Task 4 Strong Examples

TO: Principal
FROM: PAL Candidate
RE: Proposal to Increase Family Engagement to Improve Student Learning

Description and justification:

The priority academic area for the plan is to increase engagement of Hispanic families in schoolwide curriculum events to improve student achievement, specifically literacy and numerical thinking skills of Hispanic students.

Student achievement data:

ABC school is an urban elementary school with 975 students in grades K–5. There are multiple configurations at each grade level, which include regular classrooms, inclusion classrooms for special education, two-way Spanish language classrooms, and sheltered English instruction classrooms at each grade level. Based on data provided by DESE, the demographics of the school are 37.1% African American, 45.8% Hispanic, 10.1% White, 6.5% multi-race, and .5% Asian. Additionally, 32.4 % of the students who attend the school are English learners and 57.5% are economically disadvantaged. It is also important to note that of the 45.8% Hispanic students, 87% of those students speak Spanish at home. While other languages are spoken in the homes of students, Spanish is the most frequent language spoken at home in the school community other than English.

The school was assigned "No Level" in 2017 NGMCAS and received its prior "Level 3" designation for performing among the lowest 20% of schools and target student groups for the previous three years. 2017 NG MCAS data from the school indicate that students are not meeting grade level targets in progress and performance. The data demonstrate that the school is well below the state and slightly below the rest of the district in overall growth and performance of individual target student groups. Analysis of grade level data of both Mathematics and English Language Arts for the 2017 NG MCAS indicates that the combined percent of students meeting or exceeding the standard is below the state and district in every grade and in every subject except for grade four mathematics. When analyzing the data by target student group, there is an even more challenging picture. The target student group data indicate that the school is well below the state in every subject at every grade level.

One target student group that is performing below the state and district in many areas is Hispanic students. Hispanic students represent 45.8% of the overall population of the school. According to results of the 2017 NG MCAS, Hispanic students are performing below the district and state in math in multiple grade levels. In addition, the school has not met the target in narrowing proficiency gaps across multiple years. In English Language Arts, Hispanic students are performing below the district and state in grades 4 and 5. In grade 3, they are performing just slightly above the district but still below the state. The Hispanic student target group represents a large portion of the overall school population, and their underperformance has a significant impact on the overall success rating of the school.

Analysis of the school common assessments demonstrates similar results. The STAR reading data are collected three times a year with ongoing progress monitoring for students falling below benchmark. Based on the data in Cat 1: Table 7, in grades 2–5 a maximum of only 60% of students are meeting grade-level benchmarks. As with the MCAS data, the percent of Hispanic students meeting grade-level expectations is consistently below African American and White students.

Examination of this data reveals that in grades 2–5, Hispanic students perform below White and African American students at every grade level.

School/community context data:

Along with achievement data, the family engagement committee at ABC School has also examined data related to family attendance at curriculum events. Attendance rates for parents of our African American and White students met or exceeded the school demographics for each group. However, attendance from the most recent principal coffees and PTO meetings indicates that only 15% of attendees are parents of Hispanic students. At a recent literacy event where families were invited to school to listen to stories written by students, only 10% of Hispanic families attended. The attendance at school events does not match the current demographics of the school community, where 45.8% of our students are Hispanic. It is the combination of these factors—achievement data related to Hispanic students and attendance at school curriculum events—that led the family engagement committee to focus on finding a way to more effectively engage parents of the Hispanic students. By engaging families in the school community, the goal is to improve learning for Hispanic students.

Members and rationale for including in family engagement committee:

• Literacy Specialist (me): literacy coach and service provider for ABC School
• STEM Specialist: coach and service provider for ABC School
• Guidance Counselor: well connected to the community of families and has an understanding of parent needs
• Parent A: closely connected to the Hispanic parent community and has attended a parent curriculum event
• District Community Liaison: works closely with families who are new to the city in trying to connect them with community resources
• Grade 2 teacher in a multiple language classroom
• Assistant principal: speaks Spanish and often acts as a translator for families

The purpose of the family engagement committee is to identify strategies and implement a plan to increase engagement of Hispanic families in curriculum events to help them to support their children in literacy and numeracy at home.

