U . S . D E P A R T M E N T O F E D U C A T I O N

Engaging Parents in Education:

Lessons From Five Parental Information 

And Resource Centers

I n n o v a t i o n s i n E d u ca t i o n 

Prepared by WestEd

For

U.S. Department of Education

Office of Innovation and Improvement

2007

Engaging Parents in Education:

Lessons From Five Parental Information 

And Resource Centers

I n n o v a t i o n s i n E d u ca t i o n 
Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

This report was produced under U.S. Department of Education Contract No. ED-01-CO-0012, Task Order 

D010, with WestEd. Sharon Kinney Horn served as the contracting officer’s representative. The content 

of this report does not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the U.S. Department of Education, nor 

does the mention of trade names, commercial products or organizations imply endorsements by the U.S. 

government. This publication also contains URLs for information created and maintained by private organizations. This information is provided for the reader’s convenience. The U.S. Department of Education 

is not responsible for controlling or guaranteeing the accuracy, relevance, timeliness, or completeness of 

this outside information. Further, the inclusion of information or URL does not reflect the importance of 

the organization, nor is it intended to endorse any views expressed, or products or services offered.

U.S. Department of Education

Margaret Spellings

Secretary

Office of Innovation and Improvement

Morgan Brown

Assistant Deputy Secretary

Office of Parental Options and Information

John Fiegel

Director

June 2007

This report is in the public domain. Authorization to reproduce it in whole or in part is granted. While 

permission to reprint this publication is not necessary, the citation should be: U.S. Department of 

Education, Office of Innovation and Improvement, Engaging Parents in Education: Lessons From Five 

Parental Information and Resource Centers, Washington, D.C., 2007.

To order copies of this report,

write to: ED Pubs, Education Publications Center, U.S. Department of Education, P.O. Box 1398, 

Jessup, MD 20794-1398;

or fax your request to: 1-301-470-1244;

or e-mail your request to: edpubs@inet.ed.gov;

or call in your request toll-free: 1-877-433-7827 (1-877-4-ED-PUBS). If 877 service is not yet available in your area, call 1-800-872-5327 (1-800-USA-LEARN). Those who use a telecommunications 

device for the deaf (TDD) or a teletypewriter (TTY), should call 1-800-437-0833;

or order online at: http://www.edpubs.ed.gov. 

This report is also available on the Department’s Web site at: 

http://www.ed.gov/admins/comm/parents/parentinvolve/index.html.

On request, this publication is available in alternate formats, such as Braille, large print, or 

computer diskette. For more information, please contact the Department’s Alternate Format Center 

at 202-260-0852 or 202-260-0818.
iii

Contents

Foreword	 v

Abbreviations vii

Acknowledgments ix

Introduction	 1

NCLB and Parent Involvement (2)

Parental Information and Resource Centers (6)

Methodology (9)

Part I: The PIRCs’ Role in Building Understanding

of NCLB and Other Education-related Issues 13

Understanding the Audience (13)

Making Education-related Information Available and 

Understandable (15)

Getting in Touch With Parents Statewide (20)

Connecting With Hard-to-Reach Parents (26)

Promoting Cross-stakeholder Communication (31)

Moving From Information to Action (35)

Part II: The PIRCs’ Role in Preparing and

Supporting Parents and Educators to Take Action

for Student Learning	 37

Assessing Local Needs Related to Parent Involvement (38)

Training Parent Liaisons (43)

Training Parents for Leadership (47)

Training Parents and Educators to Function in Teams (53)

Conclusion 55

Appendix A: Research Methodology	 57

Appendix B: Resources 61

Notes 65
iv

Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

IIlustrations

FIGURES

1. Selected Parent Involvement Requirements Under Title I of NCLB by Type

of Education Agency 4

2. Partnering Between Parents and Educators to Increase Student Achievement:

A Conceptual Model for Parent Involvement in Education	 10

3. Indiana Partnerships Center: Excerpt From A Parent’s Guide to 

Understanding NCLB and P.L. 221 17

4. Academic Development Institute: Excerpted Report Card Guide to Help Parents

Understand Student Performance at the School, District, and State Levels	 19

5. Utah Family Center: Brochure From Satellite Parent Center With

Tailored Services (inside panels from open three-fold brochure)	 26

6. The Family Works: Invitation to Education Summit for Community-Based

Agencies in Maryland	 30

7. Intercultural Development Research Association: Checklist for Effective Action to

Improve Education (Excerpted from IDRA’s publication, A Community Action Guide: 

Seven Actions to Fulfill the Promise of Brown and Mendez) 33

8. Academic Development Institute: Principal Element from School Survey	 40

9. Indiana Partnerships Center: Example of Survey Results Presentation	 42

10. Academic Development Institute: Form for Parent Feedback on Home Visitors	 45

11. Intercultural Development Research Association: Parent Leadership Training Model	 50

TABLE

1. Selected Characteristics of Highlighted Parental Information and Resource Centers 8
Foreword

I am pleased to introduce the second publication in the latest Innovations in Education series—

Engaging Parents in Education: Lessons from Five Parental Information and Resource Centers. This 

series identifies innovative and successful education programs across the country that are closing 

the achievement gap and helping us reach our goal of every child reading and doing math at grade 

level by 2014.

The five Parental Information and Resource Centers (PIRCs) profiled in this book demonstrate how 

PIRCs and their partnering organizations can successfully increase parental involvement in education. They emphasize the power of strong parent-educator partnerships in improving schools and 

raising students’ academic achievement. 

A parent is a child’s first and most important teacher, which is why the No Child Left Behind Act of 

2001 (NCLB) recognizes parents’ vital role in education. NCLB has sent a strong message that results 

matter and that parents deserve more information and options, especially when their public schools 

do not live up to their promise. Under this law, parents must be informed if their school or district 

is identified for improvement because it has not made Adequate Yearly Progress. Parents also have 

more options than ever before for their children’s education, with magnet schools, charter schools, 

intensive tutoring, and public school choice.

PIRCs serve the important purpose of supplying parents with information about the range of programs and services available to them. Many parents, especially those who are economically disadvantaged or limited English proficient, need assistance to learn whom to talk to when they have 

questions about their child’s education or simply want to become more involved in their local 

schools and community. PIRCs have been designed with these parents and their needs in mind. 

As an education advocate and a mother, I hope you will find this guide informative and helpful. As 

we work to improve education for all of America’s children, it’s important that we continue to make 

sure parents are empowered with the information and resources they need to make the best decisions for their children.

Margaret Spellings, Secretary

U.S. Department of Education

vii

Abbreviations

ADI (Academic Development Institute)—an Illinois nonprofit organization that received funding 

to operate a PIRC from 1997 to 2006

ARISE (full term; not an abbreviation)—a faithbased nonprofit organization providing a variety 

of services to immigrant families of south Texas

AYP (adequate yearly progress)—state-designated 

academic progress goals for schools and districts, 

aimed at encouraging improved performance 

among all student subgroups

CIPL (Commonwealth Institute for Parent Leadership)—a Kentucky-based program whose parent training model has been used by three of the 

PIRCs highlighted in this guide

CPL (Center for Parent Leadership)—a program 

run by CIPL that provides consulting services for 

other organizations wanting to provide their own 

parent leadership training

IDEA (Individuals with Disabilities Education 

Act)—a federal law mandating that all children 

with disabilities have access to a free, appropriate 

public education; it emphasizes special education 

and related services designed to meet the unique 

needs of these students and prepare them for employment and independent living 

IDRA (Intercultural Development Research Association)—a Texas-based nonprofit organization 

that received funding to operate a PIRC starting in 

1999 and was refunded in 2006

IEP (individualized education program)—a written plan for educational support services and their 

expected outcomes developed for students designated for special education

IPS (Indianapolis Public Schools)—public school 

district for Indianapolis, Ind.

ISRC (Illinois Service Resource Center)—an Illinois 

State Board of Education technical assistance program funded with a grant under the Individuals 

with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA)

LEA (local education agency)—an education 

agency (e.g., district) at the local level that exists primarily to operate schools or to contract for 

education services. A single school may sometimes be considered an LEA.

NCLB (No Child Left Behind Act of 2001)—signed 

into law in January 2002 and intended to help close 

the achievement gap between disadvantaged and

minority students and their peers by improving public schools, this federal legislation is based on four 

basic principles: stronger accountability for results, 

increased flexibility and local control, expanded options for parents, and an emphasis on proven teaching methods. Key features include the alignment of 

high state academic standards and statewide assessments, the use of qualified teachers, greater parent 

involvement, and, when schools do not perform up 

to par, the options of school choice, supplemental 

tutoring, or both, for eligible students.

NNPS (National Network of Partnership Schools)—

a program of Johns Hopkins University that invites schools, districts, states, and organizations to 

join together and use research-based approaches 

to organize and sustain programs of family and 

community involvement aimed at increasing student success in school

PIRC (Parental Information and Resource Center)—the federal grant program authorized by 

NCLB to help implement effective parent involvement policies, programs, and activities intended 

to improve student academic achievement and 

to strengthen partnerships among parents, teachers, principals, administrators, and others to meet 

children’s education needs
RQP (Right Question Project)—a Cambridge, 

Mass.-based nonprofit program that develops and 

disseminates innovative methods (e.g., training) 

to prepare people, irrespective of their literacy or 

education levels, to advocate for themselves and 

participate more effectively in decision-making 

processes that affect them

SEA (state education agency)—the state board of 

education or other agency or officer primarily responsible for the supervision of public elementary 

and secondary schools in a state

SES (supplemental educational services)—a provision of NCLB that provides free tutoring services or additional academic help outside the 

regular school day for students from low-income 

families when their school enters year two of 

school improvement and is designated “in need 

of improvement”

WOW (WOW! Workshops on Workshops)—

training offered by IDRA for individuals who 

would like to be able to facilitate parent leadership training

viii

Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 
Acknowledgments

This guide was developed under the auspices 

of the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of 

Innovation and Improvement. Sharon Horn was 

project director.

An external advisory group provided feedback 

to refine the study scope, define the selection 

criteria, and clarify the text. Members (and their 

affiliations at the time of the advisory meeting) 

included Pilar Buelna, director, Parental Information and Resource Center, Families in Schools; 

Sheila Evans-Tranumn, associate commissioner, 

Office of New York City School and Community 

Services; Adam Kernan-Schloss, president, KSAPlus Communications; Sam Redding, executive 

director, Academic Development Institute; Kim 

Shipp, parent coordinator, Project SOAR; and 

Patrick Wolf, associate professor, Georgetown 

University Public Policy Institute.

Staff in the Department of Education who 

provided input and reviewed drafts included 

Steve Brockhouse, Tom Corwin, Kate Devine, 

Cynthia Dorfman, Fatimah Dozier, David Dunn, 

Rosemary Fennell, Sarah Flowers, Steve Freid, 

Virginia Gentles, Margaret Guenther, Patricia 

Kilby Robb, Dennis Koeppel, Stacy Kreppel, Rik 

Lanzendorfer, Meredith Miller, Martha Snyder, 

Tiffany Taber, and Lorraine Wise.

The five Parental Information and Resource Centers and supporting parent involvement organizations participating in the development of this 

guide and the case studies on which it is based 

were generous with both their time and attention 

to this project. We would like to thank those who 

were instrumental in coordinating and participating in the site visits that informed the case studies 

and this guide.

Academic Development Institute, PIRC

121 N. Kickapoo St.

Lincoln, Ill. 62656

http://www.adi.org/solidfoundation

Reatha Owen, Director

The Family Works, a program of the Family 

Services Agency

610 East Diamond Ave.

Gaithersburg, Md. 20877

http://www.familyservicesagency.org/site/

PageServer?pagename=The_Family_Works

Barbara Gimperling, Director

Indiana Center for Family, School, and 

Community Partnerships

921 E. 86th St., Suite 108

Indianapolis, Ind. 46240

http://www.fscp.org

Jacqueline Garvey, Executive Director

Intercultural Development Research 

Association, PIRC

5835 Callaghan Road, Suite 350

San Antonio, Texas 78228-1190

http://www.idra.org/Texas_IDRA_PIRC.htm

Aurelio Montemayor, Director

The Utah Family Center, now operating as 

Utah Family Partnership Network

2500 S. State St., Room D120

Salt Lake City, Utah 84115

http://www.utahpirc.org

Barbara Smith, Director

ix



Introduction

Children benefit academically when parents and educators work together. For this reason, parents’ 

involvement in their children’s education is a priority of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001. 

But a strong connection between parents* and educators does not come about automatically. Both 

parties may need to learn new roles and skills and develop the confidence to use them, especially 

as parents move beyond traditional activities, like helping children with homework, and toward 

shared responsibility for school improvement. Intermediary organizations, like federally funded 

Parental Information and Resource Centers (PIRCs), can help. Drawing on lessons learned from 

five PIRCs across the country that have been meeting this challenge, this guide shares promising 

strategies for increasing effective parent involvement.

Rosa Sanchez is a Maryland mother whose experience illustrates what can happen when parents 

receive help in developing the knowledge, skills, 

and confidence to participate to greater degrees 

and in new ways in their children’s education. 

It was not as if Sanchez had been uninvolved 

to start with. As the mother of four children in 

Maryland public schools, she had volunteered 

in their classrooms and helped out with some 

events sponsored by the parent-teacher organization at her school. Yet when Sanchez had questions about her children’s education, she did not 

always know where to go for help or, if she did, 

she did not always have the confidence to ask.

Although Sanchez did not regularly attend parent-teacher organization meetings, the president 

of that group had seen enough to know that 

this dedicated mother had more to offer; she 

nominated Sanchez to participate in the Maryland Parent Leadership Institute. This six-day, 

three-weekend training program produced by 

the Family Works—the PIRC that was serving 

the state of Maryland—was designed to help 

parents understand the state’s standards-based 

assessment system, the resources of No Child 

Left Behind (NCLB), and techniques and strategies for increasing parents’ involvement in their 

children’s schools. Sanchez, who speaks English as a second language, initially worried that 

she would be unable to keep up with the institute’s presentations and discussion. But with 

others urging her on, she agreed to participate, 

becoming one of 20 members selected for the 

institute’s leadership class of 2004.

Over the course of the sessions, Sanchez’s confidence grew along with her understanding of 

effective family involvement techniques and 

ways parents can contribute to their children’s 

school success. When it came time for participants to plan and implement a project at their 

children’s school, Sanchez set out to jump-start 

Hispanic parent involvement. To that end, she 

organized Spanish-language “study circles”—

parent meetings in which participants learned 

* When using the term parent, this guide intends it to refer 

as well to a child’s guardian or any other adult who plays a 

significant role in a minor’s life.


Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

about and discussed basic school functions and 

activities, and how to be involved; for example, 

they discussed how to read the school report 

card, which, as required under NCLB, describes 

how the school itself is performing in a variety of areas, including its students’ performance 

on state assessments. In addition, she worked 

with the principal to be sure that both homework directions and teacher comments on students’ report cards were translated for parents 

with limited English. Perhaps most importantly, 

Sanchez made sure parents with limited English understood to whom they could turn and 

how to ask for help if they had questions or 

problems related to their children’s schooling. 

Additional Hispanic parents have started getting involved thanks to Sanchez’s efforts, and 

Sanchez herself has become increasingly active. 

Even as she continues to volunteer in the classroom, she also has assumed leadership positions in the parent-teacher organization not just 

at one school, but at two: At the school her 

youngest children still attend, Sanchez serves 

as vice president of parent outreach; at the high 

school her oldest now attends, she serves as the 

group’s liaison to other Hispanic families. And 

when Sanchez has questions about her own or 

other children’s education, you better believe 

she knows who and how to ask. 

Education research over the past three decades 

has established a direct correlation between 

increased parent involvement and increased 

student achievement. One of the most comprehensive parent involvement studies done 

to date (encompassing more than 51 research 

studies and literature reviews) is A New Wave 

of Evidence: The Impact of School, Family, and 

Community Connections on Student Achievement.1 After r­eviewing a wide range of studies 

on parent involvement, Henderson and Mapp 

found that “students with involved parents, no 

matter what their income or background, were 

more likely to earn higher grades and test scores 

and enroll in higher-level programs; be promoted, pass their classes, and earn credits; attend 

school regularly; have better social skills, show 

improved behavior, and adapt well to school; 

and graduate and go on to postsecondary education.” Additionally, the study found, “Schools 

that succeed in engaging families from very diverse backgrounds share three key practices:

• Focusing on building trusting collaborative 

relationships among teachers, families, and 

community members;

• Recognizing, respecting, and addressing families’ needs and any class and cultural differences; and

• Embracing a philosophy of partnership where 

power and responsibility are shared.”2

By the U.S. Department of Education’s definition, parent involvement occurs when parents 

and educators participate in “regular two-way 

and meaningful communication involving student academic learning and other school activities.”3 In this definition, parents are encouraged 

to be actively involved in their children’s learning at school and are included, as appropriate, 

in decision-making activities, for example, sitting on parent advisory councils, which inform 

the policies affecting their children’s education. 

(See “Engaging Parents as Education Advisors” 

on p. 3.)

