(Vol. 3, No. 2 - Fall 1999)

Conway Middle School's
Powerful Parent Partnership

After years of strained relationships, educators at Conway Middle School are reaching out to parents and the community, inviting "outsiders" to become partners in the school's efforts to help all students achieve more.


by John Norton

Like so many other schools in Jefferson County, Conway Middle School is housed in an imposing brick structure. Figuring out how to get into one of these places can be daunting, as many lost and wandering visitors will testify.

The folks at Conway make it easy. As you approach the school from the adjacent parking lot, it's hard to miss the bright sign posted over one of several possible entranceways: "Welcome Visitors! Please Enter Through This Door!"

It's a small thing, admittedly. But Conway's welcoming sign serves as an unambiguous symbol of its transformation from a place determined to teach students well in spite of its community to a school that's working hand-in-hand with its community to help kids succeed.

Five years ago, says one long-time teacher, "I think we were projecting a 'this is my world' message to parents and others. I think we were rather arrogant and exclusive. We felt like this was our domain. 'You've got yours and we've got ours, and never the twain shall meet.' Maybe not on purpose, but we projected that message."

Conway is different today. The evidence that it's a "welcoming" school is everywhere. There's a "NICE School" banner in the entrance hall, indicating the school has passed the Middle School Coalition's rigorous test of friendliness. The school council is not chaired by the principal (as is his right) but by someone elected by its members. Parents and staff members (including the principal) participate in the Prichard Committee's Commonwealth Institute for Parent Leadership. Parents and teachers have taken students on campouts, field trips, and visits to the Science Museum and Huntsville's space center. They've even spent time together discussing the quality of student work.

After losing the community's trust, Conway Middle School - located off Dixie Highway in the southwest corner of the city - is staging a major comeback, drawing local and national attention to its parent partnership efforts. "Most of our kids - more than I've ever seen before - are happy to be here," says algebra teacher Pam Broyles. "They go home and talk to their parents about what they're doing in school. Their parents come in for activities and events. The satisfaction level is high. If they're not happy, we deal with their questions and concerns. There's a feeling of ownership, a feeling that they have a say in what's going on here."

A Proper Role for Parents

In Steve Anderson's sixth grade world history class, students are discussing the concepts of sovereignty, colonialism, and imperialism. Anderson offers a definition: "Imperialism is the practice by which powerful nations or peoples seek to extend and maintain control or influence over weaker nations or peoples."

When a student interrupts the flow of conversation with a rude request, the clean-cut young teacher in the sunflower tie uses the incident to reinforce his lesson. "I wanted this classroom to be a regulated police state, and she wanted to assert her freedom," he says with a wry smile. "I hope we can come to an accommodation."

Later, during a dialogue among Anderson and his 6th grade teacher partners, another question about sovereignty comes up. What is the proper role for parents in a public school? It's a question much on the minds of teachers and administrators at Conway. And while the answers are still a bit fuzzy, Conway is probably further along than most middle schools in Jefferson County in its willingness to pursue the question - wherever it might lead - with parents themselves.

Angie Passinisi, the team's math and reading teacher, describes one early step in her team's attempt to reach out to the families they serve. Passinisi asked parents to offer one-on-one tutoring "where some of our skills aren't up to par" and was pleasantly surprised by the response. The team also took part in Conway's "Showcase" night last year, when students demonstrated to parents what they're learning. "It was fun, and it was nice to develop a relationship with the parents," says Passinisi.

"It's not only fun," Anderson adds, "it's necessary. Our administration here realizes that we need our parents. We have to work with them, and we as a team, and other teams in the building, realize we have to have them involved."

The team's third member, Glenda Mellick, is a ten-year veteran with grown children, whose career as an involved parent began before her career in the classroom. She traces her broader perspective of parent involvement to her own experiences as a parent volunteer.

"Sometimes schools ask parents to come and be involved, but they want to keep that involvement at a very low level," Mellick says. "I had that happen. A teacher asked me to help in the classroom, and I was so excited. I thought I was going to be tutoring and so on. What she wanted me to do was to sort papers into little files. It took me 35 minutes, and then I would just leave. And I thought, 'I could have done so much more.'"

In discussions throughout the school, it soon becomes clear that Conway's staff is not of one mind about the role of parents in school life and school reform. For Mellick, it's a partnership, "and when they become partners, they see themselves as equals." Some other teachers are still at the "better communications" stage and may not have given much thought yet to the deeper implications of shared responsibility.

But there's more or less general agreement on one point, stated clearly by Barbara Staples, a long-time staffer who retired and then returned to work part time as a teacher-leader. "We can't do what we need to do without parents."

