Engaging Families in the Education of Neglected and Delinquent Youth in Residential Care

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Engaging Families in the Education of Neglected
and Delinquent Youth in Residential Care

• Trina W. Osher, M.A.
• Huff Osher Consulting, Inc.
• David M. Osher, Ph.D.
• American Institutes for Research

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Challenges to family involvement --

• ______
• ______
• ______
• ______

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Is this the Education System We Want for Our
Youth?
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Stop the School to Prison PipelineChristine A.
Christle, EDJJ 2004 Presentation
School Failure
Suspension
Dropout
Delinquency
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Keep in mind Its about being kids first
youth who need special help to do what their
siblings and friends do naturally.
Family Driven and Youth Guided
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Children and Youth Dont Exist in Isolation

• If we are really going to keep families safe,
  we need to do that in the context of communities
  and family.
• Viola P. Miller
• Commissioner, Tennessee Department of Childrens
  Services

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PARENTAL INVOLVEMENT

• The term parental involvement means the
  participation of parents in regular, two-way, and
  meaningful communication involving student
  academic learning and other school activities,
  including ensuring
• that parents play an integral role in assisting
  their childs learning
• that parents are encouraged to be actively
  involved in their childs education at school
• that parents are full partners in their childs
  education and are included, as appropriate, in
  decision making and on advisory committees to
  assist in the education of their child.
• No child Left Behind Sec. 1902 Definitions

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Who Has Responsibility for Family Involvement?

• Families, administrators, school staff, students,
  and, in many cases, the courts.
• What is the educational administrators role?
• Administrators are usually responsible for
  implementing policies that make the facility
  accessible to and hospitable for families.
• Educational leader should ensure that students
  have access to their families and that families
  have access to their children.
• What should families do?
• Get involved. Dont wait to be asked. Offer to
  help the school.

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Research Base for Family Involvement

• Family involvement is key to improving school and
  mental health outcomes and reducing disparities.
• Parental efficacy and positive attitudes toward
  mental health services correlate with a
  parents assessment of his or her ability to meet
  an improvement goal.
• Professionally or agency-driven interactions
  between professionals and families can work
  against self-efficacy and empowerment,
  particularly for caregivers who already feel
  socially stigmatized of marginalized.

IN PRESS Gullotta, T. P. Blau, G. (Eds.).
(2007). Family Influences on Childhood Behavior
and Development Evidence-Based Prevention and
Treatment Approaches. NY, Routledge.
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Parent Perceptions Matter

• Even after controlling for diverse variables
  (e.g., the educational and employment levels of
  both parents, childs grade, gender, and race)
  the strongest predictor of parent involvement was
  the parents perceptions of teacher outreach.
• Parent involvement was highest when parents
  perceived their childs teacher as
• Valuing their contribution to their childs
  education,
• Trying to keep them informed about their childs
  strengths and weaknesses and
• Providing them with specific suggestions to help
  their child.
• Parents Perceptions of Teacher Outreach and
  Parent Involvement in Childrens Education.
  Patrikakou, Evanthia N., and Weissberg, Roger P.
  in Journal of Prevention Intervention in the
  Community (The Haworth Press, Inc.) Vol. 20, No
  1/2, 2000 pp. 103-119.

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Logic Model for Family-driven and Youth Guided
Care
Collaborative Partnership
Family Youth Experience Professional Expertise
Communication Trust
Improved Safety, Health, and Well Being for
Children, Youth, Families, Schools, and
Communities
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Bottom Line

• Learning is social process that depends upon the
  ability of the student to attend and the teacher
  to personalize
• Emotions and social emotional capacities affect
  learning and teaching
• Relationships and social and emotional capacity
  provide a foundation for learning and transition
  planning
• Contexts affect emotions and relationships
• There are measurable conditions for learning that
  affect the ability of students to attend and
  teachers to personalize
• These conditions for learning are particularly
  important for students in correctional settings

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How NOT to Involve FamiliesSome Examples

• But, Im the doctor
• But, we already made a decision
• But, we didnt mean now
• We dont do it that way --

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The Challenge of Education in Correctional
Environments
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What Are The Conditions and Capacities for
Success?
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Why Be Concerned with Conditions for Learning and
Family Involvement in Correctional Settings?

• Key to addressing the educational needs of
  students
• Key to ensuring that these students have the same
  opportunities to achieve as students in community
  schools
• Necessary for successful return to the community

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Bottom Line

• Families often know students strengths and needs
• Families may have other critical information
• Families are necessary to successful transitions
• Family Efficacy and Trust are related to positive
  outcomes

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Low Achieving Students Students Who are at
Risk--

• Particular susceptibility to
• Low Teacher Support
• Negative Peer Relationships
• Chaotic Reactive Environments
• Poor Instructional and Behavioral Practices
• Family-school conflict or disconnect

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Factors To Consider In Working With Families

• Geography, transportation, financial resources,
  time
• Family members
• Skills and knowledge
• Experiences with education or other systems
• History and
• Culture and language
• Characteristics of the institution
• Security
• Staffing
• Court restrictions
• Look in the Guide for a list of opportunities to
  involve families (pages 7-8).

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What Families Say Helps Them Get Involved

• Culturally comfortable settings
• Trust building
• Communication mechanisms
• Outreach strategies
• Family support services
• See the Guide for specific suggestions (pages
  11-13).
• Consulting with families of students being
  served will help an institutions leaders choose
  strategies best suited to their specific families
  and that can work in their setting.