NCLB and Parent Involvement

NCLB recognizes the value of parent participation in the formal education endeavor, as 


evidenced in its parent-involvement requirements for schools, districts, and state education agencies (SEAs) (see fig. 1, Selected Parent 

Involvement Requirements Under Title I of NCLB

by Type of Education Agency, on p. 4). For 

example, under NCLB, all Title I schools, which 

receive special federal funding to raise the 

performance of disadvantaged students, must 

develop parent involvement policies and strategies, and all but the smallest (i.e., a district 

that receives under $500,000 in Title I funding) must spend at least 1 percent of their Title I funding on parent training and education 

programs.5 The legislation also has resulted in 

additional parent involvement requirements for 

any school or district identified under its state 

education accountability system as being “in 

need of improvement” because for two years in 

a row it has not reached state-designated progress goals, known as Adequate Yearly Progress 

(AYP). For example, individual parents must be 

informed in a timely and direct fashion if their 

school or district falls into “improvement” status 

and if, as a result, their child becomes eligible 

for school choice6 or supplemental educational 

services (SES).7 These schools and districts also

Engaging Parents as Education Advisors

Although PTA is a common household term, recognized by most parents in the United States as the parent-teacher 

association, less is known about parent advisory councils (PACs). PACs are parent-led organizations that function 

at the state, district, or school level to give parents more clout regarding their children’s education. PACs promote 

parent influence in multiple ways, including polling communities to better understand parents’ needs and wants, 

recommending policy, and advocating for the rights of parents to be involved in the education of their children.

One prime example of a well-functioning PAC is M-PAC, the Maryland Parent Advisory Council. In 2001, the 

state of Maryland adopted one of the most inclusive parent involvement policies in the country, but state education superintendent Nancy S. Grasmick thought more could be done. In the fall of 2003, she convened M-PAC, a 

statewide group of 125 appointed members charged with researching the state of parent involvement in Maryland’s 

K–12 education and recommending how to strengthen it.

To help ensure broad parent representation on M-PAC, the state education department sent membership nomination 

forms to churches, public libraries, community centers, schools, and other institutions where parents gather. The intent was to reach the full range of parent types, including those who are often underrepresented (e.g., grandparents, 

foster parents, parents of children in special education, military parents). As a result of this effort, the vast majority 

of M-PAC members ended up being parents.

Once M-PAC was up and running, it used a statewide survey to solicit from parents, educators, administrators, and 

community members across the state their thoughts on the current state of parent involvement in Maryland and 

what they would like to see for the future. Survey results identified three areas for further study by council subcommittees: parent involvement, using nontraditional (i.e., alternative) forms of communication to engage a broader 

range of parents, and education policy. At the end of two years, council recommendations were vetted through a 

series of public forums held in all 24 local school systems. The Maryland State Board of Education then approved 

the final report, A Shared Responsibility: Recommendations for Increasing Family and Community Involvement in 

Schools, (August 2005).4 Implementation of recommendations began in September 2006.


Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

Figure 1. Selected Parent Involvement Requirements Under Title I of NCLB

By Type of Education Agency

Type of 

Agency

Related Parent Involvement Requirements 

(for schools, local districts, and state education agencies)

Title I Schoolsa School works with parents to develop a parent involvement policy.b

School works with parents to develop a school-parent compact.c

School distributes both the parent involvement policy and school-parent compact to the parents.

Through partnership between parents and staff, school builds families’ capacity to improve student achievement.

Schools in Need 

of Improvement d

School consults with parents in developing a school improvement plan,e to be completed no more than three months after 

school has been identified as in need of improvement. 

District promptly provides the following communications to the parents of each enrolled student: an explanation of what it 

means to be a school in need of improvement; the reason(s) the school has been identified for improvement; an explanation of how parents can become involved in resolving the academic issues that led to identification; and, in year one of 

improvement status, an explanation of student choice options.f

If a school enters a second year of improvement status, district provides and communicates the availability of supplemental educational services for eligible children.

If a school is identified for restructuring (i.e., reorganization) because it has failed to make adequate yearly progress 

(AYP) for five years, district provides parents with prompt notice of the decision, provides the opportunity for parents to 

comment before taking restructuring action, and invites parents to participate in the development of the school’s restructuring plan.

School Districts District develops jointly with parents a written parent involvement policy that they have agreed on as part of the district 

Title I plan.

District distributes the parent involvement policy to parents.

District distributes to parents a report card on the performance of every school and of the district as a whole. As noted 

above, if schools are not making AYP, district also distributes information on school choice options and supplemental 

educational services.

District along with parents conducts a yearly evaluation of its parental involvement policy.

District promotes family and school partnership and builds capacity for parents and staff to work together to raise student 

achievement.

Local Districts 

in Need of 

Improvement

When a district is identified for improvement, the district must provide notification to parents of each student enrolled in the 

schools served by that district. This communication includes the reasons for the identification, what corrective actions will 

be taken to improve the district, and how parents can participate in these improvement efforts.

District consults with parents in developing a district improvement plan.

State education agency provides district with technical assistance to address any problems that districts in need of 

improvement may have with implementing parent involvement measures.


Type of 

Agency

Related Parent Involvement Requirements 

(for schools, local districts, and state education agencies)

State Education 

Agencies 

State education agency reviews each Title I application to ensure that it complies with the law with respect to parent 

involvement.

State education agency provides technical assistance to local schools and districts in their parental involvement 

activities. 

State education agency supports the collection and dissemination to its districts and schools of effective parental involvement practices that are based on the most current high-quality research, that foster achievement and 

high standards for all children, and are geared toward lowering barriers to greater participation by parents in 

school planning, review, and improvement processes.

State education agency monitors the implementation of parent involvement requirements. 

a Title I schools are those that have high numbers or a high percentage of students living in poverty and that, therefore, are awarded 

special funding from the U.S. Department of Education.

b

 A parent involvement policy spells out how parents will be involved in meaningful ways in making school decisions and otherwise participating in setting the school’s direction. 

c

 A school-parent compact, which should be distributed to all parents and staff, describes how educators and parents will build a 

partnership to improve student achievement.

d Schools in need of improvement are those that receive Title I funds and that have not met state reading and math goals for at 

least two years.

e

 A school improvement plan is a two-year plan that addresses the academic issues that have caused the school to be identified 

for improvement. 

f Student choice options: Parents must be told of the option to transfer their child to another school in the district that has not been 

identified for improvement.

are required to engage parents in the development of the school or district improvement plan, 

and the plan itself must include strategies to promote effective parent involvement. In all of this, 

parents are being asked to participate in decisions that will influence the education of their 

children and other students throughout schools, 

districts, and sometimes even the state. 

Although NCLB recognizes that parents are an 

important resource, mining that resource can be 

difficult. Parents who are committed and confident enough to get involved, make the necessary time to do so, recognize intuitively where 

and how they are needed, are prepared to meet 

the need, and are ready to step up as leaders—

these parents are like gold: highly valuable 

but far from common. As states, districts, and 

schools search for ways to engage greater numbers of parents in more meaningful ways, many 

find it challenging to increase the rates and 

types of parent involvement. This appears to be 

especially true at schools serving low-income 

and limited English proficient populations8 for 

whom a variety of factors are likely to inhibit 

parent involvement, including families’ difficult 

circumstances (e.g., parents working multiple 

jobs, homelessness, uncertain immigration status), parents’ negative education experiences 

when they were students, language barriers, 

Figure 1. (cont’d.)


Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

and, for some immigrant parents, cultural mores supporting the idea that they should not 

question teachers.

Does this mean that parents who are not involved with their children’s school or district 

do not care about the children’s education? No. 

What it more likely means is that many parents 

do not know how to get involved, do not feel 

capable of contributing in a meaningful way, 

or simply do not feel welcome. What these 

parents need is more information, support, encouragement, or, even, specific training—something that schools and districts are not always 

well positioned to provide. That is the premise 

underlying the nation’s system of Parental Information and Resource Centers.

Parental Information and 

Resource Centers

Parental Information and Resource Centers 

(PIRCs) were conceived by Congress under the 

Elementary and Secondary Education Act to 

provide parents, schools, and other organizations working with families with the information and support (including training and technical assistance) needed to understand how children develop and what they need to succeed 

in school. The first 28 PIRCs were funded by 

the U.S. Department of Education in 1995. Since 

then, the PIRCs’ role has expanded to include 

helping education agencies implement NCLB’s 

parent-involvement mandates. (See “Key Roles 

for a Parental Information and Resource Center 

[PIRC],” on p. 7.)

Some PIRCs are stand-alone entities; others 

operate as a program within a larger umbrella 

organization. All are funded through a competitive grant process whose guidelines have 

changed throughout the years based on new 

laws and ­Department priorities. The 2006 PIRC 

awards, which were granted as this guide was 

being written, reflect such changes. Although 

the “new” PIRCs have the same statutory mission as previously funded PIRCs, their service 

areas are configured differently. In previous 

years, some states had no PIRC while others 

were served by more than one. In contrast, the 

most recent award cycle usually only funded 

one PIRC for each state, with the requirement 

that the grantee serve parents and educators 

across the whole state. The recently funded 

PIRCs also have some timely new priorities: 

They are specifically required to increase parents’ understanding of NCLB and its potential 

ramifications for their family. The new PIRCs 

also are expected to help SEAs and local education agencies (LEAs) more fully implement 

their own parent involvement responsibilities 

under Title I—responsibilities geared ultimately to improving student academic achievement 

and overall school performance, including, for 

example, lowering dropout rates and raising 

graduation rates.

PIRCs are by no means the only programs with 

a focus on generating greater and more effective parent involvement. In fact, as is evident 

throughout this guide, PIRCs often partner 

with other organizations to increase their reach 

and influence. But their singular focus has led 

some experienced PIRCs to develop and hone 

promising outreach and engagement strategies 

worth sharing with other organizations that 

have the same or similar parent involvement 

goals, including newly funded PIRCs, other parent involvement organizations, LEAs, SEAs, and 


individual schools. This guide highlights the 

parent- and educator-engagement practices of 

five PIRCs that received funds in earlier grant 

competitions. That is, although several were 

first funded in the late 1990s, the guide focuses 

on the work of these PIRCs during the funding 

periods starting in fiscal year 2002 and 2003 and 

continuing to the end of 2006. Though the new 

PIRC priorities represented in the 2006 awards 

have resulted in only three of these five PIRCs 

being refunded, all five are considered to have 

implemented effective strategies based on the 

mandates of the funding grants that were in 

place at the time of this study. The strategies 

in this guide are drawn from the following five 

PIRCs (for selected characteristics of each, see 

table 1, on p. 8):

• The Academic Development Institute’s PIRC, 

Lincoln, Ill.;

• The Family Works, Gaithersburg, Md.;

• Indiana Center for Family, School, and Community Partnerships, Indianapolis;

• The Intercultural Development Research Association’s PIRC, San Antonio, Tex.; and

• The Utah Family Center, Salt Lake City.

How these PIRCs and their partnering organizations have been pursuing the goal of increased 

parent involvement and parent-educator partnerships—especially in the context of NCLB 

with its push to improve schools and close the 

achievement gap—is the subject of this guide.

Key Roles for a Parental 

Information and Resource 

Center (PIRC) 

As defined by the Department of Education, the funding agency for PIRCs, key PIRC roles include: 

• Providing leadership, technical assistance, and 

support in the implementation of successful and 

effective parent involvement policies, programs, 

and activities intended to improve student academic achievement; 

• Strengthening partnerships among parents 

(including parents of children from birth through 

age 5), teachers, principals, administrators, and 

other school personnel in meeting the education 

needs of children;

• Developing and strengthening the relationship 

between parents and their children’s school; and

• Providing a comprehensive approach to improving student learning, through coordination and 

integration of federal, state, and local services 

and programs.


Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

Table 1. Selected Characteristics of Highlighted Parental Information

and Resource Centers

Parental Information and Resource 

Center (PIRC) 

and state

Organizational 

status (standalone or part of 

larger agency)

Staffing 

allocationsa

Full-time (FTE)

Part-time (PTE)

Years 

of PIRC 

funding

Parent involvement strategies highlighted 

in guide

Academic Development Institute’s 

PIRC, Ill.

Has functioned 

as a program 

of the Academic 

Development 

Institute. 

5 FTEs,

5 PTEs,

4 consultants

Also utilizes staff 

from larger parent organization.

1997–

2006

• Partner with community- and faith-based 

organizations to disseminate information

• Build a school community of parents and 

educators

• Help schools assess family friendliness

• Develop programs to assist parents of 

children with special needs

The Family Works, 

Md.

Has functioned 

as a program 

of the Family 

Services Agency, 

Inc., but has 

separate program name.

5 FTEs 1995–

2006

• Enlist and train community-based organizations to disseminate NCLB information

• Train parent leaders

• Provide partnership training and support 

for educators

• Support state-level parent advisory board 

efforts

Indiana Center 

for Family, School 

and Community 

Partnerships, Ind.

Stand-alone 

program.

4 FTEs,

3 PTEs 

1998–

present

• Establish parent centers

• Help schools assess family friendliness

• Provide training and support for parent 

liaisons

• Train parent leaders

• Establish and support father volunteer 

groups

Intercultural 

Development 

Research Association’s PIRC, Tex.

Functions as a 

program of

Intercultural 

Development 

Research 

Association.

3 FTEs

Also utilizes 

staff from 

larger parent 

organization.

1999–

present

• Facilitate videoconferences

• Organize multi-sector convenings

• Facilitate dialogues between parents, 

teachers, and students

• Assist students in providing technical training to community

• Train parent leaders

Utah Family 

Center, Utah

Stand-alone 

program, with 

Utah State 

Parent-Teacher 

Association as 

its first fiscal 

agent. 

14 FTEs,

11 part-time 

parent liaisons

1998–

present

• Establish satellite parent centers

• Partner with the PTA to provide access to 

parents

• Train and support parent liaisons

• Provide partnership training for educators

a PIRC data were collected in the three-year grant cycle ending on Dec. 31, 2006, so staffing numbers are reflective of this cycle.


site observations and interview and focus group 

data, were used to develop a case study for each 

site. This guide is based on the case studies.

Conceptual Framework for Study

Parent involvement in education can mean 

many things, from parents instilling a strong 

work ethic in their children to a parent’s membership on a state board of education. It can 

mean parents participating with their toddler 

in a developmentally appropriate playgroup or 

taking their high school student on a tour of colleges. This guide, however, focuses on PIRCs’ 

work in the K–12 arena, especially—although 

not exclusively—as it relates to NCLB’s parentinvolvement requirements (see fig. 1).

Involvement in children’s education starts at 

home, of course, with primary caregivers providing love, a healthy environment, developmentally appropriate learning experiences, and, as 

children start school, encouragement, a positive 

attitude about learning, and homework support. 

But within the formal education system, parent 

involvement is most effective when viewed as a 

partnership between parents and educators. The 

conceptual model developed by WestEd for this 

study is based on current parent involvement research along with input from parent involvement 

practitioners (e.g., PIRC and other parent organization directors) on the advisory committee. This 

model focuses on how both parents and educators can come together to work more effectively in 

support of children’s successful education. (See 

fig. 2, Partnering Between Parents and Educators 

to Increase Student Achievement: A Conceptual 

Model for Parent Involvement in Education, on 

p. 10.) As evident in the figure, the end goal in this 

model is having successful parent and educator 

partnerships to increase student achievement. 

Methodology

The five PIRCs highlighted in this guide were 

selected through a process that draws on both 

benchmarking and case study methodologies 

and is described more fully in Appendix A. An 

external advisory group comprising researchers and practitioners helped guide the development of the conceptual framework and criteria used to screen programs for inclusion in 

the guide. From an initial list of 45 centers or 

other programs that promote and support parent involvement, 27 were chosen for additional 

screening that included both interviews to confirm preliminary information about initiatives 

and a review of evidence of impact (e.g., growing numbers of clients served, client satisfaction). From these 27 programs, the five highlighted PIRCs were chosen, based on the range 

and quality of their practices, coupled with the 

organizations’ locations and the demographics 

of their target populations, and the quality of 

their collaborations with other parent involvement organizations or education agencies. 

Once the five sites were selected, two-day site 

visits were conducted to find out more about 

their practices and their partnerships. The site 

visits, facilitated by each PIRC director, included 

interviews and focus groups with students, parents, PIRC staff, school, district, and state staff, 

as well as with staff from any associated organizations. The methodology also included observing key events, such as trainings, summits, 

and conferences. In addition, the PIRC director 

at each site provided artifacts that support the 

strategies, such as meeting agendas, training materials, and surveys, some of which are featured 

in the illustrative figures throughout this guide. 

Over 400 artifacts were collected from across 

the five sites and these artifacts, along with the 
Parents and 

educators work 

together to 

create policy 

that promotes 

increased student 

achievement

Parents and 

educators work 

to bridge the 

divide and 

create equitable, 

productive 

relationships

All parents and 

educators are 

informed and have 

an opportunity 

to support 

increased student 

achievement 

Involve educators in 

policymaking

• Train staff for site councils and advisory boards

• Facilitate meaningful 

two-way involvement, 

including in development 

of plans to increase student 

achievement

• Include parent input in 

evaluating effectiveness of 

parent involvement policies

• Monitor compliance with parental 

involvement requirements

Recruit and train staff to work 

with parents

• Identify, recruit, and train staff on 

value of parent involvement

• Help educators assess needs and create family-friendly schools

• Train educators to understand data

• Train educators to train other educators 

and parents

Communicate parent involvement policies 

and procedures to all educators

• Communicate NCLB information including 

accountability data, choice and supplemental 

educational services options

• Inform educators about opportunities to 

involve parents

• Inform about educators’ rights and roles in school 

improvement

Involve parent leaders 

in policymaking

• Train parents for site 

councils and 

advisory boards 

• Facilitate meaningful 

two-way involvement

• Have parents help 

monitor and evaluate 

effectiveness of parental 

involvement policies

Recruit and train parent leaders

• Identify and recruit strong 

community candidates that 

represent the parent base

• Train parents in advocacy skills

• Train parents to understand data

• Train parents to train other parents

Communicate rights, responsibilities, 

and opportunities to all parents

• Communicate timely NCLB information, including 

accountability data, choice and supplemental 

educational services options, and information on 

teacher qualifications in core subjects

• Inform all parents about opportunities for 

involvement at home and in school

• Inform about parents’ rights and roles in school 

improvement in appropriate languages and formats

• Provide materials and training to prepare parents to 

help their children increase academic achievement

PREPARING PARENTS PREPARING EDUCATORS PREPARING PARENTS 

& EDUCATORS

Parents and educators partner 

to increase student achievement

Figure 2. Partnering Between Parents and Educators to Increase Student

Achievement: A Conceptual Model for Parent Involvement in Education

10

Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 
In this model, the first stage in moving toward 

the end goal of parent-educator partnerships 

to support student learning entails making sure 

parents and educators receive and have the 

same understanding of important educationrelated information. This information includes 

but is not limited to relevant school and district data, parents’ rights and responsibilities in 

their children’s formal education, options available to families under NCLB or state or district 

programs, and how parents can contribute to 

improved education outcomes for their own 

children and other students. 