Description of work:

The family engagement committee met five times between September and December of 2018. The literacy specialist reached out to school and community members asking if they were interested in joining a working committee to find ways to build stronger relationships between the school and families with the goal of enhancing student learning. Issues discussed:

• MCAS, STAR, attendance data
• Survey questions and survey data
• Potential barriers to previous attendance at curriculum events
• Potential ideas to encourage Hispanic families to attend curriculum events
• Research articles on parent engagement and the impact on student learning
• Research articles on culturally responsive pedagogy
• Research articles on community partnerships with ELL families
• Brainstorming on how to connect with families
• Feedback about plan to implement strategy from group members, families, educators, students, and administrators

Actions taken:

• School staff members led the group in analyzing achievement and SEL data so the group could determine the focus for family engagement
• Developed survey for families
• Parent members led the group in analyzing parent survey data
• Guidance counselors and parent members collected resources on how to support Spanish-speaking families
• Found and summarized articles and resources to guide work
• Reviewed information from WIDA on family engagement and building relationships with families

My role:

• Set and send out meeting agendas
• Review achievement and attendance data to share with the committee
• Gather sample survey questions for family engagement survey
• Pull together final survey and questions as a follow-up to group meeting
• Gather research resources on the impact of family engagement on student learning
• Facilitate discussion related to meeting content and enable group members to take leadership roles on the committee and lead meetings.

District/community context information:

At the district level, there is a range of programs to support Hispanic families. The district sends out a monthly newsletter of the events in Spanish and English and the events are posted on the district website. These events include, but are not limited to, bilingual story time, drop-in bilingual playgroup, and facilitated parent conversations in Spanish and English on topics related to child development and supporting students at home.

Information from families on need for improved family engagement to address priority area:

After reviewing the data from the family survey, with a focus on Hispanic families, the committee created these guiding questions:

• Why are significantly fewer than 45.8% of Hispanic families attending school/curriculum events?
• What are barriers to Hispanic families attending schoolwide curriculum events?
• How can the family engagement committee work to decrease the barriers to family engagement? Based on the work of the family engagement committee, the following chart was created to identify barriers to parent involvement and how to address those barriers:

One consistent response was how parents can support student literacy when they are unable to speak/write in English. This theme was echoed when parent group members along with the guidance counselor sponsored two "coffee talk" events. Although the group wished to target Hispanic parents, all parents were invited to the school to discuss ways in which the school could engage parents more frequently in the curriculum. Each event lasted one hour, and a total of thirty parents attended one of the events. A key piece of feedback from this event was the need for curriculum events in multiple languages spoken in students' homes, as that would make the school more welcoming and inviting to all families. Solving this dilemma would be key to developing the first parent workshop.

Plan to improve family engagement:

Goals and objectives:

Based on the survey feedback and information shared during the coffee talk sessions, the goals of the family engagement committee are to increase engagement of Hispanic families and to find a way for families to become more involved in schoolwide curriculum events, which will improve academic achievement of Hispanic students.

Possible action strategies:

1. Increase communication to families beyond the weekly newsletter to include a positive weekly call home with translator if needed.
2. Increase communication in Spanish on social media.
3. Develop a series of workshops in Spanish and English, with childcare, to help build engagement and overcome some of the barriers presented earlier.
4. Continue to survey parents so they can suggest topics/content for future workshops.
5. Continue to hold weekly "coffee talk" feedback sessions hosted by the working group to gather feedback from all parents about curriculum needs and wants.
6. Increase resources for parents in Spanish (e.g., websites with bilingual content for parents).

Theory of action:

If the school works to improve communication with and engagement of Spanish-speaking families and provides support on how to better support literacy and numeracy at home, then achievement levels will improve for Hispanic students.

