Families in the Driver's Seat: Catalyzing Familial Transformative Agency for Equitable Collaboration

Abstract

Context An emerging body of research has begun to re-envision how nondominant families and communities might become powerful actors in equity-based educational change when issues of power, race, culture, language, and class are integrated into family engagement efforts. Beyond the commitment to more equitable engagement, the field offers little empirically-grounded evidence with regard to how to shift power and build collective agency, particularly in the moment-to-moment interactions that constitute the ongoing daily practice of family-school relations. Purpose of Study We sought to understand how nondominant parents and educators could enact equitable collaboration in the school-based co-design of a parent education curriculum. We sought to better “map” the journey to transformative agency of nondominant parents by asking: What were the turning points in the emergence and evolution of transformative agency amongst nondominant parents from different racial/cultural/linguistic communities? Within and across these turning points, how did parents narrate and negotiate their roles and evolve their transformative agency? Setting The research took place in a suburban school district in the Western United States outside a major urban city, in a region of increasing suburban poverty and marked racial, cultural, and linguistic diversity. Participants The design team included nine parents from two schools who identified as African/African American, Latina, Vietnamese, and white; three white teachers, two white principals, two district administrators (African American and multiracial), and five researchers (Asian American, African American, and Latino/a). Research Design This study merged a framework of equitable collaborations with expansive learning theory and employed participatory design research (PDR) methodologies to examine 10 design meetings with historically marginalized parents that sought to build authentic relationships, reciprocity, and accountability to one another and the targeted outcome. Findings/Results Our findings suggest a series of turning points marked by discursive expansions in which nondominant parents re-envisioned their own and educators’ roles in educational change. Through the design process, parents surfaced and engaged historical contradictions, developed collective understandings, modeled possibilities for collective voice and influence, and enacted their collective influence through the collection of data from other parents, the development and piloting of a lesson on bullying, and the completion of the curriculum. Conclusions/Recommendations We argue that these methods and theories offer ways forward from documenting deficit-based processes and historically-rooted power asymmetries in family engagement towards enacting equitable and democratic processes that leverage the expertise of nondominant families in tandem with that of formal educators and researchers.

Leadership for Family and Community Engagement: A Qualitative Policy Analysis of State Principal Evaluation Processes

“…State principal evaluation policies must place emphasis on how well school leaders develop meaningful school-community relationships, as FCE can serve as a mechanism for establishing partnerships that also contribute to school effectiveness and equitable opportunities for students and families (DeMatthews et al, 2016). This is especially true given the urgent need to address the dynamics of race, culture, and power within and around schools that serve nondominant communities (Ishimaru, 2020).…”

“…At its core, this level acknowledges most FCE approaches carry pervasive deficit framings and are structured around dominant, Eurocentric thinking, further excluding nondominant families and communities (Baquedano-López et al, 2013). Leaders’ must therefore engage in practices that move beyond symbolic gestures of inclusion to two-way communication whereby school and family stakeholders co-construct equitable collaborations that honor the strengths diverse parents bring to the school (Flores & Kyere, 2020; Ishimaru, 2020). Principals inclined toward authentic FCE seek to be in relationships with equalized power dynamics and recognize families and community members of all racial, ethnic, and economic backgrounds for their assets and cultural knowledge (Crawford, 2017; Ishimaru & Galloway, 2014; Wang, 2018; Warren et al, 2009).…”

“…This work necessitates leaders develop a deep understanding of the community, its history, how it has changed over time, and an expressed commitment to collaboratively deconstruct the unfair systems that have shaped inequitable school-community conditions (Green, 2017). In essence, authentic partnerships embody the both/and notion Ishimaru (2020) explained, “ Both families and educators have expertise we need in order to “fix” our systems- and both need to build capacity to work toward systemic change” (pp. 140–141).…”

“…Yet, principals seldom include families in decision-making processes and when they do it is often “inauthentic window dressing” that fails to recognize reciprocal connections between school and community (Noguera & Syeed, 2020, p. 85). This is especially true in nondominant communities given the “complexities of educational systems and the dynamics of race, culture, and power within and around them” (Ishimaru, 2020, p. 4) that can exacerbate leaders’ deficit orientation toward these groups.…”

“…The exclusion of families and communities from positions of power and leadership within the traditional school hierarchy is challenged by critical scholars advancing a more inclusive, asset-based approach to equitable family and community engagement (FCE) (Bertrand & Rodela, 2018; Fernández & Paredes Scribner, 2018; Ishimaru, 2020). Creating and maintaining healthy, safe, and supportive learning environments for all children requires a collective approach that includes meaningful FCE by principals who acknowledge the contributions of local stakeholders and centers them as active leaders and change agents in the school (Bertrand et al, 2018; Noguera, 2001; Warren et al, 2009).…”