{"id":5614,"date":"2019-10-03T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-10-03T04:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/aurora-institute.org\/blog\/cw_post\/bringing-parents-into-competency-based-schools\/"},"modified":"2020-03-21T09:13:02","modified_gmt":"2020-03-21T13:13:02","slug":"bringing-parents-into-competency-based-schools","status":"publish","type":"cw_post","link":"https:\/\/aurora-institute.org\/cw_post\/bringing-parents-into-competency-based-schools\/","title":{"rendered":"Bringing Parents Into Competency-Based Schools"},"content":{"rendered":"

This is the second post in a series about the Chugach School District in Alaska. Links to the other posts are provided at the end of this article.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"WhittierWhen teachers talk about the challenges of competency-based education, they tend to focus on big, structural changes such as varied pacing and pathways, diverse assessments, and student agency. So when I asked teachers at the Whittier Community School about their biggest challenge, I was surprised when two of them independently mentioned helping parents understand and embrace the system.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the biggest challenges right now is the influx of new families,\u201d Teacher Lindsey Erk said, \u201cand educating those families on what type of system we are, when 99% are used to a traditional system.\u201d Teacher Andrea Korbe said, \u201cI think the biggest challenge every year is helping families understand what competency-based really means. Because parents are always trying to hang their children\u2019s education on the framework of their own education. Naturally, that\u2019s their lens for understanding it. Understanding competency-based is my job, so it makes sense to me, but we need to help parents understand it bit by bit, as their kids grow and things change for them.\u201d<\/p>\n

This Is Just The Way It Is<\/strong><\/p>\n

At most other schools I\u2019ve visited, parents and guardians had a choice to send their children to a different school or to select the traditional track in a school that offered both traditional and competency-based options<\/a>. But reaching the nearest school to Whittier requires paying a hefty toll to drive through a long, single-lane tunnel that only opens in each direction for 15 minutes per hour\u2014and then driving well beyond that.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re in a unique situation because we\u2019ve been at this for a number of years,\u201d Korbe explained, \u201cand when a parent comes in, this is just the way it is. There\u2019s no discussion of \u2018Do we want to get on board?\u2019 or \u2018Do we want to change this?\u2019\u2014which is where many schools are. And given the transient nature of our community, every year we\u2019re onboarding more parents throughout the year. We need to say \u2018This is what this means, this is how it looks, and this is how our system progresses.\u2019 So it\u2019s just this continuous loop of information that you\u2019re trying to move everybody through.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"WhittierPersonalizing Parent Relations<\/strong><\/p>\n

These teachers\u2019 perspectives show one version of what bringing parents into a mature competency-based system can look like. In some ways it sounds like what parents encounter in the traditional system, in the sense that the school\u2019s basic approach to education isn\u2019t really up for negotiation. But what\u2019s different is the level of effort and the types of strategies used to bring parents on board and help them understand. Much like competency-based instruction for students, the strategies for parents also have varied pathways and personalization.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have tried a number of things,\u201d Korbe said. \u201cIt\u2019s different for every person. When you\u2019re first enrolling, we give you the 30,000-foot view. Then as your student is in our system longer, through conferences and other one-on-one parent meetings, you continue to educate them about \u2018This is where your student is, and this is what will come next for them,\u2019 and \u2018Yes, they\u2019re making progress,\u2019 or \u2018No, they\u2019re not\u2014and that\u2019s concerning.\u2019 So you\u2019re working through it, usually with parents one on one. We\u2019ve tried some community parent meetings, but that didn\u2019t prove very successful for us. One on one has been more effective. Because you can get more into the nitty gritty. I can\u2019t talk with a parent about their kid in front of an entire group of parents, and answer their particular questions. That\u2019s not ethical.\u201d It would be easy to imagine a larger school, with 50 or 100 new students entering every year, making greater use of group orientation strategies, but clearly there is no substitute for individualized discussion when possible.<\/p>\n

Both teachers felt that parents whose children entered the school in the early grades have been more successful in understanding the educational approach. Erk explained that it\u2019s essential to meet with families often when their children first enroll, and convey repeatedly over time that \u201cseat time no longer matters, that you can sit in a class all semester long and not master the content. So teaming up with parents and kids to make sure they understand that mastery is what we\u2019re looking for, not seat time. It\u2019s a lot of conversation. It\u2019s a lot of small bits of information at first, then slowly building on it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not a good fit for some parents,\u201d she added. \u201cYou have to have an open mind. Some people want an \u2018A\u2019 or an \u2018F\u2019 on a report card. Sometimes we need to tell parents that they can translate it however they want in their minds, but Whittier is going to report it according to our categories\u201d\u2014which are Emerging, Developing, Proficient, and Advanced. For more quantifiable subjects such as math, they also tell parents that Proficient corresponds to reaching 80% on end-of-level assessments.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome parents don\u2019t understand our system, but they trust us,\u201d Erk said. \u201cWe build that community trust, that we\u2019re here to do what\u2019s best for their kid. And we encourage them to come in and ask questions and learn more, but there\u2019s also just a lot of flat-out trust that we\u2019re going to do what\u2019s best for their kid.\u201d<\/p>\n

Student-led conferences also play an important role in bringing parents into the school. Erk explained that in the cultures that most students\u2019 families come from, it\u2019s not consistent with cultural norms for children to speak extensively to adults as the discussion leader. (More than half of the Whittier families came to Alaska from the Philippines, American Samoa, and Guam, and several other families are native Alaskans. We did not discuss which of these cultures hold particular cultural norms.) Teachers explain to parents why the school believes it\u2019s important for students to direct the discussion in these ways. They said that most parents come to see the value in student-led conferences, because they see how excited and invested their children are in their learning, and it helps parents understand the school\u2019s approach to education.<\/p>\n

One optimistic conclusion to draw from parent issues being foremost on the Whittier teachers\u2019 minds is that in seasoned competency-based systems like Chugach, perhaps some of the biggest structural changes that challenge newer systems have reached a well-functioning, steady state. If so, staff can focus on the next tier of implementation challenges in their pursuit of continuous improvement.<\/p>\n

Other Posts in This Series<\/strong><\/p>\n