Education Week - February 25, 2015 - Special Report - S44

S44
EDUCATION WEEK LEADERS TO LEARN FROM
February 25, 2015 n
edweek.org/leaders
By Alyson Klein
Patricia A. Spradley
Family Success
At the Heart
Of Engagement
Efforts in Mass.
District
I
LESSONS FROM
A LEADER
>> Strong
Relationships
Building relationships is essential
for social and academic success.
Knowing about individuals, beyond
a child's academics, makes difficult
conversations easier, because parents
believe that you genuinely care
about them and their child.
>> Planning and
Coordination
Coordinate, collaborate, and align
for efficiency to help alleviate
redundancy, create opportunities
for program improvements, and
enable the district to serve more
customers. Having a diversity of
players at the table, providing their
best thinking, is a win-win
for everybody.
>> Parent Capacity
Educators must understand
the importance of linking student
achievement and parent capacitybuilding
if schools are going to make
the necessary gains.
f parents in the Springfield, Mass.,
school system want to help their
children with the college-application
process, figure out how to balance
the family budget, learn to knit, or
even become a certified lifeguard,
there's a class for that, thanks to the
district's Parent Academy.
Now in its fourth year, the academy, started
by Patricia A. Spradley, the chief parent
and community engagement officer in the
26,000-student district, offers more than
three dozen courses. Some are geared toward
academics, some toward student well-being,
some are just for fun.
There's a theory behind the smorgasbord
of classes for parents. The Springfield Parent
Academy, which is a collaboration among
community agencies, businesses, schools, and
faith-based organizations, borrowed strategies
from similar efforts around the country,
including a well-known program in Boston.
But instead of focusing primarily on how
families can help their children do better in
school, as many academies do, the Springfield
program sought to add an appealing twist for
parents: How do you help yourself succeed?
"We knew we had to meet parents where
they were," Ms. Spradley said. "We realized
early on that the environment was going to
have to be something that interested them."
In this urban, high-poverty district on the
southwestern edge of Massachusetts, that
meant going beyond academics.
The goals at the heart of the program? To
help parents-and grandparents, siblings,
other caregivers, and community members-
connect with their neighborhood schools, pick
up new skills, learn to advocate for themselves
and their children, and, perhaps most
importantly, serve as role models for students
when it comes to the importance of lifelong
learning.
"When we can have children see their parents
succeed, when we can make the family a
success, that goes much further than just the
individual student," Ms. Spradley said.
Resources for Educators
To accommodate Springfield's sizable immigrant
population, academy courses are
offered in English but have also been made
available in Spanish, Vietnamese, and Somali.
Parents can take classes at libraries, schools,
businesses, churches, and in apartment complexes.
Courses sometimes have only one parent
enrolled or as many as 22. They can be
anything from one-off workshops to recurring
events.
The academy has become a resource for educators
throughout the district, said Gianna
Allentuck, the school-adjustment counselor at
Elias Brookings Elementary School. "It's still
relatively new, but in that time, holy moly,"
she said. "You name it, they have a workshop."
There are even "courses on wheels" that
come right to a particular school or cluster of
schools, sometimes at the request of a guidance
counselor, principal, parent, or teacher.
"You can call them up and say, 'I've got
50 families who need information about
asthma,' " and the Springfield Parent Academy
will figure out a way to meet the need,
Ms. Allentuck said.
Ms. Spradley and some members of her
team lead the courses themselves or find instructors
who are willing to lead classes for
free. The whole program costs the district less
than $100,000 a year. The efforts seem to be
paying off. By the end of last year, the district
had nearly 250 registrations for its courses.
The Parent Academy may be one of the
most recent, prominent examples of Ms.
Spradley's leadership, but it's far from the
only high point of her more than two decades
of work with the district, under four different
superintendents.
Ms. Spradley, 56, came to Springfield
through a nontraditional route. Her last job
before coming to the district was working as
a regional manager for Manpower Temporary
Services, a job-placement agency. But she'd
felt like she had hit a ceiling of sorts on that
track, and in the early 1990s, the district was
looking to hire three new leaders with backgrounds
outside of education who could bring
a fresh perspective to district management
and serve as "change agents" within the system.
The tasks included helping the district
run more efficiently and better prepare students
for the workforce.
A Strong Advocate
After helping with that work, Ms. Spradley
put her past life in human resources to
use, heading up the district's efforts to help
students transition from school into the
workforce. As the program grew, she added a
family component. Her school-to-career program,
Stairway to Success, required parents
to attend an orientation, where Ms. Spradley
gave them the same job- and career-interest
assessment she gave to her students.
"It helped foster some desires and aspirations
for them as well," she said.
Ms. Spradley's portfolio has vastly expanded
over the years, and she currently
oversees eight programs. She's in charge of
parent liaisons, the full- and part-time staff
members assigned to each school to help facilitate
contact with families. She helps parents
navigate public school options, which allow
students to transfer to public schools outside
the district. She works on family outreach,
school volunteers, and homeless education
services. She also plays a role in deciding who
can open charter schools in Springfield.
Also in her portfolio: the district's parentPOSITION:
Chief Parent and Community Engagement Officer
DISTRICT: Springfield Public Schools, Springfield, Mass.
EXPERTISE: Parent Engagement
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