Research-based rationale:

When schools build strong relationships with parents and families then student achievement increases. However, many typical school events are inaccessible to families who either do not speak English or are new to the country, which makes it difficult to build these bonds. Families and schools must work together to create equitable schools that are responsive to the needs of students of all cultures. Research by Garcia, Fernandez, Ruiz-Gallardo, and Reyes (2017) has demonstrated that while just getting parents involved in school activities may not significantly improve achievement, when educators give parents greater access to educational resources, students have greater success. By using the model developed by Hammond (2015) schools and families can work together to create an environment that is culturally responsive and inclusive. Additional research explains that children who are exposed to age-appropriate books in their native language developed stronger literacy skills than children who were only exposed to books in their second language (Association for Childhood Education, 2003).

Existing resources:

• Weekly newsletter (Spanish/English)
• Social media platforms such as Facebook and Instagram (written in English)
• Night-time school events with a translator but presented in English

New resources needed:

• Events presented in Spanish where parents help to generate topics
• Translator for social media platforms so information can be presented in Spanish and English
• Additional resources for ELL parents on the benefits of supporting students in their native language in literacy and how that translates to stronger literacy in English

Timeline:

• September and October: Analyze data, look at research, understand barriers, brainstorm action strategies, decide how to engage Hispanic families.
• November: Begin providing social media content in Spanish/English and plan for first parent information session in Spanish.
• December: Refine plans for parent information session focused on the benefits of reading to children in their native language.
• January: Present first parent literacy information session in Spanish (during the day with babysitting done by 5th-grade students during their specialist block)

Roles and responsibilities:

• Literacy Specialist (me): Plan content of parent workshop with a focus on the benefits of reading to/writing with students in your native language and how that connects to literacy development in English
• Guidance Counselor (fluent in Spanish): Present content developed by literacy specialist and act as an interpreter during the workshop when parents have questions about literacy development
• Parent A (fluent in Spanish): Make personal phone calls to families to encourage them to attend the event after initial notice goes out about the literacy event in Spanish
• Class Teacher/Stem Specialist: Generate content about the event on the school social media sites
• Assistant Principal: Oversee grade 5 students offering babysitting services
• District Community Liaison: Share district resources for the parents at the end of the event
• STEM Specialist: Generate resources for parents on STEM support at home

Description of actions to engage:

• Survey families to learn about family engagement with a focus on responses from Hispanic families
• Positive phone calls to parents/guardians with use of translator when necessary

Proposed evaluation of plan:

• After community event, we will gather attendance and feedback data to plan for future dates/events.
• We will gather data on use of social media platforms presented in Spanish.

Individuals who contributed to plan and how:

Other staff:

• Multiple teachers who are fluent in Spanish provided help with translation when district translator was not available.
• Educators and administrator reviewed and provided feedback.
• Principal allows social media platforms to be written in Spanish and English.

Families:

• Answer survey questions that guided the group toward family learning sessions in Spanish
• Provide feedback after session for topics for future sessions and usefulness of initial session

Rationale

Artifact 1

The candidate clearly defined a priority academic area using several types of qualitative and quantitative data. Furthermore, the candidate disaggregated data for several priority groups. In addition to MCAS and STAR assessment data, the candidate and the working group sought qualitative feedback from parents and the community in two different ways in order to formulate the priority area and create a goal. The candidate clearly explains how increasing parent engagement will increase students' MCAS achievement while also providing students with opportunities to enhance both literacy and numeracy skills. Existing programs, policies, and strategies for community engagement are explained. Importantly, the candidate provides a history of how different student groups have participated in or been excluded from engagement with the school community. In doing so, the candidate makes a strong case for a focus on their selected target student group and the priority academic area.

The candidate selects a community engagement team of seven members. The membership represents a diverse and relevant set of stakeholders including family and community members who are not employees of the school district. The candidate provides a rationale for why each team member is selected including efforts to purposefully seek out additional members who have relevant skills and expertise. Significantly, the candidate leads an ongoing process in which all group members share leadership for tasks. The candidate provides multiple examples of how group members took charge of certain tasks throughout both the planning and implementation stages of this process. Through surveys, community meetings, and direct outreach, the candidate seeks wider-community feedback to inform the strategy and also the working group's membership. The candidate also provides a detailed explanation of their own role in facilitating the group, engaging the broader community, and supporting the group's ongoing work by providing relevant research on culturally proficient pedagogy and creating structures for the team to share leadership and implement the strategy.

