Preservice educators' attitudes and beliefs towards families can have a profound impact on family-centered practices (FCPs) and family-professional partnerships (FPPs); unfortunately, negative beliefs about families can surface during preservice early childhood preparation and can be a challenge for faculty in higher education to address. This…

Much has been written regarding student and educator expression in school; however, until recently, family expression seemed to be overlooked in debates on speech and education. Though discussion among education practitioners and researchers on family-school partnerships has continued for over thirty years, thoughtful analysis of interactions…

This Dissertation in Practice explored the impact of an individualized meeting with family members of low-income students on the family member sense of connection to the university and knowledge of campus resources. Parents and family members play an important role in higher education as influencers, stakeholders, fundraisers, bill payers, and…

While research demonstrates that family support is essential for doctoral students, research detailing institutional efforts to involve families is limited. We developed the GAIN Scholars program, consisting of two 3-week-long boot camps for incoming first-generation and historically marginalized doctoral students. Quantitative data were collected…

Framed by family engagement frameworks, this study presents four types of interactions college access professionals (CAPs) have with the families of underrepresented college-going students - inconsistent communication, transactional exchanges, student-family mediation, and trusting relationships - to explore the nature of family-educator…

When teachers develop strong and effective partnerships with families, children experience significant benefits (see for example, Anthony, Williams, Zhang, Landry, & Dunkelberger, 2014; Fan & Chen, 2001; Henderson & Mapp, 2002; Jeynes, 2007; Weiss, Lopez, & Rosenberg, 2010). However, collaborating with families remains an area in…

This study described the lived experiences of fifteen African American male college students and their perception of their high school academics. The purpose of this qualitative study was to describe the lived experiences of African American male college students on the factors promoting and inhibiting their academic achievement. In addition, this…

Family engagement is critical to student achievement, and the essential importance of family-school partnerships has become even more evident during the current sociohistorical context inclusive of the COVID-19 pandemic and the Black Lives Matter movement. As such, it is imperative that pre-service teachers (PSTs) are equipped to build effective…

Families are now an undeniable part of prospective students' college search process. As American higher education stands at the precipice of profound demographic shifts, colleges and universities must reexamine how they engage not just prospective students, but their families as well. In collaboration with Ardeo and CampusESP, RNL collected and…

This case study explores the role of adult siblings in bridging and brokering cultural and linguistic gaps in special education on behalf of their sibling with a disability. Focusing on the Le family, the study explores how Eunice Le, an adult sibling, is navigating communication between their Vietnamese-speaking family and the school, and…

"Parent involvement", valued by the field of early childhood education, is shown to contribute to the growth and development of children. However, what has in fact, been "valued" are engagement practices based on normalized white middle class cultural patterns. The current understandings of and expectations for "parent…

Countless articles in the news, combined with colorful anecdotes from faculty and staff, share common complaints about helicopters, lawnmowers, bulldozers, and snowplows--not transportation options on campus but rather parents of college students who stay actively involved in their students' lives. Honors faculty and administrators are tempted to…

Strong family involvement in children's education supports positive academic and social-emotional outcomes. Therefore, developing early childhood (EC) professionals' competence in engaging and involving families in their children's education is emphasized across state licensure requirements, personnel preparation standards, and professional…

This study describes how culturally relevant pedagogy in a project-based science class improved student engagement and comprehension. We focus on bicultural students exploring cultural objects and household inventions with family members and connecting scientific concepts to their families' funds of knowledge. We use a multiple-case study design…

This article discusses the contributions of the international studies in this special issue and presents a few emerging topics on school, family, and community partnerships. The studies in Part I confirm that, across countries, future teachers are inadequately prepared to conduct effective partnership programmes with all students' families. Part…