Provide a brief response (general) to the following post below;
What are potential underlying causes that result in parents and families being overlooked?
There could be several reasons that parents and families are overlooked in the educational management process. Lack of parental education/understanding, lack of resources/ unknown available resources, and miscommunication are a few. Family engagement in middle school is essential to ensure optimal learning. Middle-level educators (typically Grades 5 or 6 through Grade 8 in the U.S.) play a pivotal role in helping to guide parents’ understanding of their evolving roles in supporting their adolescents’ academic success (Bachman et al., 2021). Collective trust—that is, shared trust between parents, teachers, and administrators—is a key ingredient in creating the conditions for student success (Forsyth et al., 2011). When parents and teachers trust each other, they are more likely to have a sense of collective efficacy (i.e., that they can work collaboratively at supporting the adolescent’s academic and social-emotional growth), and thus they are more likely to raise their expectations (Forsyth et al., 2011). These three ingredients—trust, efficacy, and expectations—have been shown to create a school climate that significantly improves student achievement (Hoy et al., 2006). Once a common understanding of the most effective roles for parents is shared by parents and teachers, collective trust can be built through regular and consistent communications that are collaborative, professional, proactive, and solution-focused, and that leave both parents and teachers feeling valued for their expertise and committed to a common cause (Forsyth et al., 2011; Gutman & Midgley, 2000). Reciprocal communication, in which teachers and parents both initiate and receive messages, builds collective trust by establishing and nurturing common understandings. Frequent teacher-parent communication increases student engagement through stronger relationships, expanded parental involvement, and increased student motivation (Kraft & Dougherty, 2013). Once partnerships are established, collective trust must be nurtured through reciprocal, two-way communication regarding best practices for supporting academic success during middle school (Duchesne et al., 2009; Gutman & Midgley, 2000; Hill & Tyson, 2009). As a result, middle school students may experience increased intrinsic motivation, higher academic performance, and greater academic self-efficacy (Bronstein et al., 2005; Forsyth et al., 2011; Hill & Tyson, 2009; Hoy et al., 2006). Parents need to know and understand that students at different stages in the educational process need different things. You cannot expect the things he/she needed in the 5th or 6th grade to be the things he/she needs in the 7th or 8th grade. There must be transparency and two-way communication. Partnering with teachers also allows parents to gain insight into the things that they can do to assist their student(s) as well as themselves. Some parents/caregivers lack adequate understanding of some of the things necessary to help their students be successful, so they may be able to ask for assistance in the form of parenting classes, GED classes, employment training, etc. If they have any of these issues, they can be corrected by using local community resources such as Adult Education and the Department of Human Services. Increasing parent knowledge and understanding will lead to increased student knowledge and understanding.
Suggest at least 3 specific scenarios in which the parent and family stakeholder group could be leveraged for the educational organization’s benefit.
Getting parents to volunteer on school campuses and attend school-related events, getting community members to provide/donate incentives for increased parent involvement, student attendance, and academic achievements, and incorporating parent suggestions and ideas into certain aspects of the school day will benefit the school. Parental engagement also provides the opportunity for parent learning as well. Parental involvement aims to increase the educational achievements of children by strengthening communication between home and school and enriching educational programs with the contribution of the parents to the education process (Epstein and Sheldon, 2002). The high level of engagement to the school improves positive social behavior, internal motivation, and academic success and well-being; and contributes to school climate and school life quality (Cemalcilar, 2010; Özdemir, 2018; Savi, 2011a, 2011b). Again, these things are also beneficial in the parental learning process as well.
What leadership approaches would be most appropriate in these scenarios? Explain your rationale
Leadership is a complex behavior reflecting the beliefs, personality, experiences, work environment, and situational assessment of the leader (Stogdill, 1974), and with its interdisciplinary foundations, it has been taken as a measurable personal trait of a person who may be placed at positions matching with the level of such trait (Zaccaro, 2007). Depending upon the nature, complexity, and urgency of the situation i.e., the situational leadership (Grady, 2010), a leader may exhibit the same or different behaviors i.e., the styles (Hersey, 1997; Bass, 1985) the assessment of which seems to be more appropriate to the situation of respondents (Hersey & Blanchard, 1988). It means that situational leadership is concerned with the role of followers (Grady, 2010) at a given developmental level to work in a specific environment (O’Hair & Odell, 1995). A situational leadership model is a useful tool that could help leaders in all types of organizations to achieve their targets. It addresses the task behavior, relationship behavior of the leader, and the readiness level of employees (Hersey & Blanchard, 1984) I believe that this leadership style is a good fit because all the issues at hand; parental involvement/engagement, lack of communication, community involvement, student behavior, attendance, parent education/understanding/learning, and student learning all fall under the umbrella of student success. When students succeed, the school succeeds, and the community succeeds.