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Take Advantage Of Family Visits To Engage Them In
School Activities

• Give tours of the school on visiting day.
• Open a family resource center in the school
  where
• families can pick up information relevant to
  their childs education and transition to a
  community school and
• teachers can explain the curriculum and what
  students have been working on.
• Display samples of student work in the visiting
  area.
• Give each student a packet of their recent work
  and coach them to review it with their family on
  visiting day.
• Look in the Guide for strategies that
  administrators say are working in their
  facilities see page 14

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Suggestions for Smooth Transition Home

• Include the students family in transition
  planning from the start.
• Help the family gather necessary information.
• Help them foster relationships with their
  community school education program BEFORE the
  student makes the transition.

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Involving Families in Evaluation to Determine If
Outcomes are Improving

• Give families and youth a significant role in
  designing the questions and methods of getting
  feedback that is meaningful, culturally
  appropriate, and family friendly.
• Hire and train families and youth to collect the
  data, to make follow-up calls when surveys are
  not returned, conduct phone interviews, and
  moderate focus groups.
• Ask families to support objective data by adding
  their personal testimonies when it is time to
  report on the programs or institutions impact.

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Engaging Families For Program Improvement and
System Change

• Identify governance boards, planning councils,
  advisory groups, and working committees where
  family input would be desirable. Recruit, train,
  and support families who serve in this capacity.
• Seek family input when developing any plans to
  improve family involvement in an institution or
  program.
• Demonstrate genuine respect for family members,
  warmly welcome their collaboration, and
  generously provide support to make the
  partnership work.
• Look in the Guide for a list of strategies that
  work (page 10).

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Relationships Are Key

• Establishing communication with a students
  family may require some creative effort and
  persistence.
• Dont assume that the family is not interested
  just because you dont get a response right away.
• Use more than one strategy to reach out to each
  family such as
• Sending a message in the mail
• Making a phone call and
• Trying to meet them in person the next time they
  visit their child at the facility.
• Look in the Guide for a list of specific
  questions to ask families about communication
  (page17).

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Families Expect Programs To Be Therapeutic and
Family Friendly

• Families Want Students to Have
• High-quality education, not simply one that
  pushes all students toward a GED regardless of
  their abilities and goals
• Staff who are qualified and experienced
• Vocational education assessments and training
• Creative but rigorous alternative learning
  strategies
• Social skills training
• Qualified professional mental health services
  and
• Staff who treat their children with dignity and
  respect.

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What Youth Say About Involving Their Families

• My mom and me agreed on everything and that was
  one of the biggest factors in getting through my
  treatment.
• Family support is a strong issue, and they have
  to be involved in the treatment.
• There should be some information for the parents
  to encourage them to want to be involved.
• If the child gives up the parent or support
  needs to want it for them. Its sad to see the
  parent give up.
• Blamed and Ashamed the treatment experiences of
  youth with
• co-occurring substance abuse and mental health
  disorders and their families
• Federation of Families for Childrens Mental
  Health

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3 Leverage Points for Transformation
Systems Policies, Laws, Regulations
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Universal Strategies for All Families1st Tier

• Create a welcoming environment
• Solicit family input
• Provide an orientation
• Establish ongoing communication
• Sponsor social activities

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Selective Strategies to Boost Some Families2nd
Tier

• Connect families with each other
• Offer families education and training
• Take advantage of family visits to their child
• Recruit family members to serve on advisory groups

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Intensive Strategies for Hard to Reach
Families3rd Tier

• Tailor approaches to each family
• Repair relationships between the student and
  their family
• Hire Family Liaisons to work with families 11

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Making the Paradigm Shift to Family, and Youth
Driven Practice
Families and Youth

• Source of Solutions
• Relationship
• Orientation
• Assessment
• Planning
• Access to Services
• Expectations
• Outcomes

Trina and David Osher. The Paradigm Shift to True
Collaboration with Families Journal of Child and
Family Studies, Vol. 11, No. 1, March 2002, pp.
4760.
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PARADIGM SHIFT The Changing Role for Families
and Youth
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PARADIGM SHIFT The Changing Role for Families
and Youth
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How Do We Make Practice Family-driven?

• A change in vocabulary is not enough to transform
  practice.
• Communities, agencies, providers, and families
  need training, technical assistance, and on-going
  support to make the paradigm shift.
• State and national policies must encourage,
  support, and sustain
• The conditions that are necessary for it to
  happen and
• The capacities that must exist for it to happen.
• A systemic approach to improving conditions and
  capacities

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Will This Fish Thrive?

• What is the condition of the water?
• What is the fishs capacity to live in this kind
  of water?
• What happens when something changes?
• Can we manage the system for better outcomes?

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Example of Conditions and Capacities to Support
Family Involvement
Families and youth have access to useful, usable,
and understandable information and data, as well
as sound professional expertise so they have good
information to make decisions.

• Conditions
• Accurate information is available in formats
  families can use.
• Families are given copies of data and reports
  with clear explanations.
• Professionals use commonly understood language
  without being condescending.
• Professionals support data-based decisions made
  by families.

• Capacities
• Families know how to read data and reports and
  are able to use information to make choices that
  best meet their needs.
• Families know how to ask for information and
  explanations.
• Professionals know how to access and allocate
  funds to implement data-based decisions made by
  families.

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What Does It Take to Involve Families in Systems
Change?

• A safe, welcoming, and supportive environment
• Sharing all information with everyone and
• Resources to support family involvement such as
  funds for transportation, child care, and
  training events.

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Find the Balance
Reduce risks such as anxiety about change.
Responsibility and Power
Draw upon strengths and assets such as the
desire to move forward and the courage to make
change.
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CAUTION!
This is not a joy ride. The stakes and the risks
are HIGH FOR ALL!
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Where Can You Get More Information?

• Look in the Guide for lists of
• References
• Resources and
• Other centers for technical assistance and
  information
• www.neglected-delinquent.org
• www.cecp.org
• systemsofcare.samhsa.gov
• www.tapartnership.org