Reply to Parent Engagement at Gentrifying Schools

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Reply to "Parent Engagement at Gentrifying Schools - WaPo feature story"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=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.[/quote]

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.[/quote]

Why not read up on organizing techniques in general?

I don't know what the secret sauce is either, but one thing you could do is decide not to take ANY action until you get the input of a broad swath of the school. If that means going to people's  houses, tracking them down at drop-off, so be it.  For example, my PTA has a HUGE new proposed line-item that is exactly the type of thing to please white UMC people, but I can think of about a million other things we might use it for that would be more equitable (for instance, tutoring to help close the math gap.)  A PTA that honestly wanted to be inclusive wouldn't just say "welp, we emailed the budget proposal to everyone and 20 people showed up to vote, so 15% of our annual budget will go to a GMO-free emotion coaching clown in every PK classroom! we were as inclusive as possible!"

A PTA that actually wanted to be inclusive would NOT have proposed that line item in the first place, and would instead have developed a menu of options that respond to different constituencies at the school, and done more active outreach.  Even if you can't get everyone to come and vote, you can understand their preferences.  [/quote]

NP here but this is an insane ask. If the job requires 10+ hours/week of unpaid work then most people wouldn't be willing to do it. Then the schools stay failing and that's bad for all the kids, but especially those without access to the better alternatives.[/quote]

Ok well, then if this is truly the white man's burden as you all seemed to be utterly convinced of,  you ought to do some thinking about whether you are spending PTA funds on items that truly benefit those who need them most.  [/quote]

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