The Harvard Family Research Project separated from the Harvard Graduate School of Education to become the Global Family Research Project as of January 1, 2017. It is no longer affiliated with Harvard University.
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All Publications & Resources WORKING WITH TEACHERS AND FAMILIES
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COMPLEMENTARY LEARNING CONNECTIONS
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Evaluating Family Involvement Programs
This issue of The Evaluation Exchange brings together the current knowledge base of programs in family support and family involvement, providing a continuous perspective on family processes with regard to children's learning and development, from a child's early years through adolescence. Articles address the challenges of evaluating family programs, such as the need for conceptual clarity, methodological rigor, accountability, and contextual responsiveness. Rounding out the issue are examples of ongoing evaluations of parent leadership and organizing to ensure that schools serve all children at high standards.
What Matters in Family Support Evaluation?
M. Elena Lopez of HFRP interprets themes from a participatory evaluation and parent engagement institute.
Learning From Parents Through Reflective Evaluation Practice
David Scheie, See Moua, and Pang Lee summarize lessons learned by listening to parents’ spontaneous stories during a parent survey interview.
Ongoing Evaluations of Programs in Parent Leadership and Family Involvement
Kelly Faughnan and Cassandra Wolos of HFRP present two listings of upcoming program evaluations, the first in parent leadership and organizing, the second in family involvement in education.
Perspectives on Family Involvement
Nancy Hill, Amy Baker, and Kevin Marjoribanks discuss the present state and future direction of family involvement research and evaluation, from the perspectives of developmental psychology, evaluation, and education, respectively.
Co-Constructing Family Involvement
M. Elena Lopez, Holly Kreider, and Margaret Caspe from HFRP discuss the co-construction of home-school partnerships to support children’s learning and development.
Assessing the Effects of Parent Involvement Interventions on Elementary School Student Achievement
Herbert Turner, Chad Nye, and Jamie Schwartz explain the Campbell Collaboration’s application of its systematic review process to parent involvement interventions.
Improving Parental Involvement: Evaluating Treatment Effects in the Fast Track Program
Robert Nix, research associate at Pennsylvania State University, describes how a rigorous evaluation of a complex behavior problems preventive intervention analyzes its school-home component.
Blending Evaluation Traditions: The Talent Development Model
Veronica Thomas and Velma LaPoint describe the Talent Development approach to evaluating an urban family-school-community partnership program.
A Conversation With Jeanne Brooks-Gunn
Jeanne Brooks-Gunn reflects on the breakthrough findings and new directions for research, evaluation, and practice in family-focused interventions.
Promoting Quality Outcome Measurement: A Home-Visitation Case
Audrey Laszewski, project director of the Early Years Home Visitation Outcomes Project of Wisconsin, describes how a stakeholder collaboration resulted in a common outcome measurement process.
Helping Every Student Succeed: Schools and Communities Working Together
This four-session discussion guide by the Everyday Democracy (formerly the Study Circles Resource Center)is intended for communities trying to close the achievement gap in their schools.
Engaging Parents in an Urban Public High School: A Case Study of Boston Arts Academy
An urban public school successfully engages parents by offering a variety of school-based activities, a welcoming environment, and frequent communication between staff and parents.
Preparing Teachers to Engage Parents
This research report reviews parent involvement modules created for preservice teachers focusing on parent-teacher communication and collaborating with community. The online, problem-based modules were designed by the North Texas Partnership for Parent Engagement.
Family and School Partnerships for Academic Success
Emphasis is on continuous family-school teamwork efforts. Attention is given to family background and social context. The course will cover effective family involvement programs/models and current research underscoring the dynamic interaction between families and schools on the academic success of pre-K through grade 8 students.
Rethinking the Evaluation of Family Strengthening Strategies: Beyond Traditional Program Evaluation Models
Charles Bruner of the Child and Family Policy Center outlines three factors of good family strengthening programs that evaluators are not adequately measuring in their evaluations.
Parents Write Their Worlds: A Parent Involvement Program Bridging Urban Schools and Families
A participatory research project examines a school-based writing workshop in which parents write stories for a literary magazine that is circulated in the school and community.
Social Capital
This issue of the FINE Forum features some examples families, schools, and communities coming together to enrich children's learning and social development opportunities.
People, Power, and Change
Fulfilling the democratic promise of equity, inclusion, and accountability requires the participation of an “organized” citizenry with the power to articulate and assert its interests effectively. Organizing is one way to confront these challenges by revitalizing old democratic institutions and creating new ones. In this course, students learn how to engage with social, economic, and political problems from an organizer's perspective ... and how to act to solve them.
Making Family and Community Connections
This workshop is part of the Concept to Classroom series of multimedia workshops for teacher professional development. In this workshop, Heather Weiss and Joyce Epstein provide expert insights on creating partnerships among schools, parents, and members of the local community.
Parents and Teachers Together: Creating Schools Our Children Deserve
This course provides an opportunity for students to reflect on and answer some of the following question: Why do parents and teachers both feel frustrated and powerless to meet the needs of today's students? In this class we will consider the power inequities inherent in schools today. In this class we will consider the power inequities inherent in schools today. We will focus not only on present problems in schools, but on reviewing innovative initiatives and models around the country that give a louder voice to teachers and parents on behalf of children.
Taking a Closer Look: A Guide to Online Resources on Family Involvement
This comprehensive resource guide compiles a wealth of information about family involvement from over 100 national organizations. It contains Web links to recent (published in and after 2000) research, information, and tools.
Transforming Schools Through Community Organizing: A Research Review
This paper reviews the literature on community organizing. It examines how community organizing differs from traditional parent involvement activities, outlines the characteristic strategies used to engage parents in organizing efforts, and describes the outcomes of these efforts.
Faith-Based Organizing for School Improvement in the Texas Borderlands: A Case Study of the Alliance School Initiative
At two public schools in the Texas borderlands, a faith-based organization and a school–community partnership come together to improve parental engagement.
Education Organizing
This course will focus on the role of community organizing in fostering school change. We will examine the large range of ways community groups and schools are promoting the active engagement of participants to improve education. Within that context, we will examine efforts to foster collaborations among and between a wide array of stakeholders in education, including community organizations, school personnel, school system administration, unions, the business community, faith institutions, civil rights organizations, and youth. We will also examine the role of political organizing in addressing structural inequalities in education in America, and consider that ways that education organizing strengthens broader community building efforts.