Working alongside students, parents, and families

Social justice in schools requires authentic collaboration among school leaders and marginalized students and families. 

As faculty members who teach aspiring and in-service school leaders, we see a deep desire from our students to find better ways to make their schools more equitable and welcoming, particularly for marginalized students and families.

The voices of Black, Latinx, Asian, and Indigenous students and families are missing as decision makers and agents of change in schools, for several reasons. Most public schools operate within a traditional hierarchy, with those at the higher levels of the organization, such as the superintendent, school board, and state legislature or agency, making the decisions. Also, educators and society believe that adults know what is best for kids and that young people do not have the maturity, wisdom, or life experience to make important decisions about their lives. In fact, research has found that this is far from the truth (Lac & Mansfield, 2018).

Finally, schools continue to use a rigid conception of parental and family involvement, typically grounded in white, middle-class values. Under this outdated view, caregivers are physically present in schools and can attend parent-teacher conferences during the day and support the Parent Teacher Association (PTA) program through fundraisers. PTAs often serve as vehicles to meet the needs of the school rather than creating a collaborative agenda with parents and caregivers.

Substantive changes toward racial justice and educational equity in schools will require the active participation and involvement of marginalized students and families. We know from our research what is possible when education leaders work side-by-side with racially marginalized students, families, and community members.

Building stronger schools through student voice

A great deal of education research shows the importance of centering students in our schools if we want to make our schools inviting, equitable, and places of deep learning. But what does centering students look like? And how do we do it? We have worked in and with many schools throughout our careers and have seen some remarkable ways principals and teachers are applying the idea of “centering students” in their everyday work in schools.

First, transformational educators are creating school climates that foster student voice and choice to make learning more meaningful for students. For example, educators know the content and standards for which they are held accountable. But some adults are asking students for input on how to best convey their learning. Teachers at a Colorado elementary school accomplish this by using bingo cards with a 5 x 5 matrix describing a variety of activities. Students may choose four activities to convey their development. But because the choices must make bingo, students must choose a variety of activities. No one can do all art projects, all research presentations, or all multiple-choice tests to show what they have learned.

Second, educators are engaging young people in decision-making processes on issues that impact them. A Texas middle school principal administered a survey every fall and spring mid-term to allow students to evaluate the school climate and voice concerns (Mansfield, 2014). The principal worked to address some of the concerns quickly, so students knew they were being heard. The students understood that some of their requests might be more time-consuming or costly and need additional time or other resources. For example, one semester, students complained about the “smelly” and “dirty” bathrooms and lack of privacy due to faulty door handles. The principal and custodial team reworked the daily cleaning cycle and repaired or replaced damaged locks. Students also suggested that the school offer more classes in the fine arts, such as dance and drama. Within one year, this request was approved, and after two years, the school hired a full-time dance instructor. Also, a mariachi band and dance club began meeting after school. The school continues these practices nearly a decade later.

Third, students yearn to share a place at the policy-decision table, making their educational systems more democratic and just. For example, in a growing number of school districts, students are members of the school board, some with full voting rights. Jonathan E. Collins (2022) has written about getting students involved in the budgeting process as early as middle school. Initiatives like this show that students are quite capable of informed decision making.

Students have taken the lead in community-wide efforts to promote social justice and equity in their schools. Like many districts across Virginia, Alexandria City Public Schools struggled with the vestiges of post-Civil War Confederacy and the Massive Resistance movement against school desegregation. In 2020, students led 10 school and community events centered on identity, and how some school names, and the figures who inspired them, did not reflect their community values (Mansfield & Lambrinou, 2022). Students, along with the superintendent, school principals, and school board, worked as a coalition to not only change the school names but also look at issues such as the color and class divide in advanced coursework and in the gifted and talented program.

We can see through this example and many others how students are mature and capable thinkers and leaders who can interpret education policies and practices. It is not just adults who understand history or who are able to interpret how current problems plaguing a school district may have deep roots in past inequities.

Centering parents and caregivers to improve schools

Just as there is a plethora of research on the benefits of including student voice in schools, decades of research demonstrate how family engagement improves student attendance, achievement, and graduation rates.

A common but narrow view of parental involvement focuses on how parents can support their child and school. Attending parent-teacher conferences, participating in the PTA, helping with homework, chaperoning field trips, and so on have become the script for “involved” parents to follow. Any parent or family that deviates from the script is viewed as deficient. In other words, the “script” is a one-size-fits-all understanding of parental involvement. And this script can exacerbate existing inequities, as parents with more of the expected resources are able to contribute more to their schools (Murphy, 2019).

Substantive changes toward racial justice and educational equity in schools will require the active participation and involvement of marginalized students and families.

What happens when parents and caregivers reimagine the script of parental involvement and become transformative leaders in the school? How might a building leader support this work when they have previously served as author or narrator? We have seen transformative building leaders challenge the dominant views and rewrite the script of parental involvement with and alongside parents and caregivers. Two examples in particular stand out.

