School, Family, and Community Partnerships


Book Description

Strengthen programs of family and community engagement to promote equity and increase student success! When schools, families, and communities collaborate and share responsibility for students′ education, more students succeed in school. Based on 30 years of research and fieldwork, the fourth edition of the bestseller School, Family, and Community Partnerships: Your Handbook for Action, presents tools and guidelines to help develop more effective and more equitable programs of family and community engagement. Written by a team of well-known experts, it provides a theory and framework of six types of involvement for action; up-to-date research on school, family, and community collaboration; and new materials for professional development and on-going technical assistance. Readers also will find: Examples of best practices on the six types of involvement from preschools, and elementary, middle, and high schools Checklists, templates, and evaluations to plan goal-linked partnership programs and assess progress CD-ROM with slides and notes for two presentations: A new awareness session to orient colleagues on the major components of a research-based partnership program, and a full One-Day Team Training Workshop to prepare school teams to develop their partnership programs. As a foundational text, this handbook demonstrates a proven approach to implement and sustain inclusive, goal-linked programs of partnership. It shows how a good partnership program is an essential component of good school organization and school improvement for student success. This book will help every district and all schools strengthen and continually improve their programs of family and community engagement.




Community Engagement Findings Across the Disciplines


Book Description

This book is a reference for administrators and educators at institutions of higher learning who are thinking about taking serious steps to link their educational mission to helping their surrounding communities. Various research findings across the disciplines in higher education about integrating community engagement in traditional coursework are presented. This book provides a multi-disciplinary and multi-method approach to both incorporating and studying the effects of community engagement (service learning) in the curriculum. Multiple departments, from Kinesiology to Sociology, as well as various types of classes (undergraduate, graduate, online, face-to-face, traditional, international) are represented here. Both qualitative and quantitative work is included. Methods involved include interviews, case studies, reflections, and surveys. One chapter also uses longitudinal data collection to address the overall effect of engaging in community engagement during the undergraduate college experience. If you are not sure how to study the effects of community engagement on students at your university, this book is for you.




Creating Engagement between Schools and their Communities


Book Description

Creating Engagement between Schools and their Communities: Lessons from Educational Leaders addresses how educational leaders have made efforts to reconnect their schools to their communities and the varied goals they achieved. The contributors of this book are educational leaders who have stayed committed to their neighborhoods and who have seen the moral imperative to provide equal opportunity to all students. This book shares their experiences, particularly looking at community-based schools in urban, impoverished, or immigrant communities—communities that often are disconnected from the political and economic centers of the country.




Handbook on Family and Community Engagement


Book Description

Thirty-six of the best thinkers on family and community engagement were assembled to produce this Handbook, and they come to the task with varied backgrounds and lines of endeavor. Each could write volumes on the topics they address in the Handbook, and quite a few have. The authors tell us what they know in plain language, succinctly presented in short chapters with practical suggestions for states, districts, and schools. The vignettes in the Handbook give us vivid pictures of the real life of parents, teachers, and kids. In all, their portrayal is one of optimism and celebration of the goodness that encompasses the diversity of families, schools, and communities across our nation.




Community Engagement


Book Description

Community Engagement: Principles, Strategies and Practices is a collection of chapters written by engaged scholars. The authors of the chapters work in diverse settings and come from different philosophies of community engagement. For instance, Taylor and Luter in Chapter One cogently make the argument that universities have essentially sold out when it comes to community engagement. The authors argue that engaged scholars would be better served by looking at the Civil Rights Movements than progressive theories that drive service learning. Harkavy, Hodges, and Weeks take an opposite position and discuss historical figures such as Francis Bacon. Bacon spoke of improving a mans estate. By that, Bacon meant that people should make life better for all. Astute readers will want to read and dwell on the thoughts and ideas generated in the first two chapters. In Chapter Three, Bielefeldt, discusses service learning and community engagement in relation to engineering. Her chapter will interest those who do not traditionally engage with the community and in service learning. Bielefeldts writing style is exciting and will open new doors for readers of our text. Basma and Arce-Trigatti introduce two important concepts to readers. The authors claim that mental health services are delivered more effectively through community schools than through traditional health clinics. Further, the authors entertain the notion that migrants and refugees are often missed by those doing community engagement. Basma and Arce-Trigatti fall in line with Taylor and Luter in bringing up important questions concerning the role that universities are taking in community engagement. In Chapter Five, Iwaskai does a marvelous job of describing how he involved those he is studying as part of his research team. Iwaskais discussion of the YPAR method may be of particular interest for young scholars who want to do on-the-ground research. In Chapter Six, Conwill writes from an ethnographic perspective about his personal experiences as a psychologist and community organizer. He is an inductive thinker and brings his experiences alive by relating them to theory. Readers of this chapter should be enticed to think about this type of work in regards to community engagement and service learning. In Chapter Seven, Kronick and Daniels discuss how the University of Tennessee engages with the community. The authors present service learning and collaboration as important aspects of community engagement. Hicks-Goldston and Goldston present a unique way of looking at service learning in Chapter Eight. They report both the successes and failures of doing service learning online. In Chapter Nine, Bruner, Szepe, and Blueford discuss systems theory. The authors consider the role that closed systems play in the role of mental health care. Finally, Butler uses extreme detail to describe a university-business collaboration effort to establish a STEM program.




