Parent Engagement at Gentrifying Schools - WaPo feature story

[Anonymous]

I found this story pretty interesting. It talks about some of the cultural clashes and pitfalls when a school begins to gentrify in DC or there is a wide disparity in experiences and expectations about school. It describes what happens when new to DC (usually white families) clash with native Washingtonians. https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/as-cities-gentrify-and-schools-diversify-ptos-grapple-to-ensure-all-parent-voices-are-heard/2019/09/20/50314488-7277-11e9-8be0-ca575670e91c_story.html

It features Kindred, a nonprofit founded by Laura Phelan, that is going into PTA/PTOs to get parents within a school community to talk, share and hopefully find ways to collaborate. It says that they are in 12 schools, including YY, Bancroft.

One anecdote stood out to me -- that many black parents see school leadership as authority figures and they perceive white parents as coming in and making demands and not respecting the administrators.

Did anyone else read this? Is your school working with Kindred? Do you see this dynamic at your children's schools?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I found this story pretty interesting. It talks about some of the cultural clashes and pitfalls when a school begins to gentrify in DC or there is a wide disparity in experiences and expectations about school. It describes what happens when new to DC (usually white families) clash with native Washingtonians. https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/as-cities-gentrify-and-schools-diversify-ptos-grapple-to-ensure-all-parent-voices-are-heard/2019/09/20/50314488-7277-11e9-8be0-ca575670e91c_story.html

It features Kindred, a nonprofit founded by Laura Phelan, that is going into PTA/PTOs to get parents within a school community to talk, share and hopefully find ways to collaborate. It says that they are in 12 schools, including YY, Bancroft.

One anecdote stood out to me -- that many black parents see school leadership as authority figures and they perceive white parents as coming in and making demands and not respecting the administrators.

Did anyone else read this? Is your school working with Kindred? Do you see this dynamic at your children's schools?

As a white parent, I quickly learned that I needed to respect my kid's highly experience (black) teachers! So I think this is a healthy attitude to have, within reason.

[Anonymous]

The story was a great read. I am sort of a mash-up of both here - I'm UMC black and technically a gentrifier married to a Native Washingtonian. I also attended public school growing up that had some of the same dynamics.

I tend to think that white people are using to getting what they want, which makes them comfy asking for whatever they want. They don't "see" barriers because barriers just don't typically exist for them in the same ways.

[Anonymous]

Seems like basically an infomercial for Kindred.

[Anonymous]

White PTO president here, and it was an interesting read, although, like another poster said, the article read as a promotional piece for Kindred.

It's really tough because the parents that tend to step up to help are white and/or UMC. We flier, send text messages, emails, etc., but we rarely get new faces at our meetings or volunteering at our events. The dad at YY walked into a room, didn't see a lot of faces that looked like his, and walked out. How is that the fault of the PTA leadership? And how would Kindred get him to stay and help?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The story was a great read. I am sort of a mash-up of both here - I'm UMC black and technically a gentrifier married to a Native Washingtonian. I also attended public school growing up that had some of the same dynamics.

I tend to think that white people are using to getting what they want, which makes them comfy asking for whatever they want. They don't "see" barriers because barriers just don't typically exist for them in the same ways.

I thought the line about how white people aren't afraid to draw attention to themselves in a bureaucracy was very insightful! After having run into my own issues with the school bureaucracy, I find myself basically in the "lay low" mode. Meanwhile other white parents have no issue agitating to get rid of Yoplait in aftercare or whatever.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:White PTO president here, and it was an interesting read, although, like another poster said, the article read as a promotional piece for Kindred.

It's really tough because the parents that tend to step up to help are white and/or UMC. We flier, send text messages, emails, etc., but we rarely get new faces at our meetings or volunteering at our events. The dad at YY walked into a room, didn't see a lot of faces that looked like his, and walked out. How is that the fault of the PTA leadership? And how would Kindred get him to stay and help?

Kindly, did you read the article? The point is -- that your methods of engagement are literally premised on facilitating involvement of white people. If you want engagement, you have to change what you're doing. Sending out emails and fliers then throwing up your hands is not enough. It is absolutely your fault if you don't make more of an effort. Perhaps you don't care because you just think there's work to be done, and that what you are doing benefits everyone regardless of race. That's not a completely wrong position. But if you are troubled by lack of engagement and think the beginning and end of your responsibility is to send out an email to the listserve -- then yeah, it is your fault.

[Anonymous]

I am/was a white gentrifying PTO parent. One time I got a glimpse of the way DCPS admins treat low-income parents and I was aghast. It was an extremely authoritative, top-down approach that basically told parents to step off and keep their mouths shut. They were definitely being a lot nicer and more polite to me. It was eye-opening and made me realize why people might not want to participate. I tried to be inclusive, get materials translated, chit chat with everyone, provide food and childcare, all the usual recommendations. But the way DCPS itself treats parents, it's an uphill climb.