Being fully informed about their children’s education enables parents to better decide the degree to which they want to become involved and 

the type of action they may want to take. Do they 

want to limit their role to supporting their child’s 

learning at home? Serve as a classroom volunteer? 

Become active in school governance? Participate 

in policy decisions? For some parents, having adequate information may suffice as preparation for 

greater involvement. Others, however, may benefit from training, such as reflected in the conceptual model’s second stage (e.g., to help parents 

become leaders, train them to understand data) 

and third stage (e.g., to help parents get involved 

in­ ­policymaking, train them to serve on school 

site councils and advisory boards). 

For educators, some types of partnerships with 

parents may be required, as, for example, when 

there is a state mandate to have school site 

councils that include both teacher and parent 

representatives. Other parent-educator partnerships, such as efforts to create a more familyfriendly school, may be taken on by choice, because they seem to be a good option at a given 

school. Either way, educators, too, may benefit 

from training if they are to engage effectively 

with parents in pursuit of higher student 

achievement. As will be evident in this guide, 

while the five highlighted PIRCs have common 

goals, objectives, and strategies, all reflecting 

some aspects of this conceptual model, there 

are some differences in how they implement 

various elements. Moreover, given that the 

model poses an ideal, it is not surprising that 

some of its elements have been more fully implemented than others. For example, due to the 

focus of the earlier PIRC grants on training and 

informing parents, the PIRCs featured here have 

targeted more of their efforts on the left-hand 

side of the model and done less with educators. 

A new Department of Education-established 

priority for PIRCs in the 2006 funding round 

to work with state and district Title I offices is 

intended to shift the focus to parent and educator partnerships and to push more fully into 

the right-hand side of the model, with educators receiving training and support to become 

better and more active partners with parents. 

Once both parents and educators are equipped 

with the information (first stage) and training 

(second stage) needed for successful partnership, a push into the third stage, that is, joint 

policymaking, is a natural next step.

Parts I and II of this guide, starting on pages 13 

and 37, respectively, identify and describe some 

of the key strategies used by these highlighted 

PIRCs in supporting effective parent involvement. Part I focuses on PIRC efforts to build a 

common foundation of information and understanding for parents and educators. Part II focuses on readying parents and educators for action 

and decision-making intended to improve education. Both sections—Parts I and II—include 

a series of “Tips” boxes that have distilled the 

strategies from each subsection into easily scannable lists of implementation suggestions. 

11
12

Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 
P A R T I

The PIRCs’ Role in 

Building Understanding 

Of NCLB and Other 

Education-related Issues 

The amount and variety of information—from the general to the specific—that can help parents 

more effectively support their children’s education seems almost infinite: how children learn; how 

to support that learning at home, including how best to help with homework; how to know whether 

their children are performing as well as possible; how well the school and district are carrying out 

their responsibilities; how to decipher a school report card; what volunteer opportunities exist at their 

children’s school; ways, if any, of influencing school or district policies and practices; how NCLB affects them as parents; what a school-parent compact is; what AYP is; what options exist if the school is 

not adequately serving their children; what services and rights exist for children with special needs; 

and how to know if their children qualify for SES. And that is just for starters.

Ensuring that parents receive and understand 

the information they need to support their 

children’s education is a major responsibility of the PIRCs. Today, that means, first and 

foremost, making sure parents understand their 

rights, responsibilities, and opportunities under 

NCLB, such as participating in development of 

a school-parent compact (i.e., a written agreement among parents, school staff, and the community about how to help students reach high 

academic standards) or exercising their children’s options for school choice or SES. Many 

educators also need to better understand how 

NCLB affects parents’ rights and opportunities 

in relation to their children’s education, as well 

as how parents’ growing knowledge of NCLB

and other education-related issues might cause 

them to want to become a more active partner 

with their children’s school.

Understanding the Audience

A variety of factors, such as the growing rate 

of non-English-speaking families in the schools, 

changing family composition, poverty, and 

family mobility, require that PIRCs be creative 

and persistent, especially in their efforts to connect with educationally and economically disadvantaged parents. Per the requirements of 

PIRC grants, they must find ways to assess the 

communication needs of their constituents and 

13
14

Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

address them through a variety of strategies. 

Though PIRCs in general have been focused 

most intensely on reaching parents, they recognize the need to communicate as well with 

teachers and other educators, which can be 

an equally challenging proposition, although 

for different reasons. For example, some site 

administrators may assume that they and their 

staff already know as much as they need to 

know about NCLB or already have sufficient 

parent involvement, so they see no reason to 

allocate limited staff development time to these 

issues. To help address such barriers, PIRCs 

like the Indiana Center for Family, School, and 

Community Partnerships (referred to hereafter 

as the Indiana Partnerships Center), based in 

Indianapolis, and the Family Works, based in 

Gaithersburg, Md., began working directly with 

district- and state-level education agencies, respectively. The trust developed through such 

relationships can yield greater access to staff 

(including but not limited to teachers), both for 

training purposes and for distributing materials 

(e.g., NCLB guides) to educators and, through 

them, to parents.

Although, as suggested above, PIRCs have been 

making inroads in communicating with educators, this section in particular reflects the primary 

focus of their activities, which has been helping 

parents understand key issues related to their 

children’s schooling, chief among them, NCLB.

Address Diverse Language Needs

For the many school districts across the country 

that are serving growing numbers of non-English-speaking families, successful communication with parents requires translating materials and using interpreters. But as the amount 

and kind of education-related information that 

parents need continues to grow, some schools 

and districts have been unable to keep up. The 

highlighted PIRCs have been able to help in this 

area by taking advantage of economies of scale; 

for example, whereas one school or district 

might need to hire a translator to prepare materials for just 50 or 500 families, respectively, a 

PIRC can hire someone to translate the same or 

similar materials and then expect to distribute 

them through multiple schools and districts to 

5,000 families. The Indiana Partnerships Center 

now offers all key parent materials and services 

in both English and Spanish. In recently updating its Web site, this PIRC added a Spanish language interface, which can be accessed 

by simply clicking an “Español” link. Through 

this link, the site also offers a page of resources 

specifically geared to families with limited proficiency in English. 

The PIRC program operated by the Intercultural Development Research Association 

(IDRA), based in San Antonio, Tex., also provides most materials and services in both English and Spanish. Although IDRA’s initial PIRC 

grant supported only three full-time staff members, the organization has used others on its 

staff for PIRC activities as needed. Because the 

majority of its staffers are fluent in both English and Spanish, staff presenters and facilitators 

at PIRC-produced meetings, workshops, and 

other gatherings for parents have been able to 

use what they call “simultaneous translation.” 

In this communications approach, a speaker or 

presenter effectively serves as his or her own 

interpreter, speaking for a couple of minutes 

in one language and then repeating the same 

thing in the other language. Staff find this preferable to presenting in one language while a 
15

second person interprets, which invariably 

leaves one segment of the audience feeling like 

they have to “catch up,” is more time-consuming, and can lead to participants losing interest. 

They also find it preferable to having separate 

sessions for parents based on their language. 

The point, they say, is to have all parents begin 

to feel comfortable working together irrespective of their languages and cultures. One focus group member who had participated in a 

session utilizing simultaneous translation noted 

that she had never before been to a parentinformation gathering where the audience included both fluent English speakers and those 

with little or no English, where two languages 

were used so naturally, and where, in this case, 

Spanish-speakers were made to feel so at home 

that they were not afraid or too embarrassed to 

actively participate.

Making Education-related 

Information Available and 

Understandable

Under NCLB, parents and guardians are offered 

more information, more choice, and a bigger role 

in their children’s education than in the past. But 

if the intent of the law is as singular and straightforward as its name, its intricacies can hinder 

parents in using it to their children’s advantage. 

While education agencies generally have analysts and professional associations to help them 

understand the law and its ramifications, most 

parents do not have such resources at hand. This 

is where the PIRCs come in: ensuring that parents and guardians receive relevant NCLB information in a fashion that makes it meaningful to 

them, using simplified language to communicate 

its relevant points as clearly as possible. 

A number of PIRCs have published NCLB guides 

that cover the basics of accountability, school 

choice, and SES, while also including more timedependent NCLB information, such as legislative 

updates, in newsletters that are sent to parents 

and educators. For a more personal approach 

that allows parents to ask questions and discuss 

NCLB, some PIRCs, such as the Indiana Partnerships Center and the PIRC that was operated 

by the Academic Development Institute (ADI), 

based in Lincoln, Ill., have offered workshops 

(e.g., Indiana’s “No Child Left Behind, P.L. 221 & 

YOU!”) that specifically outline parent and educator roles in fulfilling NCLB’s parent involvement mandates, such as writing the school-parent compact and engaging parents in developing parent involvement policies. The Utah Family Center, based in Salt Lake City (and as of its 

2006 PIRC grant, operating under a new name, 

Utah Family Partnership Network), includes on 

its Web site brief, concise descriptions of NCLB 

terms (e.g., a school report card, school choice, 

SES) and issues (e.g., testing requirements, what 

it means to not meet AYP).

Tips for Understanding the 

Audience

• Assess the communications needs (e.g., language, 

literacy level) of target audiences.

• Work through established education associations 

(e.g., local Title I offices, state departments of 

education, parent-teacher organizations) to build 

trust with and deliver information to teachers and 

other educators.

• Address parents’ diverse language needs by 

offering bilingual or multilingual materials, Web 

sites, and trainings.
16

Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

Start With Existing NCLB Resources

When it comes to illuminating what NCLB offers for parents, the U.S. Department of Education, SEAs, and others have already developed 

many helpful publications and Web-based documents. In such cases, there is no need for a 

PIRC to reinvent the wheel. Instead, PIRC staff 

can focus their efforts on finding an avenue to 

get these resources to parents. So, for example, the Indiana Partnerships Center has posted 

on its Web site an information resource developed by the U.S. Department of Education that 

briefly, and in an easy-to-understand fashion, 

describes a school-parent compact, gives directions and a template for writing a compact, and 

provides question prompts (e.g., “How can we 

use the compact throughout the school year?”) 

for developing related action steps (e.g., use 

the compact as part of parent-teacher conferences). This PIRC also has posted a downloadable description from the Indiana State Board of 

Education of what a local parent involvement 

policy should include and how and to whom it 

should be distributed.

Ensure User-friendly Language and Format 

Even for highly literate, well-educated parents, 

understanding how NCLB relates to them and 

their children can be challenging. For those who 

are not comfortably literate in English or who 

have little education, NCLB is virtually inaccessible in its original form, or even through the 

many articles about it that have been published 

in newspapers and magazines or via the Web. 

For these parents, it is essential that relevant 

aspects of the legislation be presented in easily 

understandable language and formats. Staff at 

these highlighted PIRCs suggest, for example, 

using colorful graphics and charts; keeping 

communication of basic elements to one page 

each, if possible; gearing language to approximately a sixth- to eighth-grade level as many 

newspapers do (based on the education level 

of their readership); and using a variety of parents, especially those in targeted communities 

or populations (e.g., those for whom English is 

a second language), to review materials as they 

are being developed. 

To help parents understand and navigate the 

legislation, ADI’s PIRC developed A Parent 

Guide to No Child Left Behind ,9 which explains 

parents’ rights and responsibilities under the 

legislation and has been offered in both Spanish and English. The guide’s narrative is broken up by colorful textboxes that either provide 

helpful tips for parents (e.g., how to assist with 

homework) or suggest questions parents might 

want to ask local educators. The guide has been 

disseminated through home visits, workshops, 

mailings, and downloads from the Internet, and 

more than 200,000 copies have been distributed 

to date, both within Illinois and nationwide via 

Internet downloads. 

Similarly, the Indiana Partnerships Center developed and distributes A Parent’s Guide to 

Understanding NCLB & P.L. 221 10 (P.L. 221 

being Indiana’s education accountability act). 

This eight-page guide, brightly colored with 

simple, appealing graphics, starts by very briefly introducing the laws and defining a few key 

terms (e.g., AYP). But most of its information 

is displayed in a chart laid out according to 

key concepts covered by the laws, including, 

for example, academic goals, teacher qualifications, student assessment, accountability, and 

school safety. (See fig. 3, Indiana Partnerships 
17

Center: Excerpt From A Parent’s Guide to 

Understanding NCLB and P.L. 221, below.) 

Each row has four columns: NCLB, P.L. 221, 

“What it means to parents,” and “Where to find 

more information.” So, for example, on the 

general topic of highly qualified teachers, the 

chart explains what the two laws (i.e., NCLB

and P.L. 221) dictate and, then, in the what it 

means column, explains that parents have the 

right to ask for information about their children’s teachers, including whether they have 

completed state requirements for licensure 

and certification, for example. The last column 

provides the names of (and Web site addresses 

for) several additional sources of information 

on the topic. This guide, too, is offered in both 

Spanish and English.

Figure 3. Indiana Partnerships Center: Excerpt From A Parent’s Guide to 

Understanding NCLB and P.L. 221
18

Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

In addition to using written materials, the Utah 

Family Center has packaged NCLB information in 

two DVDs, one about testing and accountability 

and the other about SES and school choice under NCLB. To help ensure that the DVDs would 

be easily understood by parents, the written 

scripts were shown to advisory board members 

(including parents). Rather than trying to distribute the DVDs directly to individual parents, 

the center has relied on its own trainers to use 

them at site council trainings and advisory board 

meetings and on school boards and community 

organizations, such as parent-teacher organizations, to reach additional audiences. At the time 

this guide was researched, the center was working on Spanish versions of the DVDs. In hopes 

of imparting NCLB-related information in a more 

engaging and understandable way, the Indiana 

Partnerships Center has been developing a DVD

that highlights parents discussing NCLB together. 

DVDs are a particularly helpful tool for informing 

parents who cannot or do not read, and when 

used with a group of people—at a meeting of a 

parent-teacher organization, a school staff meeting, or a church-based gathering, for example—

they oftentimes prompt questions and discussion 

that can be addressed or facilitated, respectively, 

by a PIRC staff member or volunteer.

One method for ensuring that information is 

presented in a meaningful way for the intended 

audience(s) is to have it reviewed by members 

of the targeted group(s). The Indiana Partnerships Center has convened parent focus groups, 

as well as its parent advisory council, to review 

materials and weigh in on their relative userfriendliness. Center staff present draft materials 

and ask participants to weigh in on whether 

the materials are understandable and interesting. Thus, those who live in the communities 

for which the materials are intended provide 

feedback prior to the materials being completed 

and distributed. IDRA also has its materials vetted, asking community organizations that work 

with parents in both rural and urban areas (rural 

southern Texas usually includes Mexican immigrants whereas urban areas usually include immigrants from many countries in Latin America) 

to convene groups of parents to give feedback 

on whether the information is clear. 

Make Performance Data Meaningful

Parents’ understanding of how their children’s 

school and district are performing overall is 

considered an essential component of NCLB. 

Thus, the law requires that parents receive report cards (i.e., a report card on the school or 

district, not the child) specifying at the school 

or district level how students have performed 

on mandated standardized tests, with student 

performance broken down by student subcategories, such as ethnicity, socioeconomic status, and limited English proficiency status. In 

addition, the parents of children whose school 

or district has not made AYP must be notified 

promptly and be informed of their options (e.g., 

SES, school choice) before the beginning of the 

school year or term in which choice or SES options will be offered. 

To help parents understand performance data, 

ADI’s PIRC developed a workshop that walks 

parents through a school report card to explain its different components. To make the experience more meaningful, parents are asked 

to bring their own school’s report card. The 

workshop covers the topics of demographics, 

academic performance, and AYP. After looking at each section of the report card, parents 
19

are informally quizzed on elements of their 

own school’s report card, such as whether the 

school is making progress toward achieving 

AYP in math (see fig. 4, Academic Development 

Institute: Excerpted Report Card Guide to Help 

Parents Understand ­Student Performance at the 

School, District, and State Levels, below). As 

the parents walk through this process they are 

able to ask the facilitator to clarify information 

and answer any related questions they might 

have. This training on reading and interpreting 

the data has been offered in NCLB workshops 

conducted by community-based organizations 

contracted by ADI, as well as in a range of other contexts where it might be useful, such as 

in setting up school community councils (i.e., 

ADI’s version of school site councils, which 

deal directly with school policy). 

Figure 4. Academic Development Institute: Excerpted Report Card Guide to

Help Parents Understand Student Performance at the School, District, and

State Levels
20

Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

questions. This guide is downloadable from 

the center’s Web site and is distributed at NCLB

workshops as well.

