Parent Engagement as we "pivot" during the covid 19 pandemic

The pandemic definitely forever changed the way that the school system does outreach to parents. In some ways, communication improved, such as weekly emails from all teachers to parents to increase the frequency of parent contact. Many teachers also spent more time on the phone with parents, and reaching out more than once if there was no response. The system responded to student and family needs in a different way in the wake of the pandemic, sharing information about technology difficulties, and housing insecurities to build a stronger support system for our students.

In some ways however, these improvement efforts ignored subsets of our community’s needs, resulting in inequitable access to teacher contact and services. The first need that was ignored was accessibility through language. The majority of communication by teachers is sent out in English. This makes these parent contact points inaccessible to parents who are English Language Learners. While the district often sends communication in multiple languages, these are buried within non-translated teacher emails. This barrier results in a clear inequitable usage of services offered by the district.

Another need that is ignored is accessibility through email. Many working class parents hold jobs that don’t provide access to a computer throughout the day. These parents can only check email after returning home from work, delaying and making it more burdensome to respond to teacher concerns. While these parents often respond promptly to text messages, this form of communication is not utilized often by teachers. While district is technically making information accessible, the sheer amount of emails that come through make it so by default, parents don't read this form of communication, and depend on word of mouth to utilize services.

One such service was a 24 hour tutoring company named Paper, which was purchased to help support students during Distance Learning and the transition back to school. This company connects students to a live person to support students in English, Spanish, French, or Mandarin. The tutors are trained to ask students questions to support them in reaching the right answer and to provide support whenever the student is unable to complete their work. The Paper resource was touted as a way to provide equity to students who were struggling to connect digitally during the daytime, and bridge the gap for students doing schoolwork after hours.

Initially, our Leadership Team for the Get It Done program discussed using this program as a way to support students during our program with academic concerns. While our group tries to meet socio-emotional learning needs first, we also want to help students practice identifying areas of academic struggle and problem solve how to get help. Paper tutoring adds another tool for students who struggle with raising their hand or participating in school in traditional ways. However, we wanted to make sure that this resource was widely used for all students. After promoting it equally to all students in my classroom, I found that the resource was used by less than 6% of my students over the last month. All students who fell in this group were members of “successful” student groups. This resource was not being utilized by the students it was intended for; that is, marginalized students struggling in school. While this program was not purchased with teacher input, and was a board decision on how to meet the needs of students struggling during distance learning, our school was worried about another resource that would increase the achievement gap, or further stack the odds against students struggling with the school system. We decided that if we could use the program to address the needs of our students who were struggling with distance learning - particularly students who found it easier to complete schoolwork at night, that it would help address this discrepancy.

To attract more targeted students, I partnered with the ELAC team to present the service to a broader audience and to educate parents about the tutoring company and its availability. This presentation was scheduled to take place during the transition week from distance learning to hybrid instruction in preparation for full return to school. Given that, I was also asked to review some of the logistics of the transition for parents. I then followed up by explaining how parents can use the Paper tutoring service with their students and how to check up on their usage of the service.

Main Activities

Having never used the Paper Tutoring product before in my classroom, I followed the company's recommendations for encouraging "Passive Students" to use their service. Their recommendation was to embed using the tutors within an assignment. I began by using the Paper Tutoring service with my students during class. I created an assignment with directions embedded to encourage students to reach out to Paper tutors. This assignment reached all 7th graders at my school site, ensuring that at least this grade level was familiar with the concept of tutoring via chat. It also helped me learn how it worked and how to troubleshoot technology problems. I also forwarded materials from the company to all my parents. At this point, there was no targeting toward marginalized students, and it was hoped that students who needed the service would utilize it.

After monitoring the statistics of student usage for one month, I approached the administration with data from my classroom and talked through venues we could use to inform parents whose students were not accessing the program. PTSA is a group that was discussed first, but chosen to not go through because many parents of students who we were targeting do not attend this group. During the pandemic, many other groups have not been meeting regularly, or have had very low attendance. We recognized that while there often are not a lot of parents who attend ELAC, the parents who do attend are instrumental in informing the community at large through word of mouth. Thus, we decided that presenting at ELAC would be a good first step toward reaching the parents of English Language Learners.