The group's plan includes six distinct strategies, all targeting the same priority academic area but responsive to different groups' needs. The plan is integrated, is coherent, and features a strong, research-based rationale focused on improving student learning. In clear language, the candidate provides a theory of action, a timeline, a list of existing and needed resources, as well as a plan for how each group member will contribute to and be responsible for various aspects of the plan. The candidate also provides evidence on how each strategy will increase parent engagement and improve students' academic achievement.

TO: Principal
FROM: PAL Candidate
RE: Detailed description of implemented strategy

For this task, a workshop was presented in Spanish for Hispanic parents focused on the benefits of reading with children in your home/native language. The goal of the workshop was to explain to parents/guardians that when you read to your child in your native language, it helps to build literacy skills that will then be transferred to their literacy skills as they learn English. Babysitting was offered during the workshop.

Justification:

Based on data provided by the Massachusetts Department of Education, 45.8% of students are Hispanic. 87% of those students speak Spanish at home. The school received a "Level 3" designation for performing among the lowest 20% of schools and target student groups for the previous three years. The data demonstrate that the school is well below the state and slightly below the rest of the district in overall growth and performance of individuals. Per results of the 2017 NG MCAS, Hispanic students are performing below the district and state. Along with achievement data, the family engagement committee at ABC School examined data related to family attendance at curriculum events (see Artifact 1). The family engagement survey revealed the following: only 45% of Hispanic families feel welcome when they visit the school. Overall, 36% of parents believe that the school does a good job reaching out to families of different cultural backgrounds. While overall 80% of families believe that the school does a good job encouraging parent/guardian involvement, for Hispanic parents that number is 31%. Finally, while overall parent communication seemed strong, for Hispanic parents only 24% believe that there is strong two-way communication. Individual comments from the survey indicated an emphasis on providing more content in Spanish and helping parents understand school in the U.S. and how to help their child at home when their native language is Spanish.

Additional justification comes from research that has found that children who learn to read in their native language have an easier time learning to read in their second language compared to children who never learned how to read in their first language (Anstrom, 1999). When children learn to read in their native language, in this case Spanish, they learn how reading works and understand the process of reading.

Based on the combination of the achievement data, attendance data, family survey data, and research related to the benefits of reading in your native language, the family engagement committee chose to do the parent workshop in Spanish because it would impact the Hispanic population of students. The focus for this workshop would be on the benefits of reading to your child in your native language, Spanish, and how that can improve their literacy learning in English.

Implementation:

1. Committee met in November/December to begin planning content for workshop using research from family engagement committee. The committee shared responsibility for research and planning that led to the formation of our focus area.
2. Presentation was drafted by Guidance Counselor and Literacy Specialist (me) and translated into Spanish.
3. In December the committee reviewed the final presentation, and a feedback survey was designed to gather feedback after the workshop.

Roles and responsibilities:

• Literacy Specialist (me): Planned content of parent workshop with a focus on the benefits of reading to/writing with students in your native language and how that connects to literacy development in English.
• Guidance Counselor: Presented content of the workshop in Spanish for parents and acted as an interpreter during the workshop when parents had questions about literacy development.
• Parent A: Served as an interpreter throughout the process, making personal phone calls to families to encourage them to attend the event after initial notice went out about the literacy event in Spanish. She was also available during the workshop to help answer additional questions and solicit informal feedback after the event.
• Class Teacher and Stem Specialist: Generated content about the event on the school social media sites.
• Assistant Principal: Oversaw the grade 5 students who were babysitting during the event.
• District Community Liaison: Shared district resources for the parents at the end of the event.