IDRA has taken another approach: engaging 

a group of computer-savvy students from the 

lower Rio Grande Valley—the Youth Education 

Tekies—to provide computer training and support for their parents and other adults in the 

community. A chief goal for these students, ranging from sixth grade to college, is to get their 

adult “students” proficient enough so they can 

access online information about their children’s 

schools, districts, SEAs, and NCLB. At one of 

IDRA’s leadership training sessions for parents 

and educators, the Tekies guided participants 

through the Texas Education Agency Accountability System Web site, where school, district, 

and state accountability data are posted. Participants were given worksheets instructing them 

to find their children’s school on the Web site, 

locate particular data about the school, compare 

different subsets of the data (e.g., performance 

scores for Latinos and African-Americans), and 

reflect on their findings. The Tekies coached 

parents, some of whom had never used a computer, as they carried out the tasks. IDRA’s PIRC 

director says the intergenerational program also 

is intended to support students’ development as 

active participants in their communities.

Getting in Touch with Parents 

Statewide 

States and PIRCs have the challenge of ensuring 

that all parents statewide receive information. 

Thus, PIRCs need to consider how to effectively 

communicate with parents and other constituents who are beyond easy geographic reach. 

Similarly, the Indiana Partnerships Center has 

developed a guide that walks parents through 

the Indiana Accountability System for Academic 

Progress Web site. This Web site includes information on the Indiana academic standards, accountability, professional development, school 

data (including performance data), school improvement planning, and the state performance 

profile. The guide is designed specifically to 

help parents understand the school data portion of the Web site, and it does this by providing a graphic of each relevant Web site page 

with large red arrows pointing to where parents 

should click on the screen. Hints like “scroll 

over bars on this graph to find out how many 

students took and passed this exam” and little 

messages—such as “Don’t panic!!!”—are interspersed throughout the guide. Finally, the 

guide includes a phone number to the Indiana 

Partnerships Center so parents can call with 

Tips for Making EducationRelated Information Available 

And Understandable 

• Do not reinvent the wheel—check for existing 

publications and tools to distribute.

• Create reader-friendly NCLB materials that 

are short, concise, clearly written, and well 

designed.

• Have representative parents review draft materials for reader friendliness before the materials 

are produced.

• Create informational DVDs for nonreading 

parents and group sessions. 

• Create workshops, guidance sessions, and Web 

sites to help parents understand the relevant issues. 
21

No matter where a PIRC locates its office(s), 

some portion of its targeted audience(s) is likely to live too far away to easily take advantage 

of any office-based meetings, trainings, or other 

resources. Conventional methods for delivering 

information long-distance, such as direct mailing or sending information to schools and asking that it be sent home with students, may be 

successful in reaching some parents. But even 

when written materials are sent in the home 

language of a family, this method is not reliable 

in reaching or being effective for all parents, 

especially those most in need of the information. Moreover, these methods preclude parents 

being able to ask questions, and PIRCs have 

no way of knowing whether the information 

has been understood. Thus, while such communication strategies may have a place, each of 

the five PIRCs selected for this guide chose to 

augment them. This section covers how PIRCs 

are using technology and school-based “parent centers” (not to be confused with the PIRCs 

themselves) to make information easily available for as many parents as possible.

Use Technology to Communicate

The highlighted PIRCs are using technology to 

extend their reach: Web sites because they offer 

important flexibility in communicating complex 

and, often, evolving information, and videoconferencing because it enables PIRCs to bring farflung parents and educators together without 

travel costs. 

Web sites. Many education Web sites discuss 

accountability standards and other NCLB-related 

information. The trick in creating a useful Web 

site for parents is to make sure the information 

is both relevant and clear to a wide range of 

people. To help ensure that its Web site is as 

useful as possible for its intended audience(s), 

the Indiana Partnerships Center has included a 

survey on the bilingual site. The survey includes 

both user satisfaction questions and a prompt 

to find out what kinds of additional information 

parents and educators would like on the site. In 

addition to considering the responses as it continues to develop its site, the center sends users 

a packet with information related to their stated 

interests. Initially, very few users completed the 

survey. So when the PIRC recently revamped its 

Web site, the survey link was renamed “Freebies,” and those clicking on the link learned 

that if they completed the survey they could 

receive books, kids-eat-free coupons from local restaurants, a tote bag, or informational 

CDs about parent involvement. Subsequent to 

this change, the center began receiving about 

10 responses a week from both educators and 

parents. The information compiled from these 

surveys is used to continue tailoring the Web 

site and center offerings to more closely meet 

the needs of its client base. 

At the time the information for this guide was 

researched, IDRA was about to launch a Web 

site aimed at helping parents decipher and understand accountability data for schools across 

Texas. As planned, the Web site would allow 

the public to access test scores from all the 

schools in the state, as well as to get additional 

school information, such as the percentage of 

bilingual staff and the percentage of resources 

dedicated to special education. Additionally, 

the Web site would offer a bulletin board to 

field questions, with responses offered in both 

Spanish and English. (The organization is planning eventually to have the whole site available in both languages.) As part of its planning 
22

Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

process, IDRA staff was working with parents 

at ARISE, a community-based organization serving Latino immigrants, to vet the information on 

the Web site and, thereby, ensure its usefulness. 

The biggest challenge they said they were facing was to translate the education jargon into 

terms that are meaningful for the lay person; in 

doing so, they drew heavily from their conversations with the ARISE parents.

Videoconferences. Although Web sites often 

include chat rooms and sometimes even have 

video capabilities, these technologies do not offer the immediacy of human contact and dialogue available in face-to-face gatherings. Videoconferences provide a middle ground, allowing 

people to come together and feel more personally connected without having to travel long distances. Years ago, IDRA staff started meeting via 

videoconferences and began to consider how 

this technology also might be used for training 

and information dissemination to the public. In 

2000, IDRA received funding from a foundation 

for its PIRC to start this practice in collaboration 

with other parent or family outreach organizations, such as Project READ and the IDEA South 

Central Collaborative for Equity. Since then the 

PIRC has been hosting live, interactive videoconferences whose purpose is to bring together 

educators and parents from across the state to 

discuss education issues, such as NCLB. In doing this, the PIRC benefits from the fact that each 

of Texas’s 20 regional education service centers, 

arms of the Texas Education Agency charged 

with helping school districts to improve student 

achievement, already had videoconferencing 

equipment and that, increasingly, individual 

schools have video technology that allows them 

to join in. The sessions tend to be two hours 

long, with presentations given in both English 

and Spanish. Conference materials are sent in 

advance to each participating location.

A chief benefit of convening so many people 

from so many different regions is that in addition to building a common information base, 

participants can share stories, ideas, and advice. 

A sense of extended community reinforces the 

notion that participants are not working alone 

on these issues. One member of a focus group 

for this guide who had participated in an IDRAfacilitated videoconference is the executive 

director of a local nonprofit organization and, 

also, the mother of two boys enrolled in Texas 

public schools. She said, “Sometimes I feel a 

sense of hopelessness, but to know everyone in 

Texas is going through the same thing is wonderful!” The director of IDRA’s PIRC says he 

thinks the videoconferences have produced a 

“leveling effect” because parents and educators 

from all over Texas are talking and listening to 

each other as equals.

Establish and Coordinate Conveniently 

Located Parent Centers

For four of the PIRCs highlighted in this guide—

the Indiana Partnerships Center, the Utah Family 

Center, and the PIRCs run by ADI and IDRA—

making sure parents have a conveniently located place where they can pick up NCLB- and 

other education-related resources and can meet 

and talk with other parents or with school staff 

is seen as a basic strategy for further engaging 

parents in efforts to improve education. Such 

places are broadly referred to as parent centers (spelled in lower-case and, as noted earlier, 

not to be confused with the PIRCs themselves). 

Although some PIRCs operate some sort of parent center at their office, it is more common to 
23

have such centers located at a school or in the 

general vicinity of several schools. The point is 

to locate them as conveniently as possible for 

parents. In some instances, PIRCs operate parent centers themselves, as the Utah Family Center has done, for example. In other instances, 

they encourage and support schools to set up 

and operate their own parent centers, as the 

Indiana Partnerships Center and the ADI and 

IDRA PIRCs have done. 

Some school-based parent centers consist of 

little more than a bookshelf of materials in the 

waiting room of a school office; others are more 

elaborate and self-contained, with comfortable 

seating and coffee at the ready, books and other materials that can be taken or checked out, 

and a computer, VCR or DVD player available, 

which visitors can use for informational purposes. Some have no staff, some are run by a 

changing cast of volunteers, and some have an 

actual staff member. Minimally, the purpose of 

such parent centers is to distribute information 

and to make parents feel welcome at a school 

or, if the center is located off campus, to make 

them feel more comfortable with the U.S. education system in general. Ideally, every school 

would house its own parent center, but given 

the limited resources of most schools (including 

time, funding, and space), parent centers are 

less common than many educators and parents 

alike would want.

Some PIRCs, such as the Indiana Partnerships 

Center, have stepped in to help schools establish 

and coordinate school-based parent centers that 

offer a range of parent-friendly materials as well 

as workshops and trainings on topics of interest 

to that parent clientele. Indiana now has some 

75 parent centers, most in Indianapolis Public 

Schools (IPS). This is a district whose superintendent has required that all Title I elementary and 

middle schools develop parent centers staffed 

with trained “parent liaisons” responsible for 

setting up and maintaining the centers, including working directly with parents to help them 

get needed education information. At the time 

the study underlying this guide was conducted, 

the district had asked the Indiana Partnerships 

Center to train 57 new parent liaisons for this 

role. Initially, IPS’s parent centers were funded 

through contributions from local companies and 

other small grants, but the district has since begun using Title I funds to support the liaison positions. The Indiana Partnerships Center uses its 

PIRC grant (as opposed to additional funding it 

has received from other sources, such as private 

foundations) to provide technical assistance for 

the centers along with NCLB materials and other 

resources for stocking the centers.

The experience of the Indiana Partnerships Center suggests that school-based parent centers 

that get the most use tend to be located in an 

easily accessible area, close to a school’s front 

door or parking lot, for example. However, if an 

optimal location is not afforded—one IPS parent 

center is located in a former broom closet—just 

remember that it is more important to have a 

concrete area where parents know they can go 

to get the help they need. As the associate director of the Indiana PIRC notes, “Just do it! Just 

open the space and don’t worry.” (See “Setting 

Up a Parent Center” on p. 24.)

IDRA’s PIRC also works with representatives of 

schools and community organizations, and parent outreach personnel who request help in setting up parent centers, and it has helped establish 

30 centers over the past eight years. The PIRC 
24

Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

offers this service as a technical assistance package that includes three days of planning and follow-up that, similar to the Indiana Partnerships 

Center, includes supplying materials for the center, training for setup of the center, and training on using computers to find pertinent parent 

resources. The services also include a choice of 

many Spanish-English trainings, such as parent 

leadership training, an invitation to participate 

in local and regional parent leadership networking meetings, and training of trainers for parents 

and parent-involvement staff to help plan and 

conduct workshops for parents.

The Utah Family Center takes a slightly different 

approach. From the center’s inception, its executive director has recognized the need for PIRCestablished and -operated satellite offices that 

would serve as parent centers so parents in other 

parts of the state, particularly in its more isolated 

areas, can have easy access to needed resources. 

The PIRC has operated with a central office in 

Salt Lake City. At the time of this study, the office was located in space donated by the PIRC’s 

fiscal agent, the Utah Parent Teacher Association, 

in its own building. In their common space, the 

two organizations ran a parent resource center. 

However, the PIRC also runs nine satellite offices 

as parent centers elsewhere in the state, seven 

of them housed in local schools, and all of them 

staffed with a paid coordinator. All of the satellite centers offer the same baseline information 

and resources for parents, as well as additional 

resources or services tailored to local needs. 

The first six of Utah’s nine satellite centers 

opened in 1998 and were fully funded (including the coordinators) through the Utah Family 

Center’s original PIRC grant. In 2002, the center 

received an additional PIRC grant and was able 

Setting Up a Parent Center

For those interested in establishing a school-based 

parent center with NCLB- and other education-related 

resources available for parents to use on site or to 

check out, the Indiana Partnerships Center created a 

simple checklist for what needs to be done. The following is adapted from that checklist: 

Steps for setting up a parent center:

• Seek approval from the school principal.

• Schedule a planning session (expect it to last 

about two hours) bringing together interested 

parents and educators to:

> Create a vision statement;

> Establish goals;

> Create a framework for implementation;

> Set a budget;

> Plan the physical setup of the center; and

> Identify and organize what resources it 

will offer.

• Identify and, if necessary, train the coordinator who will need to deal with inventory, help 

parents use the computer, locate volunteers, and 

establish committees.

• Find the things needed to furnish the center, including lamps, table, phone, computer, printer, 

coffee pot, and filing cabinets.

• Contact the nearest PIRC to get resources for 

the center.
25

to add three more centers, for which it budgeted to cover only materials and resources, not 

coordinators. The goal was to have communities take more ownership, with local districts 

figuring out how to fund coordinators. Districts 

stepped up: one center has been staffed with a 

worker from Volunteers in Service to America 

(VISTA); the coordinator position at another 

center, located next to a low-performing school, 

has been funded partly by the local district’s Title I money and partly by the Utah Family Center’s PIRC grant; and the position at the third 

center has been paid for by school-level Title 

I funds. Materials for all of the satellite centers 

are covered through PIRC funds, and the facilities are all donated by local districts. 

Through the Solid Foundation (SF), the ADI 

PIRC’s cornerstone program for building community and parent involvement at a school, the 

PIRC has been helping participating schools set 

up a family resource library. With accommodations ranging from a few comfortable chairs and a 

bookcase located in a hallway to an entire classroom dedicated to parent resources, these libraries focus primarily on providing materials that 

parents can use in working with their children 

(e.g., NCLB information, books on tape with cassette players, lists of community resources, parenting books, family games). In addition, some 

of the larger libraries serve as places for parents 

to convene informally or for parents and staff 

to come together for Solid Foundation trainings. 

Although various school staff (e.g., teachers, 

the principal) and volunteer parents ensure that 

the centers are organized and well stocked, the 

resource libraries do not have permanent staff 

available to answer questions or help parents 

find resources. Instead, they function as lending 

libraries that operate on the honor system. 

Tailored services. One benefit to having parent centers as localized as possible is that they 

can be tailored to meet the needs of their respective communities. For example, each Utah 

center has a local advisory board to help identify community needs and how best to meet them 

within the limits of funding and other resources. 

(See fig. 5, Utah Family Center: Brochure From 

Satellite Parent Center With Tailored Services, 

on p. 26.) These advisory boards are made up 

of a range of people varying slightly from center to center, but usually including four to five 

parents; the regional director of the Utah PTA; a 

representative from the district superintendent’s 

office, who might be the Title I director; and, if 

there is a university nearby, a representative of 

it as well. Broad membership on a parent center 

advisory board helps ensure that a center understands and serves the needs of its community.

In serving economically disadvantaged populations, PIRCs invariably run into families in need 

of much more than the education-related information and services that PIRCs normally provide. 

Some families need help with much more basic 

needs. While generally speaking, other types of 

agencies (e.g., public, nonprofit, church-based) 

are set up to address those needs, some PIRCs 

have seen a role for themselves, recognizing a 

link between family conditions and children’s 

school performance. For example, parents who 

do not have jobs may have more trouble providing healthy food, let alone school supplies; 

homes without showers or washing machines 

cannot ensure children’s cleanliness or health; 

and no access to a telephone limits communication between home and school. As one PIRC 

staff member notes, “If the parents feel better, 

the child feels better.” Thus, a number of PIRCfacilitated parent centers offer resources not 
26

Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

directly related to education. For instance, centers in both Indiana and Utah offer resume and 

job-placement help for parents. 

Utah’s Monument Valley Satellite Center, located on a Native American reservation in southern Utah, has gone a considerable step further, 

addressing families’ basic needs through a variety of services that have included use of an 

on-site shower and washer and dryer, use of 

a telephone (for parents with a phone card), 

and use of one of the center’s six computers 

for writing resumes, printing documents, and 

searching for information and jobs.

Connecting With Hard-to-Reach 

Parents

As noted earlier, PIRCs must spend at least 

half of their PIRC grant to serve parents who 

are severely economically or educationally 

disadvantaged, a category that includes those 

Figure 5. Utah Family Center: Brochure From Satellite Parent Center With

Tailored Services (inside panels from open three-fold brochure)
27

who are Spanish-speaking migrant parents; 

those who are homeless; those who may have 

an address but no telephone, let alone a computer; and those who cannot read. How PIRCs 

do so varies, depending on the needs of the 

populations they are trying to reach. For example, IDRA’s PIRC partners with a Head Start 

program that provides or brokers a range of 

supportive services (e.g., dental, medical, mental health, nutrition) to migrant farmworker 

families; the PIRC supplies the Head Start program with information about education rights 

and NCLB, which the program, in turn, gives to 

the families with which it works. The Indiana 

Partnerships Center has developed partnerships 

with homeless shelters in the state to distribute 

NCLB information, and it places informational 

spots on Spanish-language radio and television 

to reach Spanish-speaking parents. For several 

PIRCs, home visits have been a major outreach 

strategy because liaisons can target services to 

meet families’ specific needs.

Facilitate Home Visits 

For a variety of reasons, many parents never 

make it to their children’s school, which, for 

many, means they never make it to a parent 

center. Their work schedule may preclude 

coming during standard school hours and for 

parents working two jobs, as many must do, 

even extended hours might not help. Parents 

also may stay away because they had a negative experience in their own education and may 

be mistrustful of educators. For immigrant families whose documentation may not be complete, staying away from school may be part 

of a general effort to keep a low profile. To 

serve such parents, some PIRCs promote the 

strategy of home visits through which parents 

Tips for Reaching Parents 

Statewide 

• Develop Web sites and use videoconferencing to 

reach larger and more dispersed audiences.

