Attendance or Collaboration? Contextual Differences in Teacher Perceptions of Engagement of Immigrant and Refugee Families

• In Event: Marriott Roundtable Session 31
  In Roundtable Session: Views and Practices of Monolingual and Bilingual Teachers: Implications for Scholars and Educators

Abstract

There is a growing need for schools to examine the best ways of working with immigrant and refugee families, as it is ever more likely that all teachers will work with newcomers and their children during their career. However, educators frequently view newcomers as lacking interest or abilities in developing school-family partnerships and it is not clear from the literature how such perceptions might vary across contexts. This paper explores educators’ perceptions of family school engagement across four distinct school districts involved in a professional development project. While all educators were willing to reflect on their immigrant/refugee parent engagement beliefs, teachers in the smaller school districts were willing to actively collaborate with parents to create family engagement events.

Authors

• Lyndsie Marie Schultz, Washington University in St. Louis

• Lisa M. Dorner, University of Missouri - Columbia

• Edwin Nii Bonney, Radford University