Additional resources:

• Research on the benefits of reading to your child in their native language
• Presentation in Spanish

Role in the implementation:

1. Planning team met jointly to plan the content of the workshop in English and then the guidance counselor translated the content into Spanish for the presentation.
2. Advertised the event in weekly newsletter and on Instagram account, and the GC made personal phone calls to families.
3. Grade 5 students were selected to babysit during the event.
4. Literacy Specialist gathered additional resources to share with the parents in Spanish.

Description of involvement:

Parents were involved in the planning and implementation of the workshop in multiple ways. To begin, both a parent and community member were on the parent engagement committee. Next parents/guardians were surveyed about parent engagement in the school. Finally, parents supplied feedback at the end of the workshop on the value of the workshop and topics that would be helpful for future workshops.

Benefits of the strategy:

1. Learn how reading at home in Spanish can transfer to improving literacy skills in English.
2. Additional ways to help their child at home and feel more welcome at school events.
3. Allowed them to feel more engaged in the school community and attend community events in Spanish.
4. Group members, community members, and faculty/staff form connections that will help students to increase their literacy and numeracy skill development.

Quantifiable evidence:

Feedback was gathered from parents/guardians after the workshop in Spanish and then translated into English for the community engagement committee to review. Based on these data, 24 parents were in attendance. 25% of the parents surveyed revealed that they did not know that reading in Spanish could help their child in ELA classes and that they enjoyed the workshop. A smaller percentage of parents also suggested that they found some teachers to be unwelcoming because of the language barrier. Although the percentage of parents that suggested this was very small (8%), this finding demonstrates that the school must work harder to engage with the surrounding community, including language and diversity training for teachers and staff.

Strengths and weaknesses evidenced:

Based on the feedback received following the workshop, the following strengths and weaknesses were identified:

The strengths identified by parents/guardians included: Conducted in Spanish. Conducted during the daytime with babysitting for younger siblings. The content of the workshop was welcoming for Spanish-speaking parents because it focused on how to use their strengths to help their child at home. Parents felt empowered after the workshop to read in Spanish because of the crossover to building literacy skills in English.

Themes that emerged as weaknesses included: Timing of the event was difficult for working parents. Information was not clear for everyone. There was a lack of information on ESL programs in the school and how students exit from the program. In addition, parents would have liked more information on U.S. schools in general and how it differs from schooling in Central and South America.

Problems that arose and the way they were addressed or would need to be addressed in the future:

One challenge in the planning was the entire team was not fluent in Spanish. All materials, feedback sheets, etc., needed to be offered in both Spanish and English, and translation was necessary. This was especially challenging in reviewing the feedback sheets after the workshop, where they needed to be translated for the team before they could be reviewed. The data were translated and then entered into Survey Monkey to make it easier to review.

Discussion and compelling explanation:

While it is too early to tell whether this type of workshop will improve the academic achievement of the Hispanic population of students, the level of positive feedback from parents on the content of the workshop lead me to believe that continuing to have parent workshops in Spanish is a good way to engage the Hispanic families and will have a positive impact on how welcome they feel in the school community. In addition, the focus on supporting students in their native language should impact student learning.

Evidence for improving and sustaining this strategy is based on the feedback received following the workshop. While 24 parents in attendance may seem like a small number in some schools, for ABC School moving forward, the goal is to build on that number and expand it to larger numbers of parents. This has been an important first step.

Rationale

Artifact 2

The candidate describes the implemented plan in detail, outlining the implementation steps as well as roles and responsibilities of group members, which clearly demonstrated how responsibility for implementation was shared by all group members. Additionally, the resources used and the challenges encountered were described. The candidate also provides a compelling rationale for the selected strategy informed by multiple stakeholders within the school community. Using survey feedback, the candidate clearly describes how group members and community members benefitted from the event. What is more, the candidate explains the challenges encountered and how those challenges must be addressed in the future. The candidate provides both quantifiable evidence and qualitative feedback on the event. The candidate clearly describes their own role in implementing and supporting the strategy.