• Help establish parent centers in or near schools 

across the state that inform and invite the participation of parents in the education of their 

children. If a center serves a high-poverty population, it should also provide services as possible 

that help meet families’ basic needs (e.g., jobhunting assistance, including access to computers for writing resumes, telephones, showers, and 

washing machines). 

• Open satellite PIRC centers across the state that 

can assess and address the needs of local or 

regional constituents.

receive personalized communication geared to 

their needs. Equally important, home visits allow two-way communication with parents able 

to ask questions and discuss concerns. 

The Utah Family Center trains parent liaisons 

across the state to make home visits. Since 

Utah is now a multilingual, multicultural state, 

liaisons must be aware of and prepared to address cultural differences, language barriers, 

socioeconomic issues, and social factors that 

affect parents’ ability to be involved in their 

children’s education, such as substance abuse 

and incarceration. Often home visits provide 

the best means to assess the needs of families 

and then to tailor communications and services 

to meet their needs. The Utah Family Center 

helps prepare liaisons for these visits through 

group trainings on a range of topics, including 

cultural competency and NCLB. 
28

Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

Important as it is to provide effective liaison 

training, some PIRCs have found that choosing 

the right liaison candidate to begin with makes 

all the difference. For example, the Utah Family 

Center recruited a medicine man on a reservation served by one of the satellite offices to be 

a liaison. In addition to being highly respected 

within the communities in that area, he is savvy 

about what types of communications will be 

most effective for a community where few families have a phone. When the school in which 

he was based was on verge of not making AYP, 

this liaison conducted over 100 home visits to 

talk with parents about the value of student attendance and testing, explaining that parents 

needed to make sure their children came to 

school so the children would learn well and 

test well, for both the children’s sake and the 

school’s sake. 

This same satellite center also has helped facilitate improved communication between the 

local high school staff and reservation parents, many of whom, in addition to not having 

phones, have no access to transportation or, in 

some cases, even to running water or electricity. 

In hopes of making connections between these 

far-flung parents and their children’s teachers, 

the principal decided that every Friday for five 

weeks during the summer she would bus her 

staff to a different area of the reservation. Each 

visit culminated in a light meal or snack at the 

home of one of the families, with arrangements 

made by and the food supplied by satellite center staff. The principal describes these visits as 

“truly eye-opening” for her staff, many of whom 

had no prior understanding of the conditions 

in which their students lived or the struggles 

their families faced. The staff’s new awareness 

helped them be more understanding when 

students came to school with no homework 

done, were late for class, or were distracted; it 

also helped staff focus guidance and interventions in a more informed, helpful way. 

In the IPS, where all Title I elementary and middle schools are now required by the district to 

have a parent liaison, the Indiana Partnerships 

Center facilitated the first year of liaison training, 

in collaboration with the district’s Title I office 

and Bridges to Success, a United Way program 

dedicated to building healthy school communities. The training, approximately 50 hours over 

the course of a year, took place one day each 

month, and one of the key topics was how to 

connect with hard-to-reach parents, using such 

strategies as making home visits. Some participants were already experienced in conducting 

home visits, either because they had worked 

as a liaison at an individual Title I school before the position became mandatory or because 

they had worked in another social service-type 

job prior to becoming a liaison. Their feedback 

on the training was that they had found the 

home-visitor module especially important because they had already experienced challenges 

in attempting this type of outreach.

The Indianapolis liaison training emphasizes 

an asset-based approach in which, to establish trust and make parents feel comfortable, 

the liaison highlights positive things in his or 

her introductory conversation with parents in 

their home: They first thank the parents for letting them come, then compliment them on the 

hard work they are doing with their children. 

They then begin to ask open-ended questions 

about the children and parents, and then invite the parents to participate at school in ways 

they might feel comfortable (e.g., volunteering 
29

in the classroom, chaperoning field trips). Finally, they ask if the parents have any questions 

about school or their children’s education in 

general and then set a date to call or visit again. 

A role-playing exercise in which liaisons trade 

off playing parents and liaisons helps training 

participants model and practice the approach. 

Partner With Community-based 

Organizations

Community-based organizations can be invaluable in helping PIRCs connect with hardto-reach parents. Parents who for any reason 

have lost trust in their local education system 

may be more receptive to information delivered by an organization in which they do have 

confidence, such as their church or local Boys 

and Girls Club. Also, such organizations tend 

to have more intimate knowledge of the needs 

and concerns of their particular constituents 

and, therefore, understand how to reach them. 

For a PIRC with a statewide mandate, partnering with other organizations also makes sense 

as a way to leverage its own limited resources. 

By working with or through a community- or 

faith-based organization, PIRCs can exponentially increase the number of parents reached. 

To lay the ground for this method of extended 

outreach, the Family Works (a program of the 

nonprofit Gaithersburg-based Family Service 

Agency) that was funded as a PIRC in 2003 

to serve Maryland, cohosted an NCLB summit intended to solicit the help of local community-based organizations. (See fig. 6, The 

Family Works: Invitation to Education Summit 

for Community-based Agencies in Maryland, on 

p. 30.) The one-day summit brought together 

60 participants from 15 parent-, faith-, and 

community-based organizations to inform them 

about the intent of NCLB as it pertains to parent 

involvement and to enlist their help in disseminating this information to families across the city 

of Baltimore. In addition to presenting general 

information, the Family Works produced four 

topic-specific breakout sessions on parent involvement, understanding your school’s report 

card, public school choice, and supplemental 

educational services. 

ADI’s PIRC also has seen value in enlisting other 

organizations to further its reach to parents. This 

PIRC has contracted with five community- and 

faith-based organizations across Illinois to help 

distribute and facilitate understanding of NCLB

information in the communities they serve. The 

initial contracting organizations (e.g., Boys and 

Girls Clubs of Greater Peoria, Christian Women 

of the New Wave) were chosen for a variety 

of factors, among them, their geographic location, the needs of the communities they serve, 

and their reputations for communicating well 

with their communities. Using its grant funds, 

the PIRC contracted with these organizations to 

provide NCLB workshops and related guidance 

sessions for parents that would serve a minimum 

number of families annually. The three-hour 

NCLB workshops include an ADI-developed 

community curriculum, materials, and resource 

guide with general NCLB information that the 

organizations supplement with data and information from their local district. The guidance 

sessions usually are conducted for parents who 

already have attended the workshop and have 

follow-up questions, such as: What do I need to 

do as a parent? What are my individual choices? 

Who do I talk to at the district? These sessions 

offer information tailored to the specific needs 

of the participating families. 
30

Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

Figure 6. The Family Works: Invitation to Education Summit for CommunityBased Agencies in Maryland
31

To prepare these organizations for their role 

as trainers and guidance counselors, the PIRC 

has brought them together to train three times 

a year (for five hours per session) in Lincoln. 

The first training covered NCLB content and 

trained the organizations’ representatives in the 

processes for leading workshops and guidance 

sessions; the following two trainings that first 

year addressed challenges the organizations 

were facing in carrying out their work with parents and offered continued education on NCLB. 

In subsequent years, the trainings have played 

more of a support role and have been used for 

participating organizations to network and to 

go over any changes in the law. (For additional 

information on PIRCs’ use of partnerships to expand capacity, see “PIRCs Leverage Their Limited Resources,” on p. 32.)

Promoting Cross-stakeholder 

Communication

If parents, educators, and other education 

stakeholders are to become partners in raising 

student achievement, these groups need to be 

able to talk with each other. Yet parents rarely 

have forums where they can speak openly with 

educators; educators rarely have opportunities 

to talk with representatives of community organizations or the business community; and so 

on. Finding ways that all those who care about 

and have a stake in improving education can 

communicate effectively with each other can 

only help.

Convene Diverse Stakeholders

In 2005 and 2006, IDRA’s PIRC hosted three 

events—which it refers to as multi-sector convenings—aimed at facilitating understanding 

and cooperation among various education 

stakeholders in Texas: a statewide summit on 

dropout prevention, a second summit on the 

current state of Latino education in the state, 

and a four-seminar investigation into disparities 

related to the success of Latino students and 

their access to higher education. The goal of 

these statewide meetings was to bring families 

and students together with business people, 

universities, community-based organizations, 

faith-based organizations, policymakers, and 

community members to find ways to better 

educate the children of Texas, the majority of 

whom are Latino—a subgroup whose members 

are dropping out of school at disproportionate 

rates and scoring lower than their counterparts 

on state and local tests. Through these convenings, multiple stakeholders have learned 

about and discussed why so many students are 

Tips for Connecting With 

Hard-to-Reach Parents

• Provide information and materials to communitybased organizations that are in direct contact 

with hard-to-reach populations, such as homeless shelters, local Head Start programs, and 

faith-based organizations.

• Train liaisons to make home visits that are informed, targeted, and culturally sensitive. 

• Help recruit liaisons who can easily integrate into 

the target community.

• Contract with community-based organizations to 

disseminate information.

• Host summits and trainings that bring community-based organizations from across the state 

together for train-the-trainers sessions.
32

Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

PIRCs Leverage Their Limited Resources to Expand Capacity

Partnering with community-based organizations, faith-based organizations, other parent involvement organizations, and schools, districts, and state education agencies is one approach that all five of the highlighted PIRCs 

have utilized to varying degrees. While some PIRCs, such as those operated by IDRA and ADI, effectively partner 

with their larger parent organization and draw resources from the larger staff and budgets, other PIRCs, such as 

the Indiana Partnerships Center and the Family Works in Maryland, only have staffs of five. All of the PIRCs have 

limited budgets. Partnerships allow PIRCs to leverage their services to reach more parents and educators and to 

offer a wider range of training and services than if they were relying only on their own staff. 

The Utah Family Center offers a good example of what partnerships can offer: This PIRC invested in two partnerships intended to facilitate communication between students and their families. A partnership with the state 

parent-teacher association (PTA), which also initially served as its fiscal agent, enabled the PIRC to gain access 

easily to school communities: Principals with established PTAs have readily invited PIRC staff into their schools 

to conduct leadership and parenting training. The PTA newsletter, which is sent to schools statewide, usually 

has included an article by PIRC staff to update readers about NCLB and inform them about PIRC services and 

resources. In return, the center supplies PTA members with NCLB information for their own trainings and provides 

trainings for PTA members on updated NCLB policy.

A second key partner has been the Utah Parent Center, which is a state-funded program serving families of children with special needs and which, despite its very similar name, should not be confused with the PIRC itself 

(i.e., the Utah Family Center). The two organizations have worked hard to foster a relationship that leverages the 

strengths of each. Since Utah Parent Center staff have developed trusting relationships with parents of children 

with special needs across the state, they can easily bring new NCLB information to these parents, provided that 

staff stay current on the information and understand how it relates to their service population. This is where the 

Utah Family Center comes in: The PIRC supplies the Parent Center with NCLB materials and trains center staff in 

NCLB policy so that they can distribute it to their constituents.

not graduating and entering college, and the 

magnitude of the problem has been exposed. 

Participants assess the readiness for action in 

their respective communities and develop strategic action plans or “blueprints for action.” (See 

fig. 7, Intercultural Development Research Association: Checklist for Effective Action to Improve Education, on p. 33.)

San Antonio Secondary-Level Dialogues is a 

more localized parent and community engagement effort provided by IDRA’s PIRC, designed 

and facilitated by IDRA’s PIRC. The idea for the 

dialogues came to the PIRC director when he 

was facilitating professional development at a 

local San Antonio high school to help teachers 

reach English as a Second Language (ESL) students. As he taught this class he realized there 

was a need for greater understanding among 

teachers, students, and their families. The dialogues, which bring together members of each 

of these groups and are carried out in both 

Spanish and English, were conceived to help 

generate this understanding. Conversations are 

framed by three rounds of questions designed 

to help the different stakeholders understand 

more about one another and to prompt discussion of critical education issues while establishing mutual trust and respect. 
33

Figure 7. Intercultural Development Research Association: Checklist for Effective

Action to Improve Education (Excerpted from IDRA’s publication, A Community 

Action Guide: Seven Actions to Fulfill the Promise of Brown and Mendez)
34

Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

A core group of 12 teachers has participated 

regularly since the dialogues’ inception. The 

number of parents and students involved has 

fluctuated, but all those participating thus far 

have been English learners and have qualified 

for Title I services—categories of individuals 

that are commonly considered hard to reach 

for such engagement efforts. One way of trying to recruit additional families has been to 

offer students extra class credit if they attend 

with family members. At the dialogue meetings, which occur over dinner (provided with 

Title I funding, but which also can be handled 

as potlucks), participants are split into table 

groups and each group is given a translator 

and a recorder who documents key points that 

come up in the conversations. The use of question prompts (e.g., for parents, “As your child’s 

first teacher, what was something you enjoyed 

teaching him or her to do?”) are intended to 

spur conversations that will promote participants’ greater understanding of each other and 

of key education issues.

Similarly, the ADI PIRC’s Solid Foundation 

includes a Home Gatherings component designed to help parents and teachers bridge the 

communications gap. These one-hour gatherings, planned by the school community council and the school’s parent-education facilitator, 

are held at a parent’s house and facilitated by 

the host parent. The host parent and participating teachers are trained in facilitation skills by 

the parent-education facilitator. These gatherings bring together a group (of varying size) of 

parents and teachers to talk together about their 

respective responsibilities in educating children 

and how to work together to meet shared goals. 

Questions addressed in the gatherings might 

include: What is the parent’s (and conversely 

the teacher’s) role in developing a student’s 

academic skills, study habits, and self-respect? 

Questions are directly linked to the schoolparent compact and NCLB’s Title I requirements for parent involvement. ADI staff have 

found that communities respond differently to 

the gatherings: Some are excited while others 

are more reticent about trying them. But ADI 

is continuing to require all Solid Foundation 

schools to host at least one gathering in hopes 

that all schools will establish Home Gatherings 

as a lasting practice. 

Help Parents Know What Questions to Ask 

And How to Ask Them 

To help parents become more skilled communicators within the education system on behalf of 

their children, the Indiana Partnerships Center 

offers a question-development workshop. This 

training is based on the model of the nonprofit 

Right Question Project (RQP) in Cambridge, 

Mass., whose premise is that effective questioning is an essential tool for participating in a democracy. This three-hour workshop is intended 

to help parents learn how to identify essential 

issues related to their children’s education, 

formulate effective questions, and feel comfortable discussing those questions with their 

children’s teachers or others in the education 

system. The training includes activities that help 

parents generate (in groups of four to five) lists 

of questions that pertain to a topic, prioritize 

those questions, deepen their inquiry by taking 

the most important question and brainstorming 

additional, related queries, and, finally, prioritize the questions again so that parents can be 

ready to ask just a few essential questions. Parents are more likely to get thoughtful responses 

from educators if their own questions are well 
35

thought out and targeted to meet their goals, 

which is what the RQP-modeled workshop 

helps them do. 

The Indiana Partnerships Center staff has found 

the RQP workshop model to be particularly 

helpful in preparing parents with children with 

special needs to communicate with teachers, 

principals, and districts. A part-time special 

education coordinator hired by the PIRC facilitates these workshops for parents of children 

with special needs across the state. The basic 

RQP model is used, but the coordinator infuses information about individualized education 

plans (IEPs) throughout. She stresses parents’ 

responsibility to identify the needs of their children and then uses the RQP process to show 

them how to prioritize and develop related 

questions to ask teachers, principals, and district administrators in order to get those needs 

met. In addition, the coordinator has developed an “express IEP” plan that includes critical information for teachers about the needs 

of a child, including a short description of the 

disability, transportation needs, and classroom 

needs. This express plan, derived from a template that parents fill out, gives busy teachers a 

quick picture of the child’s needs. 

In addition to this parent training, the Indiana 

PIRC offers facilitation training for parents, 

school staff, and community organizers who 

wish to provide RQP-type training for other 

parents. Those wanting to become facilitators must first attend a parent workshop (described in Part II of this guide) and commit 

to facilitating at least one parent workshop in 

their community. 

Moving From Information to Action

Once parents understand their rights, responsibilities, and opportunities in relation to their 

children’s education, and once they know how 

to formulate and ask the right questions—and 

feel comfortable doing so—they are ready to 

better support and advocate for their own children. They also are more likely to feel at ease 

volunteering in their child’s classroom or helping out occasionally by working on a specific 

schoolwide project (e.g., assisting with a fundraiser, participating in a cleanup day). 

For some parents, this degree of involvement 

will feel sufficient. But some will want to do 

more. They may want to become school leaders, the ones who conceive and organize the 

special projects (e.g., a cultural celebration, a 

workshop on how to help with homework), 

who recruit additional volunteers, and who 

advocate for other students and families, not 

Tips for Promoting CrossStakeholder Communication 

About Education Issues

• Convene groups of diverse stakeholders from 

across the state to discuss, get trained, and network about issues related to parent involvement 

in children’s education. 

• At the school level, bring together parents, teachers, and students to discuss key education issues 

of importance and interest to them.

• Facilitate workshops that help parents understand 

how to identify and ask the important questions 

regarding the education of their children that they 

need answered.
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Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

just their own. Or they may want to get involved in education decision-making, participating in school governance, becoming a member of the school site council, or sitting on a 

district or state education committee or board. 

For these parents, more preparation can lead to 

greater effectiveness in their education-related 

endeavors. The same holds true for educators 

who want to partner more actively with parents 

and be involved in joint decision-making. Part 

II of this guide addresses how PIRCs help prepare well-informed parents and educators for 

action and partnership.
37

P A R T I I

The PIRCs’ Role in 

Preparing and 

Supporting Parents 

And Educators to 

Take Action for 

Student Learning

With the exception of home visits aimed at reaching specific parents, the kind of information dissemination described in Part I tends to be a broad-brush effort to reach as many parents as possible. In 

contrast, the efforts described in this section tend to be more selective and more time- and resourceintensive, as is needed for activities designed to ready parents and educators for action rather than 

simply to inform them. Even recruiting participants, particularly parents who traditionally have not 

been involved and educators who might not view the need for parent involvement as a high priority, 

can be difficult and time-consuming. Providing a broad range of training to meet the needs of constituents across an entire state also is challenging and can be expensive. But as will be evident in this 

section, the highlighted PIRCs have found ways to successfully meet these challenges.

