Linda Ariyasu, School-Family Facilitator; Richard A. Alonzo, Local Superintendent
Row 1: Dr. Eve Sherman, Elaine Kinoshita, Richard Alonzo (Superintendent), Dr. Rosa Maria Hernandez, and Diane Ramirez. Row 2: Mary Kurzeka, Rocio Arriaga, Angie Cardenas, Virginia Lampson, Linda Ariyasu (NNPS Key Contact), Maria Gonzalez, and Bob Bilovsky
Local District F, one of 11 districts in LAUSD, includes over 60 schools serving students and families with diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds. The Superintendent places high priority on family involvement to help students succeed. The district is a three-year NNPS Partnership District Award winner.
The Facilitator for school, family, and community partnerships serves on the Superintendent's executive leadership team; works with other district programs (e.g., Healthy Start, Title I) and writes a monthly section of the district newsletter on partnerships for principals, teachers, parents, and staff. The district also links to the Central LAUSD Parent Community Services Branch.
Among many activities, the district conducts an annual parent conference; workshops and monthly training for parent and community liaisons; assistance to schools' Action Teams; orientations on the six types of involvement for administrators, coordinators, and liaisons; and training for over 360 teachers in family involvement projects that are organized with the assistance of Families in Schools (see 2003 Partnership Organization Awards). The special projects include Read with Me/Lea Conmigo - an early literacy program for parents and children to enjoy books at home. Pre- and post-tests indicate that, compared to other students, the program increased participating students' vocabulary and comprehension. Also, G. O. T. (Going On To) College guides fifth grade students and parents to begin to plan for postsecondary education. The Facilitator for partnerships also meets with each school principal about their partnership programs.
Everything District F does focuses on instruction and how teachers and parents can help students in literacy, math, and other subjects. Since the passage of the NCLBA, the district leaders have worked on improving student achievement and increasing family and community involvement in ways that support student achievement. In the past year, for example, most schools in the district met their targets for Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP). The Superintendent attributed some of that success to well-coordinated, school-based family involvement programs. The district also began to "scale up" the number of schools working to improve school, family, and community partnership programs by providing over 30 schools' teams of parents and educators with training in how to organize more comprehensive partnership programs. Future plans include Parent Centers in all new schools, school and community shared use of library and recreation facilities, and improving partnership programs in secondary schools. This district takes a long view and works toward excellent family and community involvement in all schools.
The district takes evaluation seriously. The district uses many NNPS evaluation tools to review and strengthen district and school programs of partnership and progress from year to year. Starting with the district plan for partnerships, leaders for partnerships review the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and challenges, and then work to correct weaknesses, increase strengths, and share best practices.
The district concentrates on communicating with parents who speak different languages, providing translators for training workshops, for example. Evaluations of workshops and meetings are collected and reported in English and Spanish. At a recent team training workshop, one parent wrote: “Los seis tipos de envolvimiento para nuestras escuelas sobre las metas que es importante para nuestros hijos.” A teacher on a school team wrote: “I learned how to create an action team for partnerships and how to develop 1-year action plans.” Their comments indicate that, in Local District F, parents and teachers are thinking and working together in ways that will help students do better in school.
Membership in NNPS provides you with the research, information, models for implementation, best practices and technical assistance to build a comprehensive program for your schools. In addition, the conferences twice a year in Baltimore offer the opportunity to network, compare strategies, and learn from individuals from all over the country who are doing the same work in their districts. . . . NNPS helps build relationships that help us expand our vision and scope of our work -- beyond anything we could have imagined years ago.
Also see Local District F’s history of Partnership District Awards in 2001 and 2002 and examples of Promising Partnership Programs on the website, www.partnershipschools.org, in the section In the Spotlight.