Successful HS ESL Parent Meeting

For the past 15 years, I've organized ESL family engagement meetings at the elementary school level and all I had to do was send home an invitation and parents would show up!
Now that I am at a high school level I realize that the process and approach has to be different for family engagement nights. 
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So, I came to a firm understanding that in order to successfully support our students at the HS level, a group effort is a must. What I mean is, it is imperative to create a culture of opportunities and a sense of collaboration among staff so our families and students are supported and successful. 

Culture of Collaboration and Responsibilities 

In order to ensure success for our students and to encourage our ESL families to engage and participate in school events, our staff must have a strong sense of community and shared responsibility. As an ESL teacher, I feel very strongly about the need to have our ESL families' help in making sure that our students (especially ELs) have the support they need to be successful. Therefore, I invited several school staff members to team up with me in planning and implementing our very first ESL family engagement night. 
Our form of communication was through email and we maintained a constant communication with all the details. 

Who

The perfect team to implement our first meeting consisted of our Spanish teacher (Ms. Perdomo), our ELA teacher (Ms. Armstrong), our bilingual secretary (Rina Rodriguez), our guidance counselors ( Mrs. Foster and Stacey Diaz), and admin (Dr. A).

Process 

Three of us (bilingual ones) called ALL our ESL parents and personally invited them to attend. We called them with about 2-3 weeks in advance. We also provided the opportunity to attend to either one of two sessions offered. Both sessions followed the same format. 
​We also sent home this form as a reminder.

ESL Parent Meeting Format 

We didn't want this meeting to be a type of sit and get without engagement, so we provided our information in centers. We also wanted to model how we strive as teachers to have our students collaborate and work in groups with their peers. Also, being in small groups provides a more comfortable setting for parents to ask questions and engage without fear. 
We  started all together and received a welcome from all of staff who was present. I explained the format of the meeting and parents were divided into groups to begin learning. 
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The groups and information provided were as follows:

• PowerSchool with Ms. Perdomo

Parents at this center received their parent log in to access their child's grades and attendance online. We had a few chrome books available for them to login. Our school is 100% paperless so our parents must be able to access our online portal to stay informed. Many of our parents were surprised to see their child's grades. They had already asked them and they had told their parents that they were doing great. Oops! Now parents are empowered to see for themselves! 

• Attendance with Mrs. Rodriguez 

At this center, parents received our county and school attendance requirements and consequences for missing too many days of school. Parents were also able to log in and see when students have missed days and verify and it's excused or not. We believe this information is relevant because, in order for our students to be successful academically and linguistically, they MUST be in school. 

• Graduation Requirements with Mrs. Francis 

This was my center and I had the opportunity to share with our parents the requirements our state/county has in order to see our students cross the stage and receive their HS diploma. I had a handout that provided the number of credits students need to be able to be promoted from grade to grade and the required classes students have to receive for graduation. At this center, I had the guidance counselor with me so if parents had specific questions about classes or credits, she was able to answer them. 

Parents spent about 15 minutes at each center and rotated to another center until they had been to all three. 
Our principal was there in the room with us to answer questions and engage with our parents as well. Our ELA teacher, Ms. Armstrong, was present and greeted our families and also helped answer any questions regarding class grades or content questions. 
Stacey Diaz, our county's ESL guidance counselor was with us during our first session and was able to share valuable information with our families too. 
We also had a representative from a local community organization called "El Puente Hispano" who provided our families with all the available support they have for students and parents.  

Our first ESL parent night is a success! Parents are learning how to check Powerschool, about graduation requirements and attendance expectations! #Spidersimpact @emilyfranESL @SSSArmstrongCHS pic.twitter.com/tb9dYttTG2

— Dr. Adam Auerbach (@AdamAuerbach) October 16, 2018

"As a community with shared responsibility for all learners in the school, school-based practitioners can collectively move their school forward to ensure an equitable, high-quality education for English learners and can create a responsive school for their parents and guardians." - #TESOL6ps

I must say that without the sense of collaboration and responsibility from everyone who helped - this 1st awesome meeting with our ESL families would have not been as successful as it was. 

Our parents were very grateful for all the information we provided and were also happy to create connections with other parents in our school. 

If you are having successful ESL parent meetings at the HS level, please share your experience with us! We'd love to continue what we started and the more ideas we have the better!!

​Thank you for reading!