Micropolitics of Parent Engagement in an Urban Community School: Examining the Intersections of School Reform, Anti-Immigration Policies, and Latina/o Parent Organizing

• In Event: 60.072 - Toward Ethnoracial, Linguistic, and Geopolitical Justice: Heritage Communities, Cultural Politics, and Community-Engaged Research

Abstract

This article presents results from community engaged research conducted with Latin@ immigrant parents advocating for their students and themselves in and around a school engaged in multiple reforms, in an urban setting characterized as well by anti-immigrant policies and sentiments. The authors analyze the intersection of organizational reform narratives with the organizing narrative(s) of the parent group, examining the intersections, dissonances and their micro-political implications for authentic parent engagement. This analysis reveals the ways in which the intersections of reform practices and local anti-immigration measures, which are disarticulated by school administrators, produce missed opportunities to authentically engage these parents. The authors also highlight how parents navigate these intersections to continue to legitimize their presence within the schooling space, politically, symbolically and physically.

Authors

• Erica Fernández, University of Connecticut

• Samantha Paredes Scribner, Indiana University - Indianapolis