Because PIRCs have a broad mandate and 

operate with limited funding (and, therefore, 

some have only a few staff members), they 

tend to leverage their resources by working 

with and through other organizations for both 

recruitment and training. More and more frequently, PIRCs are taking a train-the-trainers 

approach in a variety of avenues, such as parent leadership training, liaison training, and 

site council training. They also have begun 

working with the staff of education agencies 

who, in turn, train targeted school and parent 

populations with which they are in close contact. PIRCs also expend resources carefully, 

trying to assess in advance the kinds of training and other preparation needed in particular 

schools and districts so they can plan their 

own efforts accordingly.
38

Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

Assessing Local Needs Related to 

Parent Involvement

The relative family-friendliness of a school refers to how inviting it feels to the families of its 

students: Do families feel they would be welcome to ask questions, to contribute somehow 

in their children’s classroom, to make suggestions, or to otherwise support their children’s 

education? The degree to which parents feel 

at ease in their children’s school is influenced 

by such factors as who initially greets them 

and whether they are met with a smile, with 

a frown, or ignored entirely; whether there 

is a physical space for parents to meet and 

find information and resources related to the 

school and education in general; whether they 

receive timely information (e.g., about school 

events, student productions, upcoming assessments) on a regular basis, as in a weekly 

newsletter coming home with their children, 

for example; whether teachers and the principal seem open to questions or feedback; and 

whether the only time parents hear from anyone at school is when there is a problem with 

their child. Parents who have made an initial 

effort to come to school to meet their children’s 

teachers and principal are less likely to return 

if their experience is not positive. On the other hand, if parents are enthusiastically invited 

into schools, warmly greeted, and engaged in 

ways that make them feel comfortable and assure them that their input and questions are 

valued, they may be willing to come back and 

become involved at levels they might not even 

have considered. 

By assessing both parents’ current thoughts 

on the climate of the school and staff feelings 

about parent involvement, schools can get a 

better idea of how they need to improve in the 

area of family friendliness, and they can solicit 

targeted help from their PIRC. While personal 

interviews and focus groups can be used to 

solicit in-depth information about parent and 

staff attitudes, few schools can manage such intensive ways of soliciting information. Written 

surveys are a much more efficient method that 

can still yield good results. The act of conducting a survey is itself a parent-friendly message 

to parents that a school cares what they think. 

It gives both parents and staff a voice in articulating what works and what does not work 

in the particular school community as related 

to parent involvement. In yielding site-specific 

information, it offers important guidance. One 

parent noted when talking about the value of a 

school survey, “It gives us data about our actual 

community. It’s not just something we got from 

someplace else like ours that may or may not 

really fit us.” 

Provide Surveys on Schools’ Family 

Friendliness as a PIRC Service 

While some schools and districts develop and 

conduct their own school surveys for various purposes, both the Indiana Partnerships 

Center and ADI’s PIRC recognized that not 

all education agencies have this capacity. Six 

years ago the Indiana PIRC contracted with an 

outside agency to develop the “Are We Family Friendly?” survey for distribution to Indiana schools. This perception survey asks parents how comfortable they feel in the school; 

how informed they feel about their children’s 

performance and how to help them; whether 

or not they feel invited to participate in the 

school’s activities and at what level; and how 
39

empowered they feel in addressing any issues 

and concerns they might have. Teachers, in 

turn, are asked how often and in what capacity parents are invited to participate in their 

children’s education in the classroom and at 

home; how informed they keep the parents; 

whether they make home visits and go into 

students’ communities; and how much they 

solicit information.

The PIRC’s intent was to have schools across 

the state administer the survey, with the PIRC 

analyzing and feeding the results back to them. 

But over the years it had become clear that 

many schools were unable to ensure enough 

of a response to make the survey worthwhile; 

sending surveys home with students or mailing 

them to a family’s home was not effective. In 

2005, the new superintendent of IPS required 

that all Title I schools in the district administer the survey to assess their family friendliness. 

The Indiana Partnerships Center collaborated 

with IPS to revise the survey and, also, create a 

Spanish-language version.

To further ensure a greater parent response rate, 

parent liaisons were used to disseminate the 

survey. Given the nature of their work, which 

entails developing strong relationships with 

parents at their site, the liaisons seemed well 

positioned to encourage parents to respond to 

the survey, to answer their questions, to monitor survey returns, and to provide follow-up if 

parents need additional encouragement to respond. As a result of this approach, some 4,900 

parents completed the survey. Equally important, 880 or 18 percent of the parent respondents were Spanish speakers, whose voices 

may have remained silent in the absence of a 

translated survey.

ADI also offers a school survey, which was first 

developed in 1996 in a project with the Regional 

Educational Laboratory at Temple University. 

The survey has evolved and expanded over 

the years; today, in addition to asking parents 

and teachers about parent-related issues at their 

school, it includes questions for principals. If the 

survey is administered for a high school, students 

also are included. The topics covered for parents 

and teachers are similar to those in the Indiana 

survey, while principals are asked more about 

what existing services and structures are already 

in place to support parent involvement: What 

types of written policies have been developed 

to promote parent involvement (e.g., homework 

policy, school-parent compact), what mechanisms exist to invite parents into the school (e.g., 

family nights, conferences), what resources are 

available at the school for parents (e.g., parent 

resource library, trainings), and what methods 

are used to communicate with parents (e.g., 

home visits, newsletters). (See fig. 8, Academic 

Development Institute: Principal Element From 

School Survey, on p. 40.) The survey is given 

to principals to administer to their school populations. ADI then analyzes the data and generates a detailed report, which is shared with the 

school community, administration, and faculty; 

the school board; parent organizations; and other interested parties. 

Use Survey Results to Inform Parent-related 

School Practice 

Both ADI and the Indiana Partnerships Center 

take steps to help ensure that survey results are 

easily understandable and are used by schools 

in meaningful ways. ADI’s analysis of survey results report goes into considerable depth comparing and contrasting how parents and staff 
40

Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

Figure 8. Academic Development Institute: Principal Element From School Survey
41

view issues and identifying areas where more 

work is needed to generate effective partnering between parents and school. Its purpose is 

to help school communities draw conclusions 

about areas of successes and challenges and to 

aid them in creating an action plan to strengthen their community. In addition to administering the survey, ADI offers a consulting service 

that includes up to three site visits: a pre-survey 

visit, a visit to review results and develop an 

action plan that is often tied to the goals of 

the school improvement plan, and a final visit 

three to six months later to assess progress. For 

Solid Foundation schools, the survey is administered at the beginning of the program and 

again at the end of the two-year Solid Foundation process. The results of these two surveys 

are then compared to identify areas of progress 

and areas still in need of improvement. ADI 

also administers progress reports twice a year 

for two years in December and June. These reports track implementation of the action plan 

through factors, such as how many home visits 

have been made.

At one school, survey results identified homework as a significant issue for many parents, although they did not necessarily agree on how 

much or what type of homework there should 

be. As a result, however, at the time of this 

study, the school was considering a new homework policy that might include, for example, 

ensuring that all teachers use what ADI has 

identified as a best practice approach to assigning homework (i.e., 10 minutes of homework in first grade, 20 minutes in second grade, 

30 minutes in third grade, and so on) and 

sending parents tips on how to help with 

homework. 

Because ADI employs an evaluator, the organization has the capacity to handle its survey 

analysis in-house. The Indiana PIRC does not 

have this same internal capacity, so it includes 

in its annual budget the funds to contract with 

an evaluator from a state university who analyzes the survey data and writes a report based 

on the findings. Committed to making findings accessible to those surveyed, including 

parents, the Indiana Partnerships Center has 

summarized survey findings into two pages of 

parent-friendly text with easy-to-read graphs 

and advice on next steps based on the findings. “We know from responses to our newsletter that people like things simple and they like 

information in graphs,” says the center director, 

adding, “Less is better.” In addition to preparing 

the written report, the evaluator consults with 

the PIRC about any implications for policy and 

practice, and the PIRC, in turn, incorporates this 

into its subsequent discussions with the client 

school or district. Once parents and educators 

realize that their voices have been heard and 

their input considered, they might be more willing to support any proposed changes in policy 

and practice. (See fig. 9, Indiana Partnerships 

Center: Example of Parent and Educator Survey 

Results Presentation, on p. 42.) 

The analysis of IPS’s 2005–06 survey identified 

“parents as decision-makers” as the area most 

in need of improvement across the schools surveyed. Based on this information, individual 

schools began considering how to get parents 

more involved in school decision-making; the 

district started reviewing its parent involvement 

policies and supports; and, for its part, the Indiana Partnerships Center undertook a review of 

its leadership training.
42

Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

Figure 9. Indiana Partnerships Center: Example of Parent and Educator Survey

Results Presentation
43

Training Parent Liaisons

A parent liaison is considered a critical player in the effort to generate greater and more 

positive connections between parents and their 

children’s school. In Title I schools across the 

country, such as those in IPS and in the state of 

Utah, there has been a movement to ensure that 

liaisons are in place to help facilitate parents’ 

involvement in the education of their children. 

Depending on where they work, a liaison’s duties might include (but not necessarily be limited to) any of the following: conducting home 

visits, staffing parent centers, distributing NCLB

information, administering surveys about the 

family friendliness of schools, informing parents about their children’s performance (both 

good and bad), providing training on parenting skills, and supplying information about 

how families can meet their basic needs (often liaisons distribute community resource lists 

identifying agencies that can help find housing, 

employment, etc.). The range of duties and importance of the role argue for comprehensive, 

ongoing training. 

Deliver a Broad Curriculum to Liaisons 

Liaison training is important for ensuring that liaisons are effective communicators with parents 

and have a clear understanding of the sometimes 

very technical information they need to communicate or about which they may be asked, such as 

matters related to school performance (e.g., how 

to interpret a school NCLB-required report card). 

In addition, training can help liaisons better define their role, can ensure greater consistency in 

the work of liaisons across schools, and can plant 

the seeds for an informal mutual-support network 

among liaisons within a district or region. 

In the 2005–06 school year, IPS contracted with 

the Indiana Partnerships Center to facilitate a series of full-day training sessions for the district’s 

new Title I parent liaisons. Held monthly, the 

sessions run in length from two to six hours, 

adding up to approximately 50 hours of training 

per year. In addition to the session on how to 

connect with hard-to-reach parents, mentioned 

in Part I (p. 26), topics include: creating familyfriendly environments in IPS schools, research 

frameworks on effective parent engagement, 

NCLB and Indiana’s Public Law 221, cultural 

competency, how parents can support math 

and reading achievement, and parents’ roles in 

school-based decision-making. 

The Utah Family Center also provides preparation and ongoing support for liaisons, through 

Tips for Assessing Local 

Needs Regarding ParentFriendly Nature of Schools

• Create and distribute surveys about a school’s 

relative family friendliness, to collect baseline 

data from parents and staff about what schools 

need to do to help parents get more involved in 

the education of their children.

• Recruit parent liaisons and community-based 

organizations to distribute the survey. 

• Enlist the help of a local university to analyze 

data results.

• Use survey results to inform organizational 

practices. 

• Distribute survey results to parents in clear language and format (e.g., using a short, concise 

summary with lots of graphics and color).
44

Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

quarterly training sessions on such topics as 

NCLB, cultural competency, conducting effective home visits, parents’ roles in children’s literacy development, as well as training to promote 

the National Network of Partnership Schools 

model, a school-based model that builds school 

community and promotes parent involvement 

(see above, “The National Network of Partnership Schools”). In addition to its standard liaison 

curriculum, the center provides ad hoc training 

as needed. For all training, liaisons travel to the 

PIRC’s main office in Salt Lake City and are reimbursed for lodging, food, and transportation. 

Through their trainings on cultural competency and literacy, among other things, Utah’s 

The National Network of Partnership Schools 

The National Network of Partnership Schools (NNPS), based at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Md., is a 

project of the university’s Center on School, Family, and Community Partnerships, directed by research scientist 

Joyce Epstein. Schools that belong to the network create an “action team for partnerships,” which includes but 

is not necessarily limited to parents, teachers, administrators, counselors, and students in the upper grades. The 

team then creates a one-year action plan, choosing activities that map to NNPS’s framework for six major types of 

involvement: parenting, communicating, volunteering, learning at home, decision-making, and collaborating in 

the community. NNPS staff have developed a one-day training workshop for schools wanting to take this approach. 

In addition to providing direct training workshops for schools, NNPS take a train-the-trainers approach to prepare 

PIRC staff, district staff, and others who, in turn, work directly with schools.

Members that join the network receive: the School, Family, and Community Partnerships: Your Handbook for 

Action,

11 which includes a framework of the program, tips and tools for implementing the model, and assessment 

tools, along with information for sustaining partnership efforts; an invitation for key action team members to attend 

workshops and conferences at NNPS’s Johns Hopkins headquarter; a semiannual newsletter designed to share 

examples of best practices, solutions to challenges, and guidelines for continuous progress in program development; an annual collection of promising practices; telephone, e-mail, and Web site assistance from NNPS staff; 

and additional tools and services.

As of September 2005, more than 1,000 schools, 130 local districts, and 16 state departments of education had 

joined the network, which supports district and state leaders in various ways, including hosting a spring workshop 

for representatives from new district and state members to prepare them to conduct training for schools’ action 

teams for partnerships and other presentations. Because the growing number of schools requesting to join NNPS 

exceeds its capacity to meet their training and support needs on its own, this train-the-trainers approach is essential, allowing districts and states to support their own school-level partnership efforts.

parent liaisons have become adept at identifying and responding to the needs of the families they serve. For example, recognizing that 

many parents, particularly new immigrants, 

are not literate themselves in English, liaisons 

have visited homes and modeled for parents 

a “book walk,” in which a parent talks to a 

child about the pictures in a book and, based 

on the pictures, helps the child consider what 

the story might be about. Because variations 

on this form of storytelling are used in many 

cultures, this liaison service helps bridge 

home and school culture and makes parents 

feel that they can participate in helping their 

children even if the parents do not read or 

speak English.
45

ADI’s PIRC has taken a different approach to 

the concept of parent liaisons. Working through 

ADI’s Solid Foundation program, the PIRC helps 

participating schools to identify parents, teachers, and other school staff members who then 

are recruited and receive specific training for particular roles related to building a cohesive school 

community. For example, some may serve on 

the school community council while others may 

facilitate various parent courses. Another role is 

that of a home visitor, someone who helps implement specific family outreach projects planned by 

the school community council. One such project 

was a literacy-building effort in which, over the 

course of the summer, home visitors called on 

all families of second-graders, giving them books 

for their children and helping parents understand 

how they could help their children with reading. Solid Foundation’s home-visitor preparation 

includes presenting procedures for a home visit, 

role-playing conversations in a home with parents, and distribution of multiple tools for conducting a successful visit (e.g., a script for scheduling a home visit, home-visit reminder, reporting form). Using a parent feedback form, ADI 

surveys parents about their experiences with a 

home visitor and uses the feedback to plan future 

visits and training. (See fig. 10, Academic Development Institute: Form for Parent Feedback on 

Home Visitors, below.)

Figure 10. Academic Development Institute: Form for Parent Feedback on

Home Visitors
46

Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

Use Parents as Liaisons to Serve Families 

Of Special Needs Children

Champions Together, a program that focuses on 

serving and engaging parents of special needs 

students, has been a collaborative effort of ADI’s 

PIRC and the Illinois Service Resource Center 

(ISRC), an Illinois State Board of Education technical assistance program funded with a grant 

under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). The program offers training, 

as requested, for parents of children with disabilities (and who receive special education services) who want to serve as family liaisons—often as paid part-time liaisons—for other parents 

at their school whose children receive special 

education services. According to the program’s 

brochure, the main purpose of having such a liaison is to “increase the comfort level of parents 

and establish positive relationships between 

parents and schools.” Although ISRC representatives were having ongoing conversations with 

representatives of schools and districts around 

the state about the need to have a paid position for a family liaison at every school, at the 

time of this study there was no funding to do 

so. Nonetheless, some 250 volunteers had gone 

through Champions Together’s liaison training 

over the past few years and were hard at work 

in their schools across the state.

In the two-day Champions Together training, 

new liaisons become knowledgeable about 

IDEA and the contents of the Illinois State Board 

of Education’s A Parents’ Guide: The Educational Rights of Students With Disabilities,12 and 

they learn how to work with parents of children 

with disabilities, including how to form parent 

support groups and teach parent courses. What, 

to some, may seem like a lot to cover over two 

days, actually may be less intimidating to the 

volunteers themselves. Many of them are parents of special education students or special education teachers who are already very familiar 

with much of the curriculum.

Create Mutual-support Cohorts

Generally speaking, parent liaisons come from 

a range of backgrounds. At one end of the 

spectrum are those who have been stay-athome parents and have never worked outside 

the home; at the other end are those who come 

to the liaison job with extensive training and 

experience in related work (e.g., social work). 

Once liaisons are on the job, their experiences 

can vary significantly, as well. To encourage 

mutual support and learning from each other, 

the Utah Family Center schedules a time for 

“sharing” whenever liaisons come together for 

training. During these sharing sessions, the liaisons have reported on what they have been 

doing at their schools, what has worked well, 

and what challenges they are facing. This session gives them an opportunity to collect ideas 

from others in the field, as well as to offer and 

receive advice from colleagues. One liaison interviewed for this study asserted that “sharing 

stories and networking is one of the best parts 

of the training.”

