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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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June’s issue of The Education Innovator, the U.S. Department of Education’s online newsletter that aims to promote innovative practices in education, features key insights from the National Family, School, and Community Engagement Working Group (Working Group) and Harvard Family Research Project.

The article touts the importance of a comprehensive, strategic approach to bringing families and schools together to increase student achievement in a time of widespread education reform.  Noting that there is strong research evidence that parental beliefs, attitudes, values, and childrearing practices, as well as home–school communication, are linked to student success, The Education Innovator highlights the Working Group’s new definition of family engagement as a shared responsibility that spans across time and multiple settings. 

The article also discusses setting priorities for a new era of engagement, empowering parents and families through accessible data, building school and district capacity, and the federal role in supporting family engagement.

Excerpt from the article:

With the Department of Education and others ‘expanding their commitments and investments and thereby creating opportunities to build and integrate effective engagement,’ [Harvard Family Research Project’s Founder and Director, Heather] Weiss and her Working Group colleagues wanted to ensure that family engagement is viewed as a core innovation and reform strategy.

The Working Group began by enumerating a set of priorities to build a strong foundation for family, school, and community engagement, including: the need for a coherent and comprehensive strategy to guide family, school, and community partnerships; a consciously designed infrastructure to elevate the essential nature of engagement as a reform strategy; and improvement of data systems in terms of timeliness, relevance to parents and families, and accountability for outcomes that strengthen the quality of family engagement.


Read “A New Era of Family Engagement” in The Education Innovator on Ed.gov’s website.

 

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Published by Harvard Family Research Project