Harvard Family Research Project (HFRP) and the National Parent-Teacher Association (PTA) have teamed up to bring you a ground-breaking policy brief that examines the role of school districts in promoting family engagement. "Seeing is Believing: Promising Practices for How School Districts Promote Family Engagement" spotlights how six…

Just a few years ago, Boston's Clarence Edwards Middle School was on the verge of being shut down. By 2009, a renaissance at the Edwards made it one of the highest performing and most desired middle schools in Boston, dramatically narrowing and even eliminating academic achievement gaps while delivering a far more well-rounded education to its…

Family Partnerships for Achievement is not a course typical of most master's programs in education. The course was designed with one overriding goal: to prepare teachers to be effective in the Boston Public Schools (BPS). This goal drives every aspect of the Boston Teacher Residency (BTR), a district-based program for teacher training and…

Although the relationship between varying levels of acculturation and depressive symptoms has been established among Latino(a) youth, the positive role of family involvement in relation to depressive symptoms among immigrant Latino(a) families has been studied less. This study draws on a sample of first-generation Latino(a) youth from the…

Support for publicly funded pre-kindergarten has increased tremendously in recent years as parents, educators and policy makers have come to recognize the many benefits of high-quality early education. As of 2008, 38 states and the District of Columbia invest in pre-k programs, and many school districts are doing so on their own with local and…

Community schools are organized around two common goals: helping students learn and succeed and strengthening families and communities. Full-service community schools extend these guiding principles. They are centers of their communities, providing high-quality after-school opportunities, comprehensive early childhood education, real-world…

The involvement of the Dunham family and their physically disabled son with the Family Challenge Program (Westfield, Massachusetts) is outlined with particular attention to how the family relationships (especially between father and son) have grown closer through improved communication, cooperation, and trust, thereby creating a partnership. (JMM)

This paper describes development of a study that includes participatory action research, specifically the establishment of a family advisory committee. The study involved a survey of Massachusetts families of children with disabilities. Suggestions for establishing and integrating the committee into the research enterprise are offered, as are…

The Boston Public Schools (BPS) Department of Early Childhood commissioned a needs assessment of current kindergarten (K2) and preschool (K1) programs (1) to inform the BPS Department of Early Childhood about professional development needs to improve the quality of existing K1 and K2 programs; and (2) to inform the Department of additional…

This document reports on a mini-summit meeting on family involvement in education that was held at the Education Center of the Massachusetts Elementary School Principals' Association. The one-day working conference brought together 95 leaders from K-12 schools, higher education and research institutions, parent involvement advocacy groups, and the…

Children benefit when their parents or caregivers are actively involved in their out-of-school learning. Yet a new report by the Harvard Family Research Project and United Way of Massachusetts Bay finds that only a quarter of programs surveyed had effectively incorporated families. This guide, funded by the Wallace Foundation under its Parents and…

Rates of childhood overweight have reached epidemic proportions (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2001), and schools have been called on to play a role in the prevention of this medical condition. This article describes a multiyear health promotion effort--the Athletes in Service fruit and vegetable (F&V) promotion program--which…

This publication provides a sample of activities taking place in schools. It is intended to offer ideas and provide contact information, so that others working to expand and improve family and community involvement in schools can benefit from shared experience. School districts and schools have implemented additional practices and policies to…

The development of community-based alternatives to institutional care for juvenile offenders should be based on (1) a clear conceptualization of what "community-based" means, (2) intervention efforts that consider the context of the clients' social relationship networks; and (3) resolution of professional and territorial conflicts.…

This double issue of "The Evaluation Exchange" focuses on one of the central components of complementary learning: family involvement. As outlined in the Theory & Practice article, investments in family involvement are important across ages and settings and through the co-constructed efforts and shared responsibilities of many…