TO: Principal
FROM: PALs Candidate
RE: Analysis of feedback from Community Engagement Committee

Individuals who provided feedback on the design and execution of the plan:

Feedback was gathered informally through discussion and formally via online Google surveys. The members of the family engagement committee provided feedback on the overall plan. They included the following: myself, the K–5 literacy coach and service provider; the STEM Specialist; the Guidance Counselor; Parent A, who is closely connected to the Hispanic parent community; the District Community Liaison; a grade 2 classroom teacher; and the Assistant Principal.

Additional feedback solicited from:

• Parents attending the workshop
• Principal overseeing the workshop
• Four classroom teachers who attended the workshop

How the feedback was collected:

Feasibility:

During the follow-up discussion and subsequent data collection, the committee found that the initial steps such as providing content on social media platforms, increasing the number of resources for Spanish-speaking families, and surveying families would be easier to continue. Staff committee members reported that positive phone calls home to Spanish-speaking families on a regular basis would be challenging because we have a limited number of translators. According to committee member feedback, additional discussion on how to make this work in such a large school and whether other Spanish-speaking faculty members would be willing to help with these phone calls must happen first. Parent A and the Guidance Counselor reported that the monthly parent workshops seem feasible this year, and there is a significant amount of content that can be covered based on the feedback surveys following the event.

Plan to increase, improve, and diversify family and community engagement:

Based on the feedback from parents, the plan will help Spanish-speaking families become more welcome members of the school community. Parent members of the group and the guidance counselor also reported feedback from parents who attended the "coffee talks"—all parents are looking for ways to engage their children in the curriculum. But for some, language barriers persist. Parents also reported that they believe parent curriculum workshops would help the school and parents to form relationships while also increasing student achievement, because more individuals would be able to monitor students' academic success. By gathering parent feedback, the school gained a better understanding of the community's cultural needs and therefore will be more responsive. Additionally, since the plan focused on the barriers faced by families and looked at ways to overcome those barriers, it is responsive to the needs of those families.

Ensuring that Hispanic families can access a greater amount of information in Spanish on multiple school platforms rather than just weekly newsletters in Spanish will ensure better family engagement.

Proposed strategies:

Both group member and parent feedback indicated that Hispanic students should be our target for support. By focusing on building the capacity of parents to support their children and to ensure that families feel like they are a welcome part of the school community, student learning will improve. Research is clear that building literacy skills in a child's native language has benefits to transferring those skills in English. When students develop skills such as phonics, fluency, and comprehension in their native language, those skills more easily transfer to English. The plan ensures that families feel more welcome in the school community and gives them tools to better support their child as learners.

Cultural responsiveness:

The plan focused primarily on Hispanic families and students because they make up such a large portion of the population of the school. Culturally responsive pedagogy seeks to better understand the cultural needs of the community and adjust teaching methods or ways of including parents that are culturally responsive to their needs. The plan relied heavily on the work of Hammond (2015), in particular on culturally responsive pedagogy. This goes beyond multicultural education to teachers providing content that reflects different cultures by truly responding to the cultural needs of the community. The plan looked to address some of the barriers faced by multicultural families, in particular families who speak Spanish at home, many of whom are new to the United States. By focusing on their needs, we can become a more culturally responsive community.

Improvements:

There are several challenges that can be addressed moving forward to improve the plan. The first challenge related to ongoing positive phone calls to families must be addressed. As the family engagement committee continues to work together, a schedule or system to access educators in the building who can translate positive phone calls will better engage parents. Another way the plan can be improved is to look at ways the school can be more culturally responsive to the needs of students in the classroom to better engage families at home. The family engagement committee spent a significant amount of time examining research and resources related to culturally responsive teaching, and this understanding needs to be expanded beyond just the initial committee to the rest of the staff. Our school still has staff who look at families with a deficit perspective based on culture and socio-economic status. More work needs to be done to ensure that all educators in the building are on board with the plan moving forward.

Summary analysis and interpretation:

The workshop was evidence of an increased number of parents/guardians who attended a school curriculum event, and 63% of attendees responded that offering the workshop in Spanish was helpful.

