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.
Advice From the Experts on Nurturing Strong Full Service Schools
The following are excerpts from an evaluation panel at the conference, “Nurturing Strong Full Service Schools: Building Bridges with Communities,” that took place on May 20, 2002. It was the fifth in a series of national conferences about full service schools organized by Margot Welch and the Collaborative for Integrated School Services at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Panelists shared their evaluation findings and lessons learned.
From the Director's Desk
An introduction to the issue on Continuous Improvement by HFRP's Founder & Director, Heather B. Weiss, Ed.D.
Evaluating Citizen Schools
Charlie Schlegel of Citizen Schools explains how their evaluation strategy successfully balances the need to determine program impact with the need for continuous improvement.
Beyond the Head Count: Evaluating Family Involvement in Out-of-School Time
This brief offers an overview of how out-of-school time programs can evaluate their family involvement strategies and practices. It draws on findings from our OST Evaluation Database, interviews, and email correspondence.
Free. Available online only.
Evaluating Municipal Out-of-School Time Initiatives
To inform municipal leaders who are developing out-of-school time evaluations, HFRP scanned the city-level initiatives in its evaluation profiles database and prepared this short brief that describes the evaluation approaches, methods, and performance measures that some cities are using for evaluation.
Free. Available online only.
Culture Clash at Intermediate School #91
Disciplinary problems at an intermediate school in the Bronx are compounded by the lack of experienced teachers whose race and class backgrounds differ from their students'. When two students get into a fight, the new teachers seek solutions that sharply contrast with the norms of the students and their families. How can teachers come to understand the families and communities in which they teach?
Free. Available online only.
Foundations and Multicultural Aspects of Parenting
This course focuses on developing competency in a variety of areas surrounding parenting education including the following: understanding of parental issues and concerns within diverse family systems, understanding the dimensions of parenting from birth to adolescence, family literacy, and knowledge of multicultural perspectives in parenting.
Free. Available online only.
Teaching for the Commonwealth: Linking Schools With Communities
This course is taught at the Jane Addams School of Democracy as a summer institute for teachers. This field-based course will examine broad strategies to link schools with communities to improve access, expand the learning resources, and strengthen or create structures that make formal and informal learning contiguous. An attentiveness to neighborhood as “place” will include the history of St. Paul's West Side in Minnesota, discussion of the public work initiatives underway, and interaction with neighborhood resource people. Participants in the course will have opportunity to reflect on their teaching as vocation and the civic dimensions of teacher.
Free. Available online only.
Public Communication Campaign Evaluation: An Environmental Scan of Challenges, Criticisms, Practice, and Opportunities
This report presents what has been happening in the field of public communication campaign evaluation in recent years. It examines evaluation challenges, criticisms, and practice and includes sections on relevant theory, outcomes, and useful methods for designing evaluations. It ends with opportunities for the road ahead.
Free. Available online only.
Concepts and Models of Family Involvement
This report identifies four conceptual dimensions of family involvement
Free. Available online only.
School Community Leadership
This course will address the identification and utilization of community resources and the creation of family engagement partnerships, community linkages, and collaborative efforts to provide for the educational, cultural, health, lifelong learning, vocational, and out-of-school needs of students and citizens in a community.
Free. Available online only.
The Transition to Kindergarten: A Review of Current Research and Promising Practices to Involve Families
This brief offers a synthesis of findings based on a review of current research on the transition to kindergarten, especially the important role that families play in the transition. It focuses on promising transition practices and how schools can get involved in their implementation.
Free. Available online only.
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.
Evaluation of 21st Century Community Learning Center Programs: A Guide for State Education Agencies
This brief offers an in-depth look at the 21st Century Community Learning Center (21st CCLC) evaluation requirements (both performance measurement for accountability and program evaluation) and provides practical suggestions about how to implement 21st CCLC evaluation at the state and local level. It includes a checklist of issues to consider when designing state and local 21st CCLC evaluations.
Hard copy out of stock. Available online only.
Participatory Action Research: Building Community Capacity Through Collaboration, Education, and Action
Priscilla Little, from Harvard Family Research Project, describes the implementation of the Milwaukee Participatory Action Research project and how it improved the evaluation and advocacy skills of all its participants.
Family Support
The Spring 2002 issue looks at family support evaluations and their role in moving the field forward. This issue features a conversation with Michael Quinn Patton about historical and emerging trends in evaluation practice, descriptions of national and local evaluations that are underway, a discussion of using “effect size” to measure program effectiveness, advice on how to bring family research to legislators' attention, a look at how data can help parents assess schools, and much more.
Lessons From a Partnership Model Project
Kathe Johnson shares her experience from her work with the Women and Poverty Public Education Initiative, outlining four lessons she learned from this project, which connects professional academic and low-income women.
From Health Consumers to Health Consumer Researchers
A grassroots network of families of children with special health care needs shares the lessons they learned about conducting research to improve the health care for their children.
Learning From Families
M. Elena Lopez, from Harvard Family Research Project, discusses expanding the role of family support to include supporting families’ using information to improve their communities.
Evaluating Effect Sizes in the Policy Arena
Kathleen McCartney and Eric Dearing from the Harvard Graduate School of Education provide an overview on effect size and what it reveals about the effectiveness of family support programs.
How Can We Strengthen Family Support Research and Evaluation?
Carl Dunst, Co-Director of the Orelena Hawks Puckett Institute, urges getting beyond the question of “what works” toward a more detailed scrutiny of the relationship among family support principles, program practice, and family outcomes.
Connecting Good Research and Ideas with Policymaking
Three experts in conducting Family Impact Seminars share their techniques for bringing research about families to legislators in a way that not only grabs their attention, but also supports policy change.
A Conversation with Michael Quinn Patton
Director of an organizational development consulting practice, professor, and author, Michael Quinn Patton reveals historical and emerging trends in evaluation practice.
Boston Parent Organizing Network (BPON)
The Boston Parent Organizing Network (BPON) mobilizes parents, local organizations, and communities to improve the quality of education in the Boston Public Schools.
Family Support America: Supporting “Family Supportive” Evaluation
David Diehl of Family Support America outlines their top evaluation projects: compiling an online national database of family support programs and developing new ways to measure the effectiveness of family support programs.