Building Staff Capacity w/ Parents
EPMS Staff Training @ 8 AM in Media Center
Building Parent Capacity is Music to My Ears!
76 Trombones (Full Scene) - The Music Man (1962)
Presentation Link: https://www.smore.com/muyq3
This presentation is for the Elkins Pointe teachers and staff to build capacity with their parents and families. The presentation is being given on our FULL RELEASE DAY/Teacher Work Day.
PLEASE SIGN IN ELECTRONICALLY & TAKE EVALUATION
At the END of Training, please SIGN IN, with your name, role (i.e. teacher), email, and the date will be recorded automatically. Please COMPLETE Evaluation.
AGENDA FOR BUILDING CAPACITY TRAINING
I. Building Staff Capacity with Parents Objectives
- Work with Parents as Equal Partners in their child's education
- Foster parent engagement in the classroom and the school
- Parents are stakeholders in their child's academic success
II. Building Capacity with Parents
- Value and utility of contributions of parents
- Reach out to communicate and work with parents as stakeholders
- Implement and coordinate parent programs to build ties between home and the school
III. Value and Utility of Building Capacity with Parents
- Partnering with parents builds relationships because it opens up 2-way communication, builds trust, and supports student success
- Because parents were their child’s first teacher, partnering with them indicates that teachers/staff value the contributions parents make towards their child's academic achievement
- Strategies are identified by teachers to further support student success both in school and through family involvement
IV. How to Building Capacity with Parents
- Communication is the key to Initiating and maintaining ties between home and school
- Create Trust by being responsive, timely, relevant, and clear in purpose
- Fill your "Goodwill Bank" by putting out POSITIVE feedback to parents about their child, by getting your parents ENGAGED in the classroom, and sharing the AMAZING things you are doing by email your parents, putting pictures in Titan Talk or Social Media.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbyhao0FtaQ
V. Parent Feedback
- The Good
- The Bad
- The Ugly
https://youtu.be/AFa1-kciCb4
The key component of Building Staff Capacity with Parents comes from parent feedback. Feedback for this Building Capacity training comes from Input collected at the FY18 Input Meeting, Spring 2017 surveys (online and hard copy), in-person feedback from parents, online comments, parent emails, and evaluations from parent workshops. Click here to see the Summary of Feedback from the Spring Input Meeting FY18.
PARENT FEEDBACK CAN TELL US ...THE GOOD, THE BAD & THE UGLY
The Good...
- 5-Star-Climate Rating for the 4th year in a row! Our parents tell me when they take their survey they rate us highly because of our teachers & staff. Our parents indicate that our teachers and staff are welcoming, helpful, care about students, provide great instruction, and offer early morning and after-school tutoring. Thank you, teachers and staff! We have a 5-Star Rating because of YOU!!
- Good Feedback is often not shared with the teacher, but I [your Parent Liaison] hear compliments directed towards our teachers, staff, administrators, instruction, programs, and clubs all the time! I hear positive feedback from 1) From our parents, 2) from the community, 3) our feeder schools, 4) and even from parents from other schools. You are putting the #1 in our Title I school!
- Our students are thriving at the high school level and parents at the feeders say it is because of our teachers and administrators here at EPMS. Our parents know that the teachers at EPMS work hard to make our students "College and Career Ready."
- RESPONSIVE...Our teachers and staff are extremely responsive. Thank you for being responsive. It makes all the difference.
- Communication: Teacher weekly emails, websites, sharing celebrations in Titan Talk, Social Media Tweets. Our parents are pleased with communication. We have tightened up communication. Keep your blurbs, pictures, announcements coming.
- Help Sessions! No other school does this like you do. This might be the most important thing you do for your students. Our parents are appreciative and so are students.
- Clubs and Extracurricular Activities. These things are very valued by our parents. FCA, Interact, Jr. Beta, Robotics, Star House, Sports...and Thursday Clubs. Our parents and students appreciate these clubs. You are making a difference in your students by helping them find their passions which lead them to their high school verification selections, their college choices and ultimately their careers.
- AVID Strategies - They are catching on and parents are seeing the value. Keep up the good work! GO AVID!!
- PBIS - It works! Really, it works! Our parents need to hear POSITIVE things from the school about their children. When a link was posted with a list of "Top Titans" in the newsletter, it had a large number of clicks.
- Parent Engagement in the school for academics...It is like the Fourth of July, Christmas and Disney World when a parent participates and sees for themselves the amazing activities you do with your students. For example, French National Week, Holocaust Museum, and Shark Tank were lauded by parents because they were wonderful for students and the parents. Our Band, Chorus, and Orchestra concerts, LGPE, and trips have always gotten enormous accolades from parent helpers.
The Bad...
Don't let the one bad day or comment get to you...
