Woodland project engages and empowers parents
by Lamar Heystek
Coordinator, Woodland Coalition for Youth
The Woodland Coalition for Youth implemented a $15,000 REACH parent engagement grant last year by training parents to influence the local public school system from within.
Josie Enriquez, a parent of a Woodland Youth Council member, was hired as a part-time parent engagement organizer to develop and strengthen a core leadership team of parents. The team then engaged a larger community of parents from 10 public schools in Woodland and nurtured its vision for maximum parental involvement in their children’s education.
“Josie brought to the work her commitment to encouraging parents to apply their talents and skills, and this was a key asset of the project,” stated a report of the Bay Area Parent Leadership Action Network (PLAN), which provided technical assistance to the Woodland Parents in Action project.
The leadership team started with five to six parents. That number quickly doubled in subsequent meetings, which took place every other week at the Yolo Family Resource Center. The core team outreached to other groups of parents meeting at the YFRC and their children’s schools. At the end, the leadership team grew to 10 parents.
“Showing up at these meetings after their working hours was a clear sign of parents’ commitment to carrying out their outlined goals” for the Parents in Action project, PLAN’s report stated.
The leadership team decided to hold a forum for parents in 10 different schools to convey information about the importance of participating in the governance of public schools, specifically English Learners Advisory Committees (ELACs) and School Site Councils (SSCs). To accomplish this, PLAN provided the team with trainings in community organizing, school governance, action planning, effective facilitation and agenda planning.
“When we trained the core team on community organizing, they were ready to engage with the material and go deeper into an analysis of community organizing as a source of shifting power,” said Rhina Ramos, the technical assistant with PLAN. “In great detail, we discussed one-on-ones as a mechanism to discover the self-interest of those we want on board to support our goals.”
In May, the culminating event took place, attracting 50 parents and community members in Woodland. Members of the core team worked together harmoniously to cover every detail at the event, from registering participants to emceeing the event. The outcome of reaching out to a larger community with essential information of how to be involved was accomplished.
One objective of the project called for the identification, creation and fostering of new parent leadership in the Woodland community, in an effort to prime future activities requiring the mobilization of a parent and youth base to take action. The reflections of the core leadership team after the forum confirmed that this had taken place. Parents reported that they felt prepared to work not only with their peers but with their children to achieve community change, including the institution of new school district and city policies and more effective engagement of primarily Spanish-speaking families throughout Woodland. Most of the parents in the core leadership team expressed interest in being at the forefront of these efforts in the future.
Furthermore, according to the post-forum evaluation, 89 percent of the participants said they were more likely to participate in ELACs and SSC at their children’s schools as a result of their attendance at the forum. In fact, six to 10 participating parents are new ELAC members at Dingle Elementary, one is a new SSC member at Gibson Elementary and one is a new SSC member at Whitehead Elementary.
“If I had not gone to the Parents in Action forum, I would not have signed up to become an ELAC member,” said one parent. “I now feel more empowered than ever to make a difference in my child’s education.”
The Woodland Coalition for Youth is a REACH Community Action coalition.