need. Service-learning projects require careful planning and collaboration to ensure that all partners work together successfully to meet their goals."
Specifically click on the link "Youth and communities helping each other..."
Kelly Muno contacted Nel Sychangco of Middleton Elementary School in Skokie and Lawrence Sasso, Principal, of Lincoln Middle School and asked what their districts did to foster collaboration with the community.
Nel's response:
Some of the things we do in my district to collaborate with community are: District International Night- (This is actually tonight) Local ethnic restaurants donate food to the event. Parents and local organizations perform ethnic dances or play music from their country showcasing our diverse population. Skokie Public Health Department came to our school to vaccinate all students and staff with the HINI. Volunteer nurses came to administer the nasal sprays and shots (for more at risk) Working together we vaccinated about 70 % of our students. Many parents were grateful we offered this due to the shortage of vaccinations. Each of our schools has either a School Improvement breakfast or Lunch. We invite our room parents, board members, and PTA to this event. We discuss our goals as a school for the year. We go over our goals from last year and discuss our accomplishments. We also gather feedback from our parents regarding what they would want to see as a goal. Items for this year included, Parent friendly Power Standards (this was a suggestion from a few parents to have a better understanding of what our curriculum looks like in all the grades).
We shared data from our MAP and ISAT to show parents student achievement. We also shared interventions we are doing with individuals who can use the extra boost to meet or exceed grade level standards. We do Readers are Leaders: This is in December. We invite Local Leaders, (Parents, our board members, our Mayor, Fire and Police, business owners), come read their favorite books to our students in the classroom. This is an all day event. We send our personal invitations to them; teacher sign up who they would like to come to read to their class Parent Visitation; Parents visit and shadow their kids to all their classes. The purpose is to give the parents and idea of what their day looks like. The teachers try to stick to having a normal day, but they do take advantage of the parents so they do things more performance based activities.
Lawrence's response:
We have parents and community involved in some of our committees. This includes strategic planning groups which meet throughout the school year.
We send out a community newsletter twice a year that goes to every household in Lincolnwood.
We attend different events in the community and our Superintendent is a member of the Chamber of Commerce.
I have principal coffees with grade level parents.
We use our website for different types of surveys--technology, parent satisfaction.
CarlFrantz
The U.C. Davis Program called "Coalition for Community Schools" promotes establishing a "community partnership" Presumably this could be done at the district level. Our group should consider whether we should recommend establishment of a "Partnership" not just a collection of disjointed initiatives. Here is an excerpt from a Coalition document http://www.communityschools.org/assessmentnew.pdf:
"In many communities, partnerships between schools and other community organizations and agencies are helping to create supports that enable children and youth to learn and succeed and help families and communities to thrive. These partnerships bring together diverse individuals and groups, including principals, teachers, school superintendents, school boards, community-based
organizations, youth development organizations, health and human service agencies, parents and other community leaders, to expand opportunities for children, families, and communities."
"Creating a successful community school partnership is a complex, challenging, and time-consuming task. To be effective, partnerships need to engage in a thoughtful process to define a vision and clear goals. Partnerships need to have effective governance and management structures to ensure that programs operate efficiently and the partnership is responsive to community needs."
"Community school partnerships also need to draw from a broad range of perspectives and expertise—from inside the school as well as from other organizations and individuals within the community. Finally, community school partnerships need to connect, coordinate, and leverage resources from a variety of sources to support and continue their work."
CarlFrantz
The Community Schools Partnership Initiative in Manitoba Canada has a character development program in their schools that involves after school programs. They also have parenting programs in the evening conducted by professional social workers, and a variety of other initiatives involving the a school/community partnership. It appears from their website that each school works wtih parents to develop their own programs. The webaddress is http://www.edu.gov.mb.ca/cspi/documents/index.html
laurasmail
All Stars Program: All Stars Core is recognized by SAMHSA as a research-based model program. All Stars is interactive, thought-provoking, and fun and is ideal for fourth to eighth graders that have never used substances, come from low-socio-economic families, and/or have English as their second language. It is designed for delivery in classrooms as well as in community and after-school settings. All Stars is a two year program and involves parents’ commitment, idealism, bonding and parental attentiveness – that have been found to prevent alcohol, tobacco use, other drugs, and violence.
