Relationships Among Families and Teachers: Implementation Tool for Enhancing Family-Professional Partnerships

• In Event: AERA Poster Session 13
  In Poster Session: Family-School-Community Partnerships Poster Session

Abstract

A vast achievement gap exists in our education system, and refugee children, especially children who have informal educational experiences are often far behind their peers. Families whose children are significantly behind in school may not be aware of their ability to partner with teachers to help their child succeed in school. The yearlong community-based participatory research study describes an implementation tool aimed at enhancing communication norms between refugee families and schools. The collaboratively designed tool was used during family and school implementation meetings called Relationships Among Families and Teachers (RAFT). The implementations involved families, teachers, and multilingual liaisons learning about each other, including how values inherent to the U.S. educational system and processes may conflict with family expectations and experiences

Authors

• Cynthia C. Reyes, The University of Vermont

• Shana J Haines, The University of Vermont