In its monthly training sessions for IPS liaisons, 

the Indiana Partnerships Center has encouraged those who have done home visits in the 

past to offer their advice about how to best 

ensure successful visits. Participants offered a 

variety of tips, for example, liaisons should be 

sure to at least taste any food offered by the 

families they visit because not to do so would 

be considered an affront in many homes. This 
47

kind of homegrown advice tends to be well 

received because, over the course of multiple 

training sessions, liaisons come to know and 

trust each other. 

Collaborate With Other Agencies for 

Training

As noted earlier, partnerships can expand a 

PIRC’s capacity to reach its goals. This is evident in the Champions Together program. In 

addition to profiting from their own collaboration, ADI and ISRC have sought, from the beginning, to engage parents and educators of 

special education children in every aspect of 

planning and developing the Champions Together program, seeing them, collectively, as a 

third partner. Focus groups consisting of parents, school administrators, school counselors, 

and special education experts informed the creation of the program at every step. The course 

curriculum used to support and educate parents 

about how to help their children with special 

needs at home and at school was written by 

directors of special education programs from 

throughout the state.

In Indiana, the IPS liaison training was planned 

and carried out through a collaboration comprising representatives of the Indiana Partnerships Center; of the community-based Bridges 

to Success program, which has worked since 

1991 to develop school-community partnerships within IPS; and of the district’s Title I office. This collaboration was created after the 

PIRC approached the Title I director and the 

IPS superintendent to ask if they needed help 

in designing and implementing a comprehensive training for the district’s new Title I parent liaisons. Although the Indiana Partnerships 

Center had the capacity to provide much of the 

needed training, staff realized that a partnership 

with Bridges to Success would both strengthen 

the connection to the district and expand the 

PIRC’s training capacity, allowing it to cover 

additional topics to which Bridges to Success 

brought expertise. Referring to how best to operate collaboratively, one Bridges to Success 

staff member says, “Early on, figure out who’s 

got the flour and who’s got the eggs—what is 

each group best at doing.” Representatives of 

the three partners met many times to work out 

goals, agendas, and formats of the training, and 

they plan to continue meeting regularly.

Training Parents for Leadership

Of the five PIRCs highlighted, three—the 

Indiana Partnerships Center, the Family 

Works, and IDRA’s PIRC—have implemented 

Tips for Training Parent 

Liaisons to Effectively Link 

Parents and Educators 

• Partner with district Title I offices to develop and 

facilitate liaison trainings.

• Deliver a broad curriculum that helps liaisons 

develop the technical, cultural, and social skills 

required for the position.

• Prepare liaisons to meet the specific needs of 

parents of children with disabilities.

• Create cohorts of liaisons to facilitate networking 

and mutual support among all liaisons.

• Collaborate with other organizations (e.g., community-based social service agencies) to train 

liaisons in additional areas of need.
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specific parent leadership training institutes. 

They have a common goal: Empower parents 

to lead other parents and educators in efforts 

to raise student achievement. 

What is a parent leader? Whether playing a supportive role in a school beautification project 

conceived and planned by another parent, attending a school governance meeting chaired by 

another parent, or tutoring in an after-school program organized by another parent, many school 

volunteers are following the lead of someone 

else. That someone else is a leader—that parent 

who is so adept at identifying school needs and 

figuring out what needs to be done and who is 

able to enlist, advocate for, and represent other 

parents on behalf of the school’s students.

Few parents are ready to become a leader without some encouragement and support, and 

even those who are can be more effective if 

they receive some training. In focus groups with 

parents who have gone through such training, 

the common message is that parents emerged 

feeling able to participate more fully in their 

schools, districts, state-level agencies, as well as 

in the individual education of their children. 

Identify and Adapt a Training Model

After deciding to incorporate parent leadership training into their services, the first thing 

that the Indiana Partnerships Center, the Family 

Works, and IDRA’s PIRC did was to look for a 

successful model from which to develop their 

own program. Although leadership training is 

a relatively new concept in the history of formal schooling, some organizations had been 

running trainings long enough to have built a 

positive reputation for success. The Commonwealth Institute for Parent Leadership (CIPL), 

which has been training over 200 Kentucky parent leaders a year since 1997, is one of those 

(see p. 49, “Commonwealth Institute for Parent 

Leadership”). Its “fellows” are expected to graduate from the program able to build partnerships 

with teachers and principals, persuade other 

parents to get involved in schools, implement 

strategies that will help all children reach higher 

levels of learning, and leverage outside funding 

to sustain their school improvement projects.

Each of the three PIRCs that have offered parent leadership training has adopted—and 

adapted—some aspects of the CIPL model, with 

all three covering essentially the same curriculum as CIPL. IDRA’s PIRC broadened the model 

to cover four different types of parent involvement, starting with parents as teachers of their 

own children, as illustrated in fig. 11, Intercultural Development Research Association: Parent Leadership Training Model, on p. 50.

At the heart of its model, and evident throughout its training, is IDRA’s recognition of parents’ 

invaluable contribution to their own children’s 

education and development, starting with parents’ efforts to help their children learn and 

grow at home. Trainers work with participants 

to analyze these efforts, to instill in parents a 

sense of pride that they are already major contributors to their children’s success, and to help 

parents overcome any feelings they may have 

about lacking relevant skills to help with their 

children’s education. Pushing into the second 

circle of the model (i.e., parents as resources to 

the school), IDRA’s PIRC trainers make every attempt to help parents understand how the skills 

they use in the home to teach their children and 

for other purposes can be applied at school.
49

Commonwealth Institute for Parent Leadership

To help parents become leaders, Kentucky’s Commonwealth Institute for Parent Leadership (CIPL) delivers three 

two-day sessions over the course of several months, with participants’ tuition, meals, and lodging all covered by 

CIPL. The training is carried out in all regions of the state, with parents participating in their home region. The 

main topics addressed in the sessions are parents’ rights to know about and gain access to school operations 

and data, key elements of the state’s education reform legislation and policy, where to go and whom to contact 

for information about educational and community resources, and specific ways to act as advocates for school 

reform. Staff from the Kentucky Department of Education are recruited to discuss the state’s standards-based education system, and representatives from education agencies and organizations in the given region are invited to 

participate in a roundtable discussion about utilizing community resources to enhance student achievement. CIPL 

prepares parents to be leaders by providing them with information and data on school performance (e.g., student 

test scores, graduation rates) and developing their partnering skills. 

A vital component of the training is a culminating project that program “fellows” are required to plan and implement and that utilizes skills and knowledge gained throughout the training. The parent must identify a student 

achievement-related priority need in a school or district, set a goal related to meeting the need, collect and analyze school data, design and implement an activity or strategy to meet the need, keep track of outcomes, and 

share the results with other CIPL fellows and the community at large. The project criteria stipulate that a project 

must focus on improving student achievement, involve other parents, and have a lasting impact on the school 

(not be just a one-time event). Fellows start designing their project early in the training and can take as long as 

two years to complete it, during which time they can draw on the support of CIPL, including a financial stipend 

and coaching. 

After analyzing achievement data at his son’s school and seeing that science scores had declined, one fellow 

decided to see what he could do to help improve them. He persuaded the school council to include a science lab 

in renovation plans, asked for a state audit of the school’s science curriculum, and sponsored a well-attended 

family science night. The following year, test results showed that science scores had risen 14 percentage points, 

a gain that the fellow attributed at least in part to the increased amount of attention focused on science, thanks 

to his efforts. 

In addition to carrying out school-based projects, many program fellows have gone on to play major policymaking roles in schools, districts, and at the state level, as members of:

School site councils – 650+; 

Local school boards – 34;

State parent advisory councils – 39;

Scholastic audit teams – 7;

State textbook selection committees – 8; and

School council boards of directors – 8.

Because over the years the organization received so many calls from other groups trying to design and implement 

leadership programs, it created the Center for Parent Leadership (CPL), which provides consulting services and 

training to organizations across the country that are trying to implement their own programs.
50

Engaging Parents in Education

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Figure 11. Intercultural Development Research Association: Parent Leadership

Training Model

The goal is to help parents see the variety of 

ways they can participate in the classroom and 

elsewhere at school. Pushing into the third circle 

(i.e., parents as decision-makers), PIRC trainers 

help parents understand and further develop 

good decision-making skills as related to education. Finally, pushing to the outermost circle, 

PIRC trainers help parents develop and hone the 

skills needed to work in groups, support one another, and act collectively, as well as to effectively 

impart to other parents the knowledge they have 

developed throughout their own earlier training.

All three of the PIRCs (i.e., Indiana Partnerships 

Center, Family Works, IDRA’s PIRC) that have 

adapted the CIPL model for their training also 

require that participants carry out a culminating 

project in their schools that gets other parents 

involved as well. These projects have ranged 

from efforts focused on getting more fathers involved in school to curriculum-oriented efforts, 

such as creating a children’s book club and 

establishing a student math competition called 

Mathletics. All three PIRCs have the leadership 

trainees start their projects toward the beginning 
51

of the training; PIRC staff members then help 

as needed throughout the ensuing months of 

training, assessing progress and needs at each 

training session. Recognizing that some projects 

require resources beyond the planners’ time 

and creativity, the Family Works’ training program has awarded participants a $500 stipend 

to help fund their projects. 

Although each of the training programs has offered multiple, recurring sessions over a period 

of months, the length of each session, their frequency, and the number of overall sessions has 

varied among programs, depending on the needs 

and desires of their constituents. For example, the 

Indiana Partnerships Center received feedback 

from participants saying they would like to cover 

the same material, but meet less often. So the 

center packed more content into each session, 

lengthening the time commitment for each meeting, but bringing participants together for only 

four overnights and three additional one-day sessions, instead of the original seven overnights.

Unlike the other two PIRCs, whose leadership 

training has been offered independent of any 

individual school or district, IDRA’s PIRC offers the training only when it is requested by a 

host organization (e.g., a district). It also tailors 

the length and frequency of the sessions to the 

needs and desires of whichever organization is 

hosting the event. For the most part, its curriculum is delivered in five to eight monthly sessions of about three hours each. 

IDRA’s PIRC is also the only PIRC that offers 

bilingual leadership training, as reflected in 

the name of its training program, the Bilingual 

Parent Leadership Academy. One IDRA trainer 

notes that many districts have requested separate leadership academies, one in English and 

one in Spanish, but IDRA has refused to make 

this split because, he says, “a mission of leadership training is to bring people together.” The 

Indiana Partnerships Center recently identified 

a need for parent leadership training in Spanish 

and, at the time of this study, was planning to 

pilot a Latino parent leadership academy. 

Recruit Participants Who Mirror Their 

Community

Because IDRA’s PIRC responds to district or 

other organizations’ requests for training and 

delivers it at their sites, the host organization 

(i.e., the requesting district) is responsible for 

recruiting participants. In contrast, the Indiana 

Partnerships Center has been recruiting its leadership trainees by using its own database of 

contacts and by reaching out to other community organizations and education agencies to ask 

for nominations. In choosing from among applicants it makes efforts to ensure a diverse pool 

of participants that mirrors their communities. 

Each potential Parent Leadership Institute participant submits an application that addresses 

the candidate’s participation in the school system. The applicant also must pledge to attend 

all training sessions and submit one personal 

reference. Unlike some of the other models, the 

Indiana Partnerships Center also requires that 

any school, district, or organization nominating 

an applicant send candidates in teams of at least 

two, which could be two parents or could be a 

parent and an educator. Parent candidates must 

have a child enrolled in an Indiana K–12 public 

(including charter) or private school. 

The Family Works also has had an extensive 

outreach campaign to attract leadership trainees 
52

Engaging Parents in Education

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In this same vein, IDRA’s PIRC offers additional 

leadership training to those who want to be able 

to train others. WOW! Workshops on Workshops 

(WOW) is a two-day training that provides future trainers with the skills to run their own effective, engaging workshops; it does so, in part, 

by reviewing recognized principles about how 

adults, in particular, tend to learn and by helping participants understand how to apply these 

principles in the context of designing innovative 

activities. In the 2005–06 school year, 132 parent leaders and educators participated in WOW 

training, and these participants, in turn, trained 

more than 3,960 parents on education issues. 

For its part, the Indiana Partnerships Center has 

responded to participant feedback by beginning to offer regionalized leadership training 

rather than basing all training in Indianapolis 

and infusing it with a statewide perspective. In 

the 2005–06 school year, it instituted a regional 

leadership academy for Monroe County, to the 

south of Indianapolis; and, at the time of this 

study, it was planning to pilot a Latino parent 

leadership academy in another region that has 

a greater concentration of Latino families than 

elsewhere in the state. According to a 2005 external evaluation,13 the regional model “was 

shown to be as effective in promoting [parents’] 

skill development, confidence in coordinating 

with schools, and involvement in projects”14 as 

the centralized model of training that has been 

used since the PIRC began offering parent leadership training in 2003. The evaluation report 

also notes that in comparison to the state model, 

the regionalized training was far more specific 

and targeted in developing school-based projects. Another benefit of the regional approach, 

the report notes, is its reduction of travel time 

and costs for trainees.

each year. Parents have been recruited through 

targeted mailing, using lists generated by the 

Maryland State Department of Education, Title 

I schools, the Maryland PTA, district family involvement offices, and other family support organizations. E-mail distribution lists and a network of program graduates serving as “ambassadors” also have been used. A Family Works staff 

person asserted that the PIRC has not looked 

to train established leaders, but, instead, has 

sought “traditionally not-involved or untapped 

parents who have capabilities.” Applicants have 

had to receive a sign-off from the principal of 

the school they represent to ensure that the parent and school were establishing a productive 

partnership. Selection has been made by a committee of stakeholders charged with developing 

a cohort that is balanced, both geographically 

and racially, and that spans K–12 education. 

Evaluate and Innovate to Improve

Although the Family Works has not allowed 

educators to participate in leadership training 

unless they do so as parents, IDRA’s PIRC has 

actually targeted educators as a way of having greater impact, a goal that emerged in the 

natural course of the organization’s self-reflection. PIRC trainers see the staff of a district’s 

Title I office as a natural audience for the training. If district-level staff are trained, such as 

district-level parent coordinators or liaisons, 

who are connected to the extended education 

community, there is a much better chance that 

the model will proliferate. As one trainer puts 

it, “We’re trying to work ourselves out of a job 

here by preparing them to train parent leaders, 

not us. The train-the-trainers model is always 

uppermost in our minds.”
53

Training Parents and Educators to 

Function in Teams

Efforts to form and train teams of parents and 

educators offer the most direct route to the ultimate goal of using such partnerships to increase 

student achievement. Several of the highlighted PIRCs have established programs to create 

and train these school-based teams to focus on 

parent involvement and student achievement. 

These teams either supplement the efforts of 

already established school-based teams (e.g., 

school improvement teams, school site councils) or, if no other teams exist, become the 

main vehicle for partnership at a school site. 

At the heart of the National Network of Partnership Schools (NNPS) model, which Maryland’s 

Family Works adopted as a core program to 

promote, is the school-based action team for 

partnerships, described earlier on p. 44. The 

team, which is intended to be an arm of a 

school site council or school improvement 

team, develops an annual action plan that reflects its family- and community-involvement 

goals for the year and that ties directly to the 

school improvement plan and the parent involvement policy. School teams are supposed 

to meet at least once a month. 

In early 2000, the Family Works was focusing on 

the topics of early childhood education, parent 

leadership, and communication when its director realized that the parent-school partnership 

piece seemed a logical extension of these foci. 

She contacted NNPS to seek training for her 

staff in program implementation and in preparation to serve as NNPS trainers themselves for 

participating Maryland schools. Thereafter, the 

Tips for Training Parents for 

Education Leadership 

• Identify and adapt current successful models of 

parent leadership training to meet your needs.

• Enlist the help of community-based organizations, alumni of past training, and education 

agencies to recruit diverse participants that mirror 

the community. 

• To build capacity and reach, take a train-thetrainers approach (e.g., train district staff who, in 

turn, train school staff).

• Evaluate and innovate a training program to 

meet the needs of targeted constituents regarding 

such matters as location, time requirements, and 

informational needs.

Family Works staff began offering NNPS’s oneday professional development workshops at 

which school representatives learn how to:

• Establish an action team for partnership;

• Write an annual action plan for partnerships 

linked to their school improvement plan;

• Use NNPS’s framework (i.e., six types of involvement, located on p. 44) to include activities that will engage all families in many 

different ways, all linked to school improvement goals; and

• Evaluate and then work to improve the partnership program each year.15

To entice schools and districts to join the partnership, the Family Works began to cover their 

initial fees for joining NNPS, provide training 

sessions for interested district staff, pay for two 

substitute teachers per school for teachers on 

the action team to attend training, and convene 

periodic meetings with district NNPS members 
across the state to share ideas and sustain progress. The Utah Family Center, while not quite 

so far along in its implementation, has begun 

working with some schools across the state to 

promote the NNPS model, and it also infuses 

the NNPS philosophy into many of its own materials and trainings.

Pursuing goals similar to those of NNPS, ADI 

developed its Solid Foundation program to 

generate and support more effective parent 

involvement, particularly in communities with 

high poverty and children living in risky environments. ADI considers the Solid Foundation 

less as a program and more as a “blueprint,” a 

highly flexible model for building school communities with components that can be tailored 

to support the unique needs and goals of any 

school or district while respecting the context 

of the lives of the parents, students, and educators who live there. As with the NNPS model, 

a major piece of the Solid Foundation model 

is the creation of a school community council 

that will guide school efforts to involve parents 

in meaningful ways in everything from helping 

their children at home to decision-making at 

the school policy level. The council also makes 

recommendations for strengthening the school 

improvement plan’s emphasis on school-family 

connections. Additionally, for schools that do 

not already have a school-parent compact in 

place, the council develops one, detailing some 

of the basic responsibilities of parents, teachers, 

and students for achieving the school community’s learning goals. 

