The Every Student Succeeds Act: Theory vs. Practice — and Why Closing the ‘Parent Gap’ Is Key to Building an Educated Workforce
This article is part of a series exploring how the Every Student Succeeds Act can encourage parents and families to actively contribute to improving education in their communities. It focuses on parents’ perspectives and emphasizes the importance of effectively utilizing new funding to involve parents in the decision-making process. The goal is to measure the success of these efforts. Click on the grid below to read personal essays from parents across the country.
For over 15 years, I have been involved in various parent organizations related to my children’s schools. I have volunteered in concession stands, managed websites, and created weekly newsletters. These efforts were not only aimed at supporting the school but also at ensuring that minority voices were represented. However, I never felt truly engaged or involved, and it’s possible that some individuals did not want my participation.
Numerous studies conducted over many years have shown that parents play a crucial role in partnering with schools to provide effective education for children. Federal education laws have consistently highlighted the expectation for parents to be involved in decision-making processes.
Educators and policymakers often stress the importance of including parents, and the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) and its predecessor, the No Child Left Behind law, require states and schools to find ways to make this happen. ESSA even replaces the term "parent involvement" with "parent engagement" to emphasize the need for more meaningful outreach.
In Tennessee, education officials have developed a plan called Tennessee Succeeds, which successfully met the requirements of ESSA. This plan includes three and a half pages of promises and best practices for districts to effectively engage families. From reaching out to hard-to-reach families to implementing Academic Parent-Teacher Teams and supporting migrant families, Tennessee’s plan covers all aspects of engagement. However, despite these well-designed plans, achieving full parent participation remains a challenge for most schools, especially those in distressed communities.
Although NCLB and ESSA have increased the conversation around family engagement and allocated federal funds to support these efforts, there are still crucial elements missing that would turn rhetoric into reality.
Education leaders must refrain from making assumptions about certain parents and instead genuinely invite them to be partners. They should clearly communicate their expectations and work towards eliminating barriers to engagement.
There should be a cultural shift within school districts, where parents are equal partners in the education journey. Parent outreach should be seen as a strategy rather than a mere program to achieve educational excellence.
Effective inclusion requires diverse and innovative approaches. For instance, in Chattanooga, two teachers recognized that disadvantaged families were not being reached by the district. To address this, one teacher purchased a bus and equipped it with instructional materials, creating "The Passage." This mobile classroom travels to the students’ communities, providing tutoring and assistance to parents. These teachers understand the importance of family buy-in and have invested their own resources to include families, despite the barriers they face.
Implementing federally funded mobile classrooms staffed by teachers and school bus drivers could have a significant impact in urban and rural areas where students live miles away from school. Where there is a will, there is a way.
School districts should be required to offer federally funded literacy training and job skills programs to parents. They should also provide tutoring and other learning opportunities for their children.
Some districts have dedicated departments for parent outreach, while others rely on schools and parent organizations to take the lead. Districts with ample resources for family engagement usually host periodic literacy and math events and provide training on homework assistance. Districts like Nashville even offer childcare, transportation, and meals to boost attendance. Additionally, high-need schools in Nashville employ the Community School model, which offers various wraparound services to students and families.
However, there is a lack of focus on improving parents’ quality of life through personal development initiatives. It is concerning that our nation has over 30 million functionally illiterate individuals, and we still graduate students with poor reading skills.
Investing in parents’ personal development would yield immediate benefits by improving their quality of life, strengthening the school-to-family connection, and increasing parental involvement. In the long run, this would benefit the nation’s economy by breaking the cycles of generational poverty and illiteracy through an educated workforce.
Funding allocated for families should result in meaningful short-term and long-term benefits for both families and future generations. It is essential that the funds go beyond superficial offerings like snacks and information packets, and instead meet the state and federal mandates in a substantial way.
Engaging families in the educational process is a challenging task, regardless of the support provided by federal and state governments to school districts. Schools face numerous obstacles on a daily basis, and involving families is often seen as an additional challenge. However, if school districts establish the expectation that parents are vital contributors to the educational system, school leaders will embrace this ideology and the school culture will reflect it. By bridging the gap between our stated intentions and our genuine beliefs about parental involvement, we may discover that these efforts are not as daunting as they initially seem.
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