Читать книгу Five Practices for Equity-Focused School Leadership - Sharon I. Radd - Страница 24

This is another story educators across the nation tell, regardless of context. Many educators believe that successful students, even those who "beat the odds," do so because of their parents' care and support. However, when educators think that way, they simultaneously believe that if students struggle and are not successful, it is because their parents don't care or aren't capable.

Bay Creek is a high-performing urban school where 30 percent of students receive free or reduced-price lunch. The school's sizable upper-middle-class population is enhanced by increasing numbers of students learning English and increasing racial diversity across all socioeconomic strata. Still, the PTO was small, made up entirely of White middle-class parents, and quite influential in school operations. Although Bay Creek was a lovely school in many ways, both staff and active White parents would lament that "the parents don't care" when talking about families living in poverty, families of color, and families learning English. Some staff who were striving to be more empathetic said things like, "Their parents just can't help them—they're working three jobs and don't have the time" or "They don't speak English."

As part of a school improvement effort around inclusive services, Principal Meg and a few staff started ethnically specific Parent Coalitions (PCs) to facilitate communication and enhance relationships with families. These PCs were for parents who, or had students who, identified as Latino/a/x, Hmong, or African American. The Latino/a/x and Hmong group meetings were held in the families' home languages and translated for the principal and other staff.

A number of the active upper-middle-class White families were very upset by this effort. They felt excluded, arguing that these distinct groups violated the school's diversity values. Although she was bothered by this resistance, Principal Meg and her staff expressed that the PCs were an important step toward equity; parents and students with marginalized identities also deserve a place where they are centered, and further, different people need different things. While this was controversial to some of the White families, the PCs were an example of differentiated resources as a core equity principle.

In the years that followed, the PCs engaged hundreds of parents who had not previously been actively connected to Bay Creek School. After three to four years, the previously all-White PTO became multiracial, and two parents active in the PCs—an African American parent and a Hmong parent—ran for and were elected to the citywide school board. In addition, everyone in the school began to recognize and value the myriad ways that families show they care about and value a child's education.

We encourage you to recognize how easy it is to rely on deficit-oriented views that suggest that the problems with student learning are problems from outside of school. Remember, it takes leadership, reflection, and action to nurture new spaces for caring and learning. Bay Creek's story shows what is possible when you reject deficit views of parents and instead engage with them in open-minded, respectful, and authentic ways.