Learning from parents

From parent involvement research, we know that schools place parents in roles of service, which makes sense if we only focus on school needs (Scribner & Fernández, 2017). Seeking to challenge the status quo was Connecticut high school principal Ms. Jackson (a pseudonym). Faced with the challenge of increasing student achievement, Ms. Jackson understood that she could not address long-standing systemic and structural issues alone. She sought input from community members, students, and parents and caregivers about what they believed the priorities of the school should be. In various listening circles, Ms. Jackson learned that for decades the school had remained a separate entity from the community, which created mistrust among community members, students, and particularly parents and caregivers.

Ms. Jackson concentrated on learning from parents and caregivers. By establishing weekly coffee sessions hosted in the mornings and evenings to allow for better access, designating a dedicated space for parents and caregivers in the school, and inviting parents to be a part of her advisory council, Ms. Jackson began to slowly earn the trust of parents and caregivers. She flipped the script of parental involvement at the school and repositioned parents as partners and decision makers in the school. Through this process, Ms. Jackson and parents were able to establish a parent advisory group to help provide guidance to Ms. Jackson and her leadership team regarding school policies, processes, and practices.

Providing space

Sometimes the best thing building leaders can do is to provide space for parents and caregivers and step aside. It’s challenging, but sometimes parents and caregivers need space to process their own issues, concerns, and joyous moments that may or may not directly involve the school.

School leaders at an Indiana elementary school knew that a group of Latinx immigrant parents had been meeting weekly in the school’s family resource room. The principal did not know what was happening during these meetings, but she honored their need for the space. It turns out that parents were organizing around anti-immigrant issues and cultivating a collective kinship amongst themselves and other Spanish-speaking families within and beyond the school (Fernández & Scribner, 2018). This work perhaps would have been stifled if school personnel were attending and unintentionally invading the sacred space the parents had established for themselves. For instance, the topic and threats of anti-immigration policies were often at the forefront of meetings. Parents intentionally used this space to strategize and leverage resources to support Latinx families. Had school officials been present, the conversation would not have been as open and vulnerable. Because school officials present a real threat to undocumented parents and families, Latinx families were cautious of what to share with them regarding their immigration status. Given the freedom that parents had, the space they created grew to be a place of active parent organizing, healing, and joy for Spanish-speaking immigrant parents and families.

Sometimes the best way to support and center parents and caregivers is to leverage resources, in this case space, and to step aside. However, staying too far on the sidelines for too long as a school leader can further marginalize the work of parents and caregivers. Because the principal failed to learn anything about the work being done by the parent group, parents began to question if the principal even cared about them or their children. As such, building leaders should find a balance between stepping aside and continuing to demonstrate support. This can be achieved by periodically checking in with parents and caregivers to gauge how things are going and to see if they need additional support or resources. Ultimately, the parents and caregivers are writing this script, but building leaders need to be ready to step in when invited.

Questions to consider

Rather than offering a laundry list of recommendations for how to promote student voice and parent and caregiver involvement, we offer you some questions and points for consideration as you work to partner with students, parents, and communities:

• How do you know what you know? For example, perhaps your school has implemented a new restorative practices program. How will you know its impact without a systematic way to gauge it
• Where will I find the time? Embedding student voice or parent and caregiver involvement can range in intensity. Your initiative might be simply to implement a school-wide or grade-level survey about the climate and culture at your school or to facilitate a full-on research project to engage students and families.
• Where do I begin? Holding listening circles with students or families is a good first step. A listening circle requires a quiet and safe space for participants to honestly share their greatest hopes, fears, and concerns regarding a specific topic. Your role in the session is to take notes and listen.

Social justice work in schools should not land solely on the shoulders of school administrators or teachers. Deep and authentic collaborations with and alongside marginalized students and families are necessary for lasting reform and change.

References

Collins, J.E. (2022). The case for democratic reforms in urban school districts. Phi Delta Kappan, 104 (2), 62-63.

Fernández, É. & Scribner, S.M.P. (2018). “Venimos para que se oiga la voz”: Activating community cultural wealth as parental educational leadership. Journal of Research on Leadership Education, 13 (1), 59-78.

Lac, V.T. & Mansfield, K.C. (2018). What do students have to do with educational leadership? Making a case for centering student voice. Journal of Research on Leadership Education, 13 (1), 38-58.

Mansfield, K.C. (2014). How listening to student voices can inform and strengthen social justice research and practice. Educational Administration Quarterly, 50 (3), 392-430.

Mansfield, K.C. & Lambrinou, M. (2022). “This is not who we are”: Students leading for anti-racist policy changes in Alexandria City Public Schools, Virginia. Educational Policy, 36 (1), 19-56.

Murphy, B. (2019). PTAs, parent involvement, and the challenges of relying on private money to subsidize public education. Phi Delta Kappan, 100 (8), 42-46.

Scribner, S.M.P. & Fernández, É. (2017). Organizational politics of parental engagement: The intersection of school reform, anti-immigration policies, and Latinx parent organizing. Educational Policy, 31 (6), 895-920.

This article appears in the October 2023 issue of Kappan, Vol. 105, No. 2, p. 48-52.