As we approached the date of the presentation, I also met with the Community Liaison to address any other questions that she was received or areas of parent confusion. She explained that the parents immediate worries were about the logistics of full return. The community was in the middle of a transition from distance learning to full return with the option of distance learning. While the district had messaged safety protocols to these parents, there was confusion as to the logistics in terms of schedule, what students needed, and how lunch would work. To meet the needs of parents, I decided to begin my presentation by reviewing some of these logistics, particularly our new schedule, followed by an opportunity for questions. This would ensure that I meet parents immediate needs first, allowing them to focus on the new service I wanted to present. I then modeled how to use the Paper app as a student and discussed ways that a parent can monitor their child’s use of the resource.

Reflection

Presenting to the parents during ELAC was a great and humbling experience. I was blessed with a support team, including the Community Liaison who provided live translation, the Spanish and ELL Language Support Teacher, and the administration. These members of my community helped establish the trusting and welcoming environment needed to generate questions and conversation during the presentation.

During the presentation, I presented slides. Parents were free to ask questions via the chat or by unmuting and asking in any language. My support team helped with translation back and forth to ensure that parent concerns were addressed. Other parents also chimed in when a question was asked. This collaborative process allowed me not only to share big picture information, but also allowed the meeting to alleviate concerns that the parents had about sending their children back to school. Parents shared insights they had as to how teachers would meet the needs of children at home and how to talk to their children about distancing. Other parents asked larger district questions about safety protocols, which my administration was able to jump in and answer. Not surprisingly, parents were grateful for the opportunity and space to talk with each other, and talk with a teacher who approached the presentation from the lens of a parent. The community liaison shared the groups gratefulness with me afterward, and shared how after my presentation, parents continued asking questions about other logistics they were unsure of.

My greatest strength was preparation. I started by meeting with the community liaison to understand and accommodate parent needs. As a teacher and a leader, I feel it is important to meet the needs of my learners first, as this will help reduce anxiety and make people more receptive to the information. Based on the community liaison input, I prepared logistic and schedule information to meet the immediate needs of parents, and provided a space to ask questions. While preparing the presentation, I used my parent lens, thinking of what information I would need to support my own children using this service. This helped me add slides such as checking the use history if a child claims they have already used the resource, or presenting the schedule if a parent wants to confirm class times. I also made sure to translate all parts of the slides using Google Translate, and then had our Bilingual Liaison look it over to make sure that the translation was accurate. This preparation was a success, and a reminder for future meetings with any groups to give some space to address immediate needs, and to allow questions first.

My challenge was my own personal feelings of not belonging to the community to whom I was presenting. ELAC is a tight knit group with a lot of power and advocacy on our campus. Presenting to this group made me realize how little I recognize and acknowledge the power that this group of parents has. I think of the possibilities that could arise if I continually attend this group and learn the norms of this community of practice instead of just observing as an outsider. Before studying communities of practice through this program, I would have been oblivious to this, my work this year made me reflect on my role as an outsider coming in, and my expertise rang false to me because I was acutely aware that I was not a member of this community of practice. While the group still treated me very kindly, I came in with my policies and procedures of "asking questions in the chat", or "asking questions out loud" from my classroom, instead of learning the policies and procedures for this group. For the next year, I am going to try and attend this parent group more regularly to build a more “insider” role to truly address needs and build trust. This also follows with my larger learning during PLI of acknowledging and treating adults with the same respect and care that I give my students. It made me realize that while I felt that I had good relationships with my ELL students, I still had very few relationships with their families. In the future, I plan on extending my relationships beyond the classroom to include the family, which will also help with my insider status with the ELAC group.

My work to ensure that the Paper resource is used equitably is not done, as English Language Learners are not the only marginalized students on campus. Next steps include training after school support services utilizing Paper as they serve students, such as the Get It Done program, or Boys and Girls Club afterschool support. Also, as we transition to full return, there will be more informational meetings for parents, and the Paper resource is going to be presented at those different contact points -- such as technology pickup and return, and registration day. Finally, I plan on following up with PD with the teachers in the classroom. The more we support students by modeling how to reach out using this resource, the more the resource will be used.

CAPES

Supporting Documents (Presentation, and Student Work)