permalink
permalink
Posted Nov 12, 2009 2:25 pm - [[message/view/home/16805555#|[delete]]] ||
laurasmail
laurasmail
laurasmail
This program is offered in District 63 by Omni Youth Services. In response to community needs, OMNI offers programs in cooperation with school personnel in the school setting. Past programs have addressed both prevention and intervention of topics such as bullying, gang involvement, suicide, and substance use/abuse, parenting adolescents, social skills, and transition to high school. Consultation and program development can be provided for individual school issues or needs.
ssguest
I found this study that gives some great input as to why it is so important for parents and educators to work together.
What are best practices other school districts use for collaborating with the community, including parents?
(List your source and use bullet points to summarize ideas)Kelly found this article on service learning projects. Please click on the article
Hello Team!
This afternoon I met with one of my teachers from high school, Jim Arey, who ran the Public Service Practicum (PSP) program at Elk Grove High School in District 214 (The program is much smaller than in the past and will not be around much longer because of a stronger focus on the core subjects and because of budget cuts). He had a lot of information to share. He wanted to know which direction we wanted to go with collaboration; he was asking if our goal was to create stronger partnerships in order to integrate community with curriculum (fulfilling learning standards) or was it more in the direction of just generally teaching students civil behavior/citizenship. I have attached a link that takes you to a curriculum guide he created for a high school community program. If you read the table of contents, you will see all the topics he discusses including the need for public service and how to develop a public service/community program. There is also a lot of information about internships in the community, but that is definitely geared toward older, high school aged students. The end of the document is about Service Learning, which is more relevant to our goals. What I would like you to look at: Scroll down to the bottom of the document, the last ten pages or so is the Annual Report for his PSP program at Elk Grove High School. This Annual Report lists all the activities the students were involved in in the community and the results they got. It is pretty interesting; there might be some ideas we could use.
Here is the link: Curriculum Guide
In addition, here is a link to the Elk Grove Community Character Coalition which is a community organization that supports events based on the six pillars of character (trustworthiness, respect, responsibility, fairness, caring, citizenship): Character Coalition
I have a question: Jim Arey's job was to communicate and collaborate with the Elk Grove partnership, he built relationships with the community and coordinated all of this for Elk Grove High School, so, are classroom teachers/administrators in District 64 going to be individually responsible for being "Community Outreach Liaisons" in each building to make sure the community is involved at their schools? Or is that something that we are going to decide in our plan?
Julia
Kevin found a recent article from the Daily Herald about District 214.
*Having an updated, "fresh" web page is a critical to communicate with the community and parents.
District 214: New Web PageSara Born added several items:
E-Lead: A Partnership of the Laboratory for Student Success and the Institute for Educational LeadershipHere is an excerpt from the article:
The Institute for Educational Leadership's (IEL) "Education and Community Building: Connecting Two Worlds" offers some basic "rules of engagement" for school leaders and community leaders to use to build and sustain partnerships:
Service learning is an excellent tool for community collaboration.
ASCD's Educational Leadership, May 2009- "Service Learning and Civic Participation"
Intro: "Service learning promotes good deeds and academic achievement, but its greater potential lies in preparing students to be engaged citizens."
National & Community Service- Service Learning Resources
Intro: "An effective service-learning project provides a meaningful experience for students, volunteers, or national service participants; includes opportunities for reflection on service; fosters positive attitudes about citizenship and lifelong service; and meets a real community need. Service-learning projects require careful planning and collaboration to ensure that all partners work together successfully to meet their goals."
Specifically click on the link "Youth and communities helping each other..."
Kelly Muno contacted Nel Sychangco of Middleton Elementary School in Skokie and Lawrence Sasso, Principal, of Lincoln Middle School and asked what their districts did to foster collaboration with the community.
Nel's response:
Some of the things we do in my district to collaborate with community are:
District International Night- (This is actually tonight) Local ethnic restaurants donate food to the event. Parents and local organizations perform ethnic dances or play music from their country showcasing our diverse population.