[Anonymous]

So you’re going to write this off just because the article presented a nonprofit doing important work to try to disrupt the destructive pattern of rapidly gentrifying community in a positive light? Clearly attempts made by parent organizations at many of these schools haven’t succeeded in overcoming these challenges on their own. Is it not worth getting help from an organization like Kindred just because people think it won’t work? Lame.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:White PTO president here, and it was an interesting read, although, like another poster said, the article read as a promotional piece for Kindred.

It's really tough because the parents that tend to step up to help are white and/or UMC. We flier, send text messages, emails, etc., but we rarely get new faces at our meetings or volunteering at our events. The dad at YY walked into a room, didn't see a lot of faces that looked like his, and walked out. How is that the fault of the PTA leadership? And how would Kindred get him to stay and help?

Kindly, did you read the article? The point is -- that your methods of engagement are literally premised on facilitating involvement of white people. If you want engagement, you have to change what you're doing. Sending out emails and fliers then throwing up your hands is not enough. It is absolutely your fault if you don't make more of an effort. Perhaps you don't care because you just think there's work to be done, and that what you are doing benefits everyone regardless of race. That's not a completely wrong position. But if you are troubled by lack of engagement and think the beginning and end of your responsibility is to send out an email to the listserve -- then yeah, it is your fault.

You do have to try different things and never give up. But look, it's hard. Most of the high-income parents don't engage either. Some people just don't want to do PTA stuff and they wouldn't even if they had far more money. A small PTA has a hard time affording the level of food and childcare that would really make it easy for people to attend. It's a ton of work, people burn out, and it's tiring to be criticized and get little credit for a lot of your efforts. So hang in there, PP.

[Anonymous]

I hate it when the Post equates white with gentrifiers and black with native Washingtonians.

Cities are transitory places, always have been.

[Anonymous]

I don’t understand why all the burden is on the white people to solve the ‘participation gap.’ That seemed to be the assertion of both the article and Kindred — people complaining about white people not doing enough to make them feel welcome.

I understand their is a history and culture gap (eg, school as authority figure vs service provider). The gentrifiers absolutely need to be aware of the differences and manage across them.

But I think, too, that the people used to feeling less empowered need to show up and speak up — that they should try learn something from the gentrifiers.

Kindred seems to focus on the former but not also the latter.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:White PTO president here, and it was an interesting read, although, like another poster said, the article read as a promotional piece for Kindred.

It's really tough because the parents that tend to step up to help are white and/or UMC. We flier, send text messages, emails, etc., but we rarely get new faces at our meetings or volunteering at our events. The dad at YY walked into a room, didn't see a lot of faces that looked like his, and walked out. How is that the fault of the PTA leadership? And how would Kindred get him to stay and help?

I'm white and my kid isn't school age yet, so maybe I am off base but one element I thought was missing from the article is the discussion of discrepancy in work flexibility in a lot of gentrifying neighborhoods. UMC/ UC white families that move into gentrifying neighborhoods might have parents with flexible jobs and more seniority, making it easier to volunteer. Or, parents who have just one job and aren't driving uber to make ends meet. This has been covered w/r/t voting and voter suppression. American minorities are less likely to have workplace flexibility than their white counterparts.

Maybe this plays less of a role than I might guess, but if WaPo ever does a follow up, I hope they explore this angle.

[Anonymous]

I think the article is inspiring, honestly, but they don't say what exactly is in this secret sauce. What is it they're doing, just opening the conversation and having select group of non-involved POC parents take part? If it works, that's great, and I hope our school participates, but...also who is paying them? Can we copy some techniques?

Agree it's an infomercial, a bit short on details, but it certainly caught my attention. I think while we don't really know what their approach actually is, there are any number of things that we need to be doing better to have strong parent communities and what we typically do is not working well enough.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think the article is inspiring, honestly, but they don't say what exactly is in this secret sauce. What is it they're doing, just opening the conversation and having select group of non-involved POC parents take part? If it works, that's great, and I hope our school participates, but...also who is paying them? Can we copy some techniques?

Agree it's an infomercial, a bit short on details, but it certainly caught my attention. I think while we don't really know what their approach actually is, there are any number of things that we need to be doing better to have strong parent communities and what we typically do is not working well enough.

This. What, specifically, is the secret sauce? A paid facilitator? Because I have tried all kinds of things, and hardly anyone, of any background or income level, shows up. What is a school to do if they cannot afford Kindred?

Also, there are a lot of other pressing issues. Engagement is important, yes. But maybe if the PTA a track record of real accomplishments, that would help. Maybe if the school didn't have so many problems, people would be more interested. Doing all these flyers and everything costs money and it isn't working. The school can't even get it together to put the flyers in the backpacks half the time. We can't afford food at meetings yet. I pay the sitter out of my own pocket because so few other children are even there.