Hispanic families have not attended workshops in large numbers in the past and this was a vast improvement on that attendance. Based on the feedback after the workshop, parents felt like a more welcome part of the school community as a result of this workshop. 20% of respondents also reported that they were now better equipped to help their students with a variety of literacy skills. Workshop attendees also provided feedback on what future workshops they would like to attend, with 22% of participants wanting more information on MCAS, homework policies, and the difference between school in the United States and schooling in South/Central America.

While most attendees (80%) reported feeling welcome, a small percentage (8%) still see language as a barrier to their success in engaging with the school. The school community will need to work harder, including training teachers, to engage with these parents. The family engagement committee must look for ways to gather additional workshop ideas from Hispanic families. By reaching out to them in multiple ways the school can better understand their needs and how to work together as partners in their child's education.

Sustainability and improvement:

The committee is already planning for future workshops with content such as literacy, numeracy, homework, and similarities/differences with schooling in the U.S. compared to countries in Central/South America. Although the group is looking to have monthly workshops this year, participant and working group feedback suggest that evening workshops are more sustainable and that offering babysitting and food would help to increase attendance. The group will continue to keep track of attendance and parent feedback for these workshops.

Summary analysis/interpretation leadership skills:

With regards to my skills as a leader and facilitator of the group, I solicited feedback from the working group. I solicited answers to questions such as my preparedness for meetings and my ability to communicate clearly and work effectively with the team. Importantly, all committee members felt as though I was an active listener. The parent members also noted that they were inspired by my commitment to culturally relevant pedagogy and parent engagement. The committee felt that my strengths were my organization and my calmness, and they emphasized my focus on fairness and equity. In addition, they felt that I could keep the group on task and be reflective. The group also identified skills that needed improvement, including not taking it personally when the group is having difficulty working together. This is important as a school leader because that will often be the case in facilitating difficult work. In addition, the group asked that I make sure to send out resources in a timelier manner before the committee meetings. Reflecting on this feedback, I know that as a facilitator moving forward, I will solicit feedback from the committee on when they would like to receive readings/agendas and how far in advance is necessary.

Rationale

Artifact 3

The candidate coherently analyzes and interprets feedback from both the working group and the community members who attended the event. It is clear that feedback on the plan was sought through two different methods: open informal discussions and formal surveys. The candidate provides feedback on both the plan and the implemented strategy's efficacy and success. Feedback is differentiated by stakeholder need and experience. What is significant is that the candidate includes feedback from teachers, parents who attended the event, and working group members to demonstrate how each group experienced the event and what changes are needed to improve the strategy in the future. The candidate also provides opportunities for working group members to provide feedback throughout the planning and implementation process. The candidate describes how feedback was gathered and how different group members as well as the group as a whole were responsible for gathering and analyzing feedback.

Category Documents

1. Priority Area Justification—Include all relevant school demographic and enrollment data. Include all student achievement data relevant to the priority academic area (e.g., ELA MCAS achievement data and STAR ELA achievement data).
2. Summary of Policies and Strategies—Include the school's improvement plan and a list of the school's current programs, policies, and offerings that seek to engage families in the school community. Examples could include existing curriculum nights, open houses, parent-teacher conferences, or school groups in which parents are involved such as the PTO or the School Site Council.
3. Participation and Engagement of Families—Provide any survey or feedback instruments used to gather community feedback, faculty and staff feedback, and working group feedback. Feedback instruments should include those used to gather feedback both on the plan itself and the implemented strategy. Include all survey results including feedback from the working group on the candidate's leadership skills.

TO: Principal
FROM: PAL Candidate
RE: Commentary and Leadership Reflection

There were several lessons that I learned that will be important to remember as I become a school leader. First, keep a focus on the data and allow the team to determine the priority area. The next lesson was the importance of reviewing and sharing relevant research. Research was important in helping the team understand how culturally responsive teaching can impact and improve student learning. The final lesson relates to listening to parents/guardians. Parents/guardians know their children, and it is critical to solicit their feedback. Listening to families also enabled the team to get a better handle on the problem of engaging families. In creating the family workshop in Spanish, we addressed multiple barriers to family involvement. The barriers addressed included difficulty with communication, lack of English proficiency, and the home/school culture disconnect.