Skokie Public Health Department came to our school to vaccinate all students and staff with the HINI. Volunteer nurses came to administer the nasal sprays and shots (for more at risk)
Working together we vaccinated about 70 % of our students. Many parents were grateful we offered this due to the shortage of vaccinations.
Each of our schools has either a School Improvement breakfast or Lunch. We invite our room parents, board members, and PTA to this event. We discuss our goals as a school for the year. We go over our goals from last year and discuss our accomplishments. We also gather feedback from our parents regarding what they would want to see as a goal. Items for this year included, Parent friendly Power Standards (this was a suggestion from a few parents to have a better understanding of what our curriculum looks like in all the grades).
We shared data from our MAP and ISAT to show parents student achievement. We also shared interventions we are doing with individuals who can use the extra boost to meet or exceed grade level standards.
We do Readers are Leaders: This is in December. We invite Local Leaders, (Parents, our board members, our Mayor, Fire and Police, business owners), come read their favorite books to our students in the classroom. This is an all day event. We send our personal invitations to them; teacher sign up who they would like to come to read to their class
Parent Visitation; Parents visit and shadow their kids to all their classes. The purpose is to give the parents and idea of what their day looks like. The teachers try to stick to having a normal day, but they do take advantage of the parents so they do things more performance based activities.
Lawrence's response:
We have parents and community involved in some of our committees. This includes strategic planning groups which meet throughout the school year.
We send out a community newsletter twice a year that goes to every household in Lincolnwood.
We attend different events in the community and our Superintendent is a member of the Chamber of Commerce.
I have principal coffees with grade level parents.
We use our website for different types of surveys--technology, parent satisfaction.
The U.C. Davis Program called "Coalition for Community Schools" promotes establishing a "community partnership" Presumably this could be done at the district level. Our group should consider whether we should recommend establishment of a "Partnership" not just a collection of disjointed initiatives. Here is an excerpt from a Coalition document http://www.communityschools.org/assessmentnew.pdf:
"In many communities, partnerships between schools and other community organizations and agencies are helping to create supports that enable children and youth to learn and succeed and help families and communities to thrive. These partnerships bring together diverse individuals and groups, including principals, teachers, school superintendents, school boards, community-based
organizations, youth development organizations, health and human service agencies, parents and other community leaders, to expand opportunities for children, families, and communities."
"Creating a successful community school partnership is a complex, challenging, and time-consuming task. To be effective, partnerships need to engage in a thoughtful process to define a vision and clear goals. Partnerships need to have effective governance and management structures to ensure that programs operate efficiently and the partnership is responsive to community needs."
"Community school partnerships also need to draw from a broad range of perspectives and expertise—from inside the school as well as from other organizations and individuals within the community. Finally, community school partnerships need to connect, coordinate, and leverage resources from a variety of sources to support and continue their work."
The Community Schools Partnership Initiative in Manitoba Canada has a character development program in their schools that involves after school programs. They also have parenting programs in the evening conducted by professional social workers, and a variety of other initiatives involving the a school/community partnership. It appears from their website that each school works wtih parents to develop their own programs. The webaddress is http://www.edu.gov.mb.ca/cspi/documents/index.html
All Stars Program: All Stars Core is recognized by SAMHSA as a research-based model program. All Stars is interactive, thought-provoking, and fun and is ideal for fourth to eighth graders that have never used substances, come from low-socio-economic families, and/or have English as their second language. It is designed for delivery in classrooms as well as in community and after-school settings. All Stars is a two year program and involves parents’ commitment, idealism, bonding and parental attentiveness – that have been found to prevent alcohol, tobacco use, other drugs, and violence.
This program is offered in District 63 by Omni Youth Services. In response to community needs, OMNI offers programs in cooperation with school personnel in the school setting. Past programs have addressed both prevention and intervention of topics such as bullying, gang involvement, suicide, and substance use/abuse, parenting adolescents, social skills, and transition to high school. Consultation and program development can be provided for individual school issues or needs.
I found this study that gives some great input as to why it is so important for parents and educators to work together.