Once a school decides to implement the Solid 

Foundation model, ADI’s PIRC staff work with 

the principal to identify 1) a teacher or other 

education professional at the school to serve as 

a facilitator for parent education activities and 

2) a group of parent leaders to coordinate 

parent-involvement efforts in the school. This 

group forms the nucleus of the school community council, and these members will recommend and recruit other parents, educators, 

and community members to fill key roles and 

positions and carry out essential communitybuilding activities as specified in Solid Foundation’s materials. These activities include, for 

example, providing school-home communication tools for teachers and holding workshops 

for teachers and parents on how to work together to support student success.

Solid Foundation staff work with individual 

schools for two years. Their goal is to train 

and support school leaders well enough so the 

school community council will be able to sustain itself and grow on its own once Solid Foundation staff move to the next school.

Tips for Training Parents and 

Educators to Team Up for 

School Achievement

• Look for existing programs that facilitate partnerships and enlist program representatives’ help or 

adapt their measures.

• Make sure teams are developing policy and practice that supplement and integrate with existing 

school policy and practice.

• Train other trainers to help ensure that team efforts 

are sustainable. 

• Use those closest to the community to identify potential team members. 

54

Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 
Ensuring success for all students is a monumentally important task that requires the cooperation of those with the greatest influence in children’s lives—parents and teachers. Taken as a 

whole, the strategies presented in this guide are 

aimed at generating that cooperation on behalf 

of higher student achievement.

Given their differing constituents, locations, 

resources, and staff expertise, the highlighted 

PIRCs operate in different manners. Not all of 

them use all of the same strategies. Nor do they 

all implement the same strategies in the same 

way. Nonetheless, there are enough general 

patterns and similarities to validate the promising nature of these approaches and to underscore the importance of the following suggestions, in particular:

• Assess the needs of your constituents. This 

means understanding the range of communication and training needs of parents in the 

schools and districts being served, as well as 

understanding how different education agencies need to evolve if they are effectively to 

include parents as partners.

• Be creative in efforts to engage all parents, 

including those who are considered hard-toreach because, for example, they live in remote areas, do not speak English, are homeless, or have developed a mistrust of schools 

due to their own education experience.

• Prepare parents and educators alike for partnership by ensuring that both parties are 

familiar with NCLB parent involvement requirements, understand why these requirements are important, and are adequately 

trained to work together.

• Build greater organizational capacity and avoid 

duplicative or conflicting efforts by promoting 

networks and other cross-collaboration efforts 

among multiple organizations that have similar goals, including parent involvement organizations, education agencies, and a range of 

community-based organizations. 

Through these efforts, PIRCs and other parent 

involvement organizations can seed and nurture 

strong parent-educator partnerships, helping to 

ensure that parents and educators alike understand parents’ essential role in their children’s 

education and are prepared to work together to 

achieve greater student success.

Conclusion

55
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57

A P P E N D I X A

Research

Methodology

The research approach for this guide is a 

combination of case study methodology and 

benchmarking of “best practices.” Used in 

businesses worldwide as they seek to continuously improve their operations, benchmarking has more recently been applied to 

education. Benchmarking is a structured, efficient process that targets key operations and 

identifies promising practices in relationship 

to traditional practice, previous practice at 

the selected sites (lessons learned), and local outcome data. The methodology is further 

explained in a background document,16 which 

lays out the justification for identifying promising practices based on four sources of rigor 

in the approach: 

• theory and research base; 

• expert review; 

• site evidence of effectiveness; and 

• systematic field research and cross-site 

analysis.

The steps of the research process were: defining a study scope, seeking input from experts 

to refine the scope and inform site selection 

criteria, screening potential sites, selecting sites 

to study, conducting site visits, collecting and 

analyzing data to write case reports, and writing 

a user-friendly guide. 

Site Selection Process

The first step in site selection was to compile 

a list of candidate organizations into a matrix. 

The initial list of 43 sites included a mix of 

Parental Information and Resource Centers 

(PIRCs), other intermediary organizations, and 

SEAs and LEAs. This list was compiled through 

research findings and recommendations from 

members of an advisory panel, other experts 

in the field, staff from the U.S. Department of 

Education, and education agencies implementing parental involvement programs. A variety 

of organizations, locations, and distribution 

models were identified.

The parental involvement model that was developed to frame the guide was used to create 

a screening matrix for site selection. For the organizations identified as potential candidates, 

their strong parent involvement practices were 

mapped against the various elements of the 

model. Supplementary questions based on the 

specific relevant subcategory were asked of each 

organization and ratings based on their responses were entered in the screening matrix. (See the 

next section for more detail on criteria.) 

Site selection was based on the total score in 

the screening matrix and also on geographic 

considerations. The set of sites was chosen to 
58

Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 

include different states, target audiences, and 

distribution models. In addition, a “cluster” approach was used, with priority given to candidates that worked successfully with other intermediary organizations and education agencies 

so that a more complete partnership story and 

a broader range of practices could be gathered during a single site visit. These partner 

organizations and agencies also had to stand up 

as exemplary organizations that could be featured in the guide as well. 

Screening Criteria

The rubric used to select the sites included 

two organizational factors: mission and stable 

structure. In addition, it included four practice 

dimensions: number of subcategories from the 

parent involvement model that the organization addressed; populations targeted; partnerships with education agencies; and evidence of 

growth over time. These four practice dimensions are summarized below. 

Subcategories of Parent Involvement Model 

Addressed 

The parent involvement model that was developed through consultation with experts and 

practitioners in the field includes a range of 

strategies to inform parents and educators on 

their rights and responsibilities regarding parent 

involvement, to train parents to become leaders 

and work in partnership with educators, and to 

support parents and educators in partnership at 

the decision-making level. Organizations were 

scored on the number of strategies that they implemented on the various levels of the model.

Populations Targeted

Those organizations that reached as broad a spectrum of parents as possible in their communities 

were scored higher on the rubric. For example, 

although it is a mandate that all PIRCs target at 

least 50 percent of their services to low-income 

families, many of the PIRCs went above and beyond this mandate to try to engage hard-to-reach 

populations, such as low-income Native American 

families on reservations and migrant families.

Partnerships with Education Agencies 

Criterion

Organizations were asked if and how they 

partnered with education agencies to improve 

schools and raise student achievement. Those 

candidates that had successful, sustained, and 

varied partnerships established with agencies 

were scored highly on the rubric.

Evidence of Growth Criterion

Researchers looked for evidence that organizations had attempted a range of strategies to support schools and raise student achievement and 

that, over the years, these strategies had developed or been replaced with more effective ones. 

Type and frequency of reflection was gauged, 

as well as the documentation of changes that 

led to more efficient and effective practice.

Study Framework and 

Data Collection

A conceptual framework (i.e., the parent involvement model in fig.2 on page 10) was developed to guide the study of the selected sites. 

While each organization i­ncluded in the guide 
59

practices a range of strategies to support parent involvement, each case study needed to 

focus on those practices supporting the end 

goal of helping parents and educators work as 

partners to improve student achievement. The 

framework used in this study was developed 

based on the research literature on parent leadership and the benefits of parent involvement. 

The major categories in the framework include 

strategies for communicating the rights and responsibilities of parents and educators regarding parent involvement, for training parents and 

educators to work in partnership, and for supporting these partnerships at the decision-making level. Input from researchers on the project’s 

advisory panel and from practitioners in the field 

informed the development of this model. 

A two-day site visit was conducted at each PIRC 

to gather the information for this guide. Each 

visit included informal observations throughout 

the organization, attendance at events, school 

visits, and interviews. The primary source of data 

were interviews with a variety of role groups, 

including parents, staff members, administrators, and members of partner organizations. An 

interview protocol was developed based on the 

study framework and was adapted to each role 

group. That is, separate but overlapping sets of 

questions were developed for parents, administrators, staff, and others. Most interviews were 

tape-recorded, with key interviews later transcribed for more detailed analysis.

Documents from each organization served as 

an additional source of information. Collected 

during the site visit, these artifacts included 

such items as training manuals, NCLB guides, 

letters to parents, newsletters, training materials, brochures, and surveys. 

Analysis and Reporting

A case report was written about each site and 

reviewed by site directors for accuracy. From 

these case reports, artifacts, and transcripts of 

interviews, the project team analyzed similarities and differences in strategy implementation 

across the sites. This cross-site analysis, along 

with site detail, contributed to the final guide.

This descriptive research process suggests 

promising practices—ways to do things that 

other parent involvement practitioners have 

found helpful, lessons they have learned—and 

practical “how-to” guidance. This is not the 

kind of experimental research that can yield 

valid causal claims about what works. Readers should judge for themselves the merits of 

these practices, based on their understanding 

of why they should work, how they fit the local 

context, and what happens when they actually 

try them. Also, readers should understand that 

these descriptions do not constitute an endorsement of specific practices or products.

Using the Guide

Ultimately, readers of this guide will need to 

select, adapt, and implement practices that 

meet their individual needs and contexts. Organizations supporting and promoting parent 

involvement may continue the study, using 

the ideas and practices from these sites as a 

springboard for their own action research. In 

this way, a collection of promising practices 

will grow, and organizations and agencies promoting parent involvement can support each 

other in implementation and learning.
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Engaging Parents in Education

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61

A P P E N D I X B

Resources

BuildingChoice.org

BuildingChoice.org, a Web site funded by the 

U.S. Department of Education, provides tools 

and resources for educators who are working to 

expand choice options for families. The Web site 

includes many examples of how districts across 

the country are communicating choice options 

to parents and working to involve parents in 

their schools, along with sample materials from 

these districts and tools that have been developed to help facilitate parent involvement.

http://www.buildingchoice.org

Harvard Family Research Project

Housed in the Harvard Graduate School of 

Education, the Harvard Family Research Project (HFRP) assists policymakers, practitioners, 

and philanthropic organizations in developing strategies to support more effective educational programs, practices, and policies for 

all children, especially those who are disadvantaged due to poverty and other challenging 

circumstances. In addition to featuring relevant 

research and information that the project has 

collected, analyzed, and synthesized, the organization’s Web site also includes a link for 

joining the Family Involvement Network of 

Educators (FINE), its national network of over 

5,000 people who are interested in promoting partnerships between children’s families, 

educators, and their communities. 

http://www.gse.harvard.edu/hfrp/index.html

KSA-Plus Communications

The KSA-Plus Communications Web site offers training opportunities and a range of other 

services to help parents gain the skills, knowledge, and confidence to become advocates for 

better schools for their children. KSA also runs 

workshops and provides consulting services, 

and provides materials to help administrators 

and teachers better understand how they can 

tap into the underutilized resources that parents 

and families offer and can better meet the increasingly diverse needs of families.

http://www.ksaplus.com

National Network of Partnership Schools

The National Network of Partnership Schools 

(NNPS), at Johns Hopkins University, is an organization that helps to build parent involvement, 

family engagement, and community partnerships 

for elementary, middle, and high schools across 

the country by providing tools, guidelines, and 

a model for developing a school-based action 

team. Among the many resources offered on the 

Web site are information on how to join NNPS, 

research publications and products that support 

implementation of the NNPS model, training opportunities for school- , district- , and state-level 

participants, and myriad success stories from 

those who have used the model.

http://www.partnershipschools.org
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The Parent Teacher Association

The Parent Teacher Association (PTA) is a national organization with state and local offices 

around the country. Its national Web site offers a 

range of resources, including parent resources, 

relevant current event articles and stories, and 

information about training opportunities. It also 

provides a tool to help visitors find their local 

PTA. PTAs provide a forum at which parents, 

administrators, teachers, and other concerned 

adults discuss how to promote quality education and how to encourage community involvement in order to create a healthy environment 

and safe neighborhoods for all children.

http://www.pta.org

Parents for Public Schools

Parents for Public Schools is a national organization with community-based chapters working in public schools to improve education. The 

Web site offers links to all of the local chapters, which offer a range of services, such as 

trainings, outreach events, and information on 

school enrollment. The Web sites for both the 

national organization and local chapters also 

include links to a range of other organizations 

that provide resources for advocacy, training, 

and many other types of assistance.

http://www.parents4publicschools.com

The Prichard Committee for Academic Excellence

The Prichard Committee for Academic Excellence is a nonprofit education advocacy organization serving the state of Kentucky. Among 

its key initiatives is the Commonwealth Institute 

for Parent Leadership, which trains Kentuckians 

to become advocates in their children’s education. In response to requests for assistance from 

outside of Kentucky, in 2001, the Prichard Committee also initiated the Center for Parent Leadership to offer similar parent support and training in other states. The Prichard Committee and 

its multiple initiatives offer training, consulting 

services, and publications to support parents as 

education advocates.

http://www.prichardcommittee.org

The Right Question Project

The Right Question Project offers ideas and services intended to equip low- and moderate-income families and their communities with the 

skills to participate at all levels of democracy. 

The organization’s Web site provides materials 

and publications, information on training sessions and consulting services, and stories of 

how other organizations and participants have 

used the organization’s services.

http://www.rightquestion.org
63

The Southwest Educational 

Development Laboratory

The Southwest Educational Development Laboratory (SEDL) is a nonprofit education research, 

development, and dissemination corporation 

that works with professionals in schools, districts, states, and service agencies to improve 

education for all students. Its Web site provides 

a PDF version of A New Wave of Evidence: 

The Impact of School, Family, and Community 

Connections on Student Achievement (2002), 

a synthesis of 51 studies about the impact of 

family and community involvement on student 

achievement and effective strategies to connect 

schools, families, and community. SEDL, in collaboration with the Harvard Family Research 

Project, is now providing technical assistance to 

the PIRCs through a 2006 award from the U.S. 

Department of Education.

http://www.sedl.org/welcome.html

U.S. Department of Education

Parental Information and Resource Centers

The U.S. Department of Education’s Web site 

provides a Parental Information and Resources 

Center section that includes a description of the 

program and links to additional information, 

including lists of current and former awardees 

and information on the grant process.

http://www.ed.gov/programs/pirc/index.html

In addition, the home page of the Department 

Web site includes on its main navigation bar a 

parent link that serves as a portal to a section 

created exclusively for parents. Here parents and 

guardians can find information about how NCLB

affects them and their children, how to help their 

children succeed in school, how to help their children learn to read, and other education issues.

http://www.ed.gov
64

Engaging Parents in Education

Innovat ions i n Edu cat ion 
65

Notes

1

 Henderson, A. and Mapp, K. 2002. A New Wave 

of Evidence: The Impact of School, Parent and 

Community Connections on Student Achievement,

p. 7. Austin, Tex.: Southwest Educational Development Laboratory. 

2

 Ibid., p. 7. 

3 Parental Involvement: Title I, Part A, Non-Regulatory Guidance, April 23, 2004, p. 3.

4

 Available at http://www.marylandpublicschools

.org/MSDE/programs/familylit/mpac. Last accessed 

on June 8, 2007.

5 The funds are intended to target three overarching categories of parent involvement: advocacy 

and decision-making (including school improvement planning and creation of a required parent 

involvement plan); communicating information 

and exercising options (including providing a 

school report card, informing parents about school 

improvement and choice options, and assisting 

parents in exercising their options); and partnering with schools to improve student achievement 

(e.g., creating a school-parent compact). 

6

 When a school has been identified as being in 

need of improvement, its district must offer students at the school an opportunity to choose and 

transfer to another school in the district that is not 

in need of improvement.

7

 If a school remains in need of improvement for 

a second year, it must offer students from low-income families access to federally approved “supplemental educational services,” including tutoring and other academic supports, that will be paid 

for by the local district.

8

 McDermott, P., and Rothenberg, J. 2000, October. Why urban parents resist involvement in their 

children’s elementary education. The Qualitative 

Report, 5(3 & 4).

9

 Academic Development Institute. 2004. A Parent 

Guide to No Child Left Behind. Lincoln, Ill.: 

Author.

10 The Indiana Center for Family, School and 

Community Partnerships. (n.d.) A Parent’s Guide 

to Understanding NCLB & P.L. 221. Indianapolis: 

Author. Available at http://www.fscp.org/index

.asp?p=9. (Click on link for No Child Left Behind

and choose A Parent’s Guide pdf.) Last accessed 

on June 9, 2007.

11 Epstein, J. L., Sanders, M. G., Simon, B. S., 

­Salinas, K. C., Rodriguez Jansorn, N. R., and Van 

Voorhis, F. L. 2002. School, Family, and Community Partnerships: Your Handbook for Action (2nd 

ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.

12 Illinois State Board of Education. 2001. A Parent’s Guide: The Educational Rights of Students 

with Disabilities. Springfield, Ill.: Author. Available 

at http://www.cusd220.org/special/docs/­parent_

guide_english%5B1%5D.pdf. Last accessed on 

June 8, 2007.

13 Cassidy, J. C. 2005. Evaluation of the Indiana 

Center for Family, School, and Community Partnerships’ Parent Information Resource Center 

Programs. Ball State University. Unpublished 

evaluation.

14 Ibid., p. 16.

15 Epstein et al., op. cit.

16 Filby, N. 2006. Approach to Methodological 

Rigor in the Innovation Guides. Working paper. 

San Francisco: WestEd.


The Department of Education’s mission is to promote student achievement

and preparation for global competitiveness by fostering educational

excellence and ensuring equal access.

www.ed.gov