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.
Featured Teaching Case: Defining “Fine”—Communicating Academic Progress to Parents
Harvard Family Research Project’s Teaching Cases are designed to support teacher training and professional development by highlighting challenges that schools, families, and communities may encounter in supporting children’s learning. In this month’s newsletter, we feature Defining “Fine”—Communicating Academic Progress to Parents, a case that highlights one elementary school’s efforts to use and understand data about student progress toward state standards and to communicate the meaning of these data clearly to parents.
A Human-Centered Approach to Family Engagement
A human-centered design approach – an approach that is based on observation, empathy, optimism, collaboration, and experimentation – opens new possibilities for educators to motivate and sustain family engagement.
Academic Achievement
This issue of FINE Forum explores new forms of and strategies in family involvement, all of which share a common goal: expanding and deepening family and community roles to help students meet high standards.
Free. Available online only.
Raising Our Future: Families, Schools, and Communities Joining Together
This book provides one of the most thorough and complete analyses of innovative family support and education programs to date. Seventy-three profiles taken from around the country vividly illustrate the key elements of a successful program, while detailed charts, tables, and cross-referencing indexes give quick and easy access to information.
Hard copy out of stock.
Taking the Lead in Family Engagement: A Message to Our Followers on Presidents’ Day
Presidents’ Day is a time to reflect on the importance of leadership. Learn how policymakers, researchers, and practitioners are leading the field of family engagement.
Webinar Brief: Data Driven—Making Student and School Data Accessible and Meaningful To Families
This is a briefing on the third webinar in the series Achieving Excellence and Innovation in Family, School, and Community Engagement brought to you by the U.S. Department of Education in partnership with United Way Worldwide, National PTA, SEDL, and Harvard Family Research Project. The webinar, which took place on August 10, 2010, featured Kevin Jennings from the U.S. Department of Education and a number of speakers from across the country discussing examples of how data can be used to engage families in programs, schools, and school districts.
Early Childhood Education
As we celebrate the Week of the Young Child, the FINE Forum presents some innovative ideas and practices in family involvement in early childhood education.
Free. Available online only.
Commentary from Harvard Family Research Project on the Promise Neighborhoods Program
Harvard Family Research Project submitted recommendations to the National Register Notice regarding the Promise Neighborhoods program's proposed priorities, requirements, definitions, and selection criteria.
Free. Available online only.
Family Engagement Policy Resources
We've added a section to our website to inform stakeholders of our policy-related work in family engagement. This work seeks to promote the broader definition of family engagement that stresses shared responsibility and cross-context learning within a cradle-to-career approach to education. Visit our new policy page for more details, including our comments in the Federal Register regarding the U.S. Department of Education’s $4.35 billion Race to the Top Fund competitive grants program.
Free. Available online only.
Family Involvement News: December 2011
We at Harvard Family Research Project are committed to keeping you up to date on what's new in family involvement. This list of links to current reports, articles, events, and opportunities will help you stay on top of research and resources from HFRP and other field leaders.
Breaking New Ground: Data Systems Transform Family Engagement in Education
In this issue’s commentary, Heather Weiss and M. Elena Lopez from Harvard Family Research Project and Deborah Stark, Commissioner of First 5, Alameda County revisit the new definition of family engagement—as a shared responsibility, across multiple settings, from cradle to career—as applied to student data use. They discuss how data can effectively bring families, teachers, and administrators to the table, and engage everyone around student learning and performance.
University–Community Partnerships
This FINE Forum features the Jane Addams School for Democracy, a university-community partnership in which Hmong and Latino immigrants, professors, high school teachers, parents, and students all work together on public issues.
Free. Available online only.
Family Involvement News: March 2016
Are you looking to break free of traditional strategies for promoting family-school-community partnerships? Discover how video games, human-centered design thinking, and digital media resources are making this happen!
Featured Teaching Case: Suspension at Aurora Middle School
Harvard Family Research Project’s Teaching Cases support teacher training and professional development by highlighting challenges that schools, families, and communities may encounter in supporting children’s learning. In this month’s newsletter, we feature Suspension at Aurora Middle School, which highlights the shared responsibility of community groups to resolve home-school difficulties.
Logged In: Using Technology to Engage Families in Children’s Education
Based on research of promising practices in school districts and communities, Harvard Family Research Project has identified a range of technological innovations that have the potential to boost key dimensions of family engagement: positive parent–child interactions, home–school communication, and parent responsibility for a child’s learning.
Family Involvement in Mathematics
This issue of the FINE Forum focuses on promising practices to engage families and communities in supporting students' mathematical proficiency.
Free. Available online only.
Building Villages to Raise Our Children: Six Volume Set
This set of six volumes offers practical advice for establishing and managing a family support program.
Hard copy out of stock.
Teaching Cases on Family Engagement: Early Learning (Ages 0–8)
HFRP's teaching cases involve real world situations and consider the perspectives of various stakeholders, including early childhood program and elementary school staff, parents, children, and community members. This handout provides a detailed list of our teaching cases on family involvement, focusing on the earlier years of a child's learning and development.
Findings From HFRP's Study of Predictors of Participation in Out-of-School Time Activities: Fact Sheet
This Fact Sheet summarizes findings and implications from HFRP's recently completed Study of Predictors of Participation in OST Activities. With funding from the W.T. Grant Foundation, we examined the child, family, school, and neighborhood predictors of children's participation in OST activities, paying special attention to disadvantaged youth.
Free. Available online only.
Family Involvement News: February 2013
We are committed to keeping you up to date on what's new in family engagement. View our list of links to current reports, articles, resources, and events in the field.