- Parents are VERY HAPPY with our teachers and staff, very happy! Things go bad usually when a parent does not give the teacher the benefit of the doubt and does not reach out to the teacher to ask what is going on. Try to foster 2-way communication by letting parents know that you are open to communications when things are not going great. Let your parents know that there will not be repercussions towards their child if the parent asks an awkward question or brings something unfavorable to your attention. Let your parents know that your #1 concern is to have "SMART, HAPPY, & CONNECTED" students. Encourage your parents to reach out to you if their student is not achieving, is unhappy, and does not feel connected in class.
- Let your parents "Get to know You!" This is the NUMBER ONE way to stop "The Bad" in its tracks. To know you is for them to know how AWESOME you are and that you are approachable.
- Negative feedback about this school is very rare. Just like one bad day does not make for a bad year. Don't allow one bad comment to diminish your value because the feedback shows that our parents EXTREMELY happy with our teachers and staff! Keep in mind parents are quicker to "fire off" a complaint than to take the time to write a compliment. They usually send a negative email in the heat of the moment and often without even getting the full picture. I get to hear your compliments and I hear them ALL the time!! I try to get the parent to email you and tell you, but they usually feel too bashful or they forget. One of my SMART Goals as Parent Liaison is to "pass on" the compliments by telling the teacher/staff member or writing an email.
- Try to see the value even in THE BAD feedback. Sometimes unfavorable feedback is not always wrong, it is not always completely right, but there may be value in improving in some way. For example, I gave a presentation to parents and they "slammed" me for not using my time well. From that feedback, I now make it a practice to ONLY take questions at the end of a presentation and to stick to the agenda more closely.
The Ugly...
This is very rare!
Can't always prevent THE UGLY things, but here are a few things that can help keep "The Ugly" Away:
- Usually "The Ugly" is a result of a misunderstanding or when a parent has not been given enough notice for their child to recover failing or slipping grade.
- Just like the movie "The Ugly" sometimes is not as bad as it initially seems, but if it involves a student not being able to recover from a failing/slipping grade it will get ugly quickly, stay ugly, and ends up with an email to an AP or the Principal.
Can't always prevent THE UGLY things, but here are a few things that can help keep "The Ugly" Away:
- Load Home Access Center...Early and Often! This is your biggest protection against THE UGLY!
- Be Proactive by Being the FIRST to contact a parent to tell them about a failing or slipping grade. If possible, do NOT let THE PROGRESS REPORT be THE FIRST indicator that a student has failing or slipped in grades. Yes, this is the purpose of a Progress Report" and this is IRONY at its best! Parents who have "A" students slipping to "B" want to know before the progress report arrives. THE UGLY happens for parents when there is not enough time for a parent to intervene and help their child recover from a slipping or failing grade.
- Misunderstandings. If you think there is a misunderstanding...please, pick up the phone and call OR invite the parent with their student to school to meet in person.
TIPS FOR CLEARING THE AIR:
- "FaceTime" Tip: Person to person, either on the phone or face-to-face, is the best way to clear the air. It harder for a parent to say an ugly thing to you on the phone or in person than to write an ugly email/comment. Also, empathy, concern, caring, and tone are things that are hard to convey in an email.
- "Dial Tone vs. Email Tone" Tip: Some parent email styles come across as curt, defensive, or abrasive. For example, I had an experience with a parent who's email style came across as very offensive to me. However, in person, the parent was absolutely delightful, understanding, reasonable, smiled easily, and not at all like her email style would indicate. Speaking with the parent in person made all the difference in clearing up the misunderstanding. Now when I receive an email that has a concerning tone, I pick up the phone and talk to the parent and offer to meet them in person or ask if we could chat on the phone. I find that both the parent and I are usually happier by the end of the phone call or meeting because we are partnering together to find a resolution.
- "He Said, She Said" Tip: Inviting the student with their parent stops the student playing the, "He said, she said" game SIMPLY because ALL parties are present.
VI. Communication is the Key
- Connect with your parent Liaison on Twitter
- Create a window into your classroom
Follow EPMS Parent Liaison on Twitter
Tag me in your tweets so that I can share the AMAZING things you are doing in your classrooms!
BUILDING PARENT CAPACITY RESOURCES
VII. Additional Resources
Below is an article with suggested ways for teachers to work with parents.
- Share School Experiences
- Find Common Ground
- Consider the Parent’s Perspective
VIII. Take the Evaluation
- Your feedback is important
- Please help me build bridges with parents and improve my role
IX. Climate Survey
- Help us achieve 100% participation
- Because we can never have enough surveys in education :)
FOR CCRPI AND CLIMATE RATING
Please take ONE more Survey!
- We ask that all teachers and staff take the GADOE survey below.
- Full teacher/staff participation in this survey scores points on CCRPI index.
- The results of this survey impact the GADOE Star Climate ratings
Take the GADOE School Personnel Survey for 2017-2018
Please take this survey from GADOE on the Climate of the School. It has 5.5 sections and takes about 5 minutes to complete the survey.