To form the family engagement committee, I first spoke to a team at a faculty meeting. After this initial invitation, I had some individual conversations with faculty members who I felt would offer a unique perspective on the school community. One example was the guidance counselor. The guidance counselor did not initially volunteer to be a part of the committee, but I reached out to her because of her knowledge of the school community, fluency in Spanish, and understanding of Central American cultures. In forming a working group, I learned to reach out to people even if they did not volunteer. Sometimes people might be reluctant to volunteer, but with additional support they may be willing to get involved. Had I not reached out to the guidance counselor, I would have been missing an important member of the team with a deep knowledge of culture and the community.

I have also gained several insights that will impact my future work. To begin, it is important to consider all stakeholders in the school community to ensure that there is engagement from everyone who can have an impact on student learning. Ultimately, the goal as a school leader is to ensure that learning occurs, and by working together with a focus on student learning, we can make that a priority. In order to foster increased engagement, I will regularly include the rest of the school staff in the committee's work. I provided limited communication on the purpose of, and the steps being taken by, the family engagement committee. Moving forward I would make sure that our notes are public and that I give updates at faculty meetings. Additionally, since some of the plan's steps include the work of teachers not part of the engagement committee, I would make sure to solicit their feedback on how to engage families. Throughout this process, a small group gave feedback, but a larger number of teachers giving feedback would be helpful. Overall, I believe I was successful facilitating the committee and implementing the workshop, but I must make more efforts to connect the committee's work to each classroom.

Our greatest success as a team was implementing our theory of action. As feedback from participating families demonstrates (see artifact 3), we now have more knowledge of the types of supports families want. Based on the feedback and follow up conversations with parents, parents left the workshop feeling empowered by the message that they can maintain their native language and support their child in reading in that language. The greatest challenge is facilitating a team effectively while listening to the opinions of the team and then coming to consensus. Every team is different, and in the case of the family engagement team, the group had a consistent focus on engaging families. However, we had different ideas of how to do that. Keeping the group focused on data and research was key to the success of that work. But I also needed to continually make sure that I was leading the group based on their consensus and that we were making decisions in the best interests of increasing students' academic achievement. We were able to do that because I promoted an atmosphere of trust most exemplified by sharing leadership and responsibility for different tasks with each group member.

Based on the feedback survey, several strengths emerged relevant to my work as a school leader. The team felt that the meetings were well organized with a focus on the research of emerging bilingualism of ELL students. The team felt that I was able to remain calm when there was conflict, and I was always ready to listen. Next, the team discussed my focus on the importance of promoting equity in education. Finally, and sometimes the most challenging, the group feedback indicated that I was able to keep them on task. As the facilitator it was my role to keep us on task and remind the group of our work's purpose.

Even though I experienced some success as a leader, I will need to improve in several areas as well. As noted by the committee, I should not take setbacks personally. In addition, it is important to give people on the committee plenty of time to read any research or information for the meetings. There were times when I mailed things out a day before the meeting and teachers needed more time to prepare for the meeting. One thing I would do as a facilitator moving forward is to prepare all materials at least a week in advance so that everyone has time to be prepared. Lastly, I learned the importance of prioritizing based on the needs of the group. I see my role as a facilitator—one who shares the work and cannot go it alone. By listening to members and using that information to prioritize the work I can do a better job facilitating the work and being a more collaborative leader.

Rationale

Commentary

The candidate describes and evaluates relevant leadership skills used throughout the implementation of the task. The candidate draws on specific learning experiences and provides clear examples that demonstrate how they used and adjusted leadership skills throughout the task. The candidate provides several examples of challenges encountered and what they would do differently in the future. The candidate also surveys group members on their leadership skills providing specific examples of group members' feedback. Group member feedback is used to evaluate the candidate's leadership strengths and suggest areas for future improvement.