Community Engagement for Better Schools


Book Description

In the United States, government participation in education has traditionally involved guaranteeing public access, public funding, and public governance to achieve accountability, representativeness and equality. This volume discusses the role of broad regimes of local community actors to promote school improvement through greater civic engagement. Taking a historical perspective, this text examines the relationship between government at the federal, state, and local level and local actors both inside the traditional education regime and those stakeholders outside the schools including parents, non-profit organizations, and businesses. It then drills deeper into the role of state legislatures and finally local leadership both inside and outside the schools to promote change, focusing on efforts that include parental choice through tax incentives, charter schools, magnet schools, and school vouchers to achieve accountability, representativeness and equality. The text examines the perceptions and relationships of various actors in urban education reform in numerous cities across the country with special attention dedicated to Chicago, Illinois, and Milwaukee, Wisconsin to offer a deeper understanding of the barriers to and opportunities for fostering greater civic capacity and engagement in urban education reform, as well as developing inclusive educational policy. Attention is also given to accountability and measuring success, traditionally defined by high stakes testing which fails to consider non-classroom factors within the community that contribute to student performance. An alternative approach is offered driven by a wholistic accounting of various factors that contribute to school success centered around third-party inspections and accreditation. Providing insight into school reform at the local level, this book will be useful to researchers and students interested in public policy, education policy, urban governance, intergovernmental relations, and educational leadership, as well as teaching professionals, administrators, and local government officials.




Community Engagement Abroad


Book Description

A landmark in our understanding of international community-engaged learning programs, this book invites educators to rethink everything from disciplinary assumptions to the role of higher education in a globalizing world. Tapping the many such programs developed at Michigan State University during the last half-century, the volume develops a comprehensive framework for analyzing study-abroad programs with a community-engagement focus. More than a how-to guide, it also offers seven theoretically framed case studies showing how these experiences can change students, faculty, and communities alike. The purposeful broadening of who is involved in these types of international learning programs leads to conceptual transformation and self-reflection within the participants. The authors take the reader on a fascinating journey through how they changed as a result of designing and delivering programs in full collaboration with community partners. The arguments given in this volume for developing truly reciprocal, mutually beneficial partnerships beyond the academy are powerful and persuasive.




Community Engagement in Higher Education


Book Description

There seems to be renewed interest in having universities and other higher education institutions engage with their communities at the local, national, and international levels. But what is community engagement? Even if this interest is genuine and widespread, there are many different concepts of community service, outreach, and engagement. The wide range of activity encompassed by community engagement suggests that a precise definition of the “community mission” is difficult and organizing and coordinating such activities is a complex task. This edited volume includes 18 chapters that explore conceptual understandings of community engagement and higher education reforms and initiatives intended to foster it. Contributors provide empirical research findings, including several case study examples that respond to the following higher educaiton community engagement issues. What is “the community” and what does it need and expect from higher education institutions? Is community engagement a mission of all types of higher education institutions or should it be the mission of specific institutions such as regional or metropolitan universities, technical universities, community colleges, or indigenous institutions while other institutions such as major research universities should concentrate on national and global research agendas and on educating internationally-competent researchers and professionals? How can a university be global and at the same time locally relevant? Is it, or should it be, left to the institutions to determine the scope and mode of their community engagement, or is a state mandate preferable and feasible? If community engagement or “community service” are mandatory, what are the consequences of not complying with the mandate? How effective are policy mandates and university engagement for regional and local economic development? What are the principal features and relationships of regionally-engaged universities? Is community engagement to be left to faculty members and students who are particularly socially engaged and locally embedded or is it, or should it be, made mandatory for both faculty and students? How can community engagement be (better) integrated with the (other) two traditional missions of the university—research and teaching? Cover image: The Towering Four-fold Mission of Higher Education, by Natalie Jacob




The Morehouse Model


Book Description

How can the example of Morehouse School of Medicine help other health-oriented universities create ideal collaborations between faculty and community-based organizations? Among the 154 medical schools in the United States, Morehouse School of Medicine stands out for its formidable success in improving its surrounding communities. Over its history, Morehouse has become known as an institution committed to community engagement with an interest in closing the health equity gap between people of color and the white majority population. In The Morehouse Model, Ronald L. Braithwaite and his coauthors reveal the lessons learned over the decades since the school's founding—lessons that other medical schools and health systems will be eager to learn in the hope of replicating Morehouse's success. Describing the philosophical, cultural, and contextual grounding of the Morehouse Model, they give concrete examples of it in action before explaining how to foster the collaboration between community-based organizations and university faculty that is essential to making this model of care and research work. Arguing that establishing ongoing collaborative projects requires genuineness, transparency, and trust from everyone involved, the authors offer a theory of citizen participation as a critical element for facilitating behavioral change. Drawing on case studies, exploratory research, surveys, interventions, and secondary analysis, they extrapolate lessons to advance the field of community-based participatory research alongside community health. Written by well-respected leaders in the effort to reduce health inequities, The Morehouse Model is rooted in social action and social justice constructs. It will be a touchstone for anyone conducting community-based participatory research, as well as any institution that wants to have a positive effect on its local community.




Family, School, Community Engagement and Partnerships


Book Description

How can colleges and schools support the inclusion of family, school and community engagement curricula in teacher and administrator preparation programs? The contributions in this book try to answer this question, with contributors describing their experiences, their programs, and their support for the goal of enhancing parental involvement and engagement in Schools and Colleges of Education. The authors and researchers, such as Joyce Epstein, who is the foremost researcher on the topic, have the knowledge and expertise in family, school, and community engagement and partnerships from both theory and best practice perspectives. The book is designed to be interactive, and readers are encouraged to engage themselves in the conversation. Readers are invited to e-mail any of the editors to discuss the questions posed. This book was originally published as a special issue of Teaching Education.