"I think we felt like we were doing everything we could do," Staples says, looking back a few years. "We had embraced every reform idea that was out there. We were open and willing, and frankly working our tails off. But we weren't even getting close to the payoff we thought we should be getting, given the effort we were making."

The frustration teachers were feeling, Staples says, sometimes led to "parent-blaming." "You begin to look for outside causes of your problems, and you feel the pressure because you're being held so accountable, and pretty soon you're asking, 'What about the parents?'"

It's a common defense among professional educators, not without some justification. What's unusual about Conway (and a handful of other JCPS middle schools) is that they are beginning to take the all-important next step: Moving from seeing parents as culprits to seeing them as allies.

"Perhaps it was out of sheer desperation," says Staples, "but we started looking at parents and thinking 'maybe they can give us some help.' Once we got past our own anger and quit trying to place the blame, we began to unlock our doors. And we found out something important - it's nobody's fault and it's everybody's job."

The Power of Partnership

Before Jeannie Linker joined the Conway staff last year - first as an office clerk and now as an assistant in the new Youth Services Center - she was a parent activist. "A mom first," Linker's seven children kept her in constant contact with the public schools. When the Kentucky Education Reform Act passed in 1990, greater parent involvement was one of its anchor points. In KERA's wake, Linker and other parents who went looking for larger roles in their children's schools were often frustrated. "A lot of educators were not ready for true parent partnerships," she says.

By the time Linker's next child reached middle school, Steve St. Clair had been appointed principal at Conway. "I filled out several PTA volunteer forms, but nobody ever called me. So I trotted up to the school office and said, 'This is my name and this is my number, and if there's anything you have that you need me to do, let me know. And they said, 'Don't ever, ever have a moment when you have nothing to do and not let us know.' That was Steve St. Clair's doing. He was beginning, even then, to change the school's attitude toward the community."

Conway's veteran teachers say that St. Clair's predecessor was an innovative principal who worked hard to strengthen teachers' skills and built them into a team that took responsibility for the whole school's success. But several also admit, as one says, that "his strong point was not community involvement. The community perception was that this place was an ice cube where they were not welcome and had no voice."

When St. Clair arrived four years ago,"he brought a vision of working with community," says social studies teacher Steve Anderson. "That's something that was very important to him from Day One when he got here - making us an integral part of the community, connecting with the people and businesses and the families we serve."

Part of St. Clair's success, Linker believes, was his own confidence. "He was not threatened by parents being involved. That was clear from the beginning. And I think that's helped the teachers feel more secure about taking this step."

"Risky Behavior"'

In his modest office, where his own paintings decorate the walls, preppily dressed Steve St. Clair combines humility and forthrightness when he talks about the changes at Conway. It's never "I" - always "we."

"We've done a lot of what some might call 'risky behavior,'" he says. "We've taken a lot of chances. If you look at everything we've done and are doing, you can see we've left ourselves vulnerable." He cites as one example the school's upcoming student-led parent conferences, which will leave the responsibility for reporting on student progress to the kids themselves. "That's a big risk. It may be a big success, and it may not be. But we have a pure motive."

Is parent involvement always risky?"No," he says, "but we're trying things that are different, that are out of people's comfort zones. Anytime you do things with parents that are outside of the traditional PTSA type activities - like looking at student work together, for example - you run the risk of a parent saying 'You're not doing a good job. My kid can do better than this. That teacher is doing better than that other teacher.'"

The school took its greatest risk three years ago, St. Clair believes, when it began to develop a trio of "academies" - schools-within-schools - each with its own theme and teaching staff. One team emphasizes talent development, one technology, and the third offers a "traditional" curriculum, following in the footsteps of the district's three traditional middle school magnets.

The effort began, in part, as a way for Conway to compete for students in its residential population who were being lured away by other schools with district-sanctioned special programs - something Conway didn't have. Rather than set entrance requirements for its three academies, Conway let parents and students choose.

"The academy concept was a big change for us, I can guarantee you," he says. "That's probably the biggest risk we've undertaken. We said, 'you tell us where you want your kid,' rather than us just placing them. But it paid off. And that's part of what parent involvement is about. When you let parents have some choice, you invite them to be a real part of the school."

A Groundbreaking Activity

Last May at a meeting of the Commonwealth Institute's middle school parent leadership class, Conway parent Marsha Kennison received hearty applause when she told the group of two dozen parents and educators that "the key issue in making schools successful doesn't change. It's about putting our children first in our priorities. As a nation, we don't do that very well."

Kennison, a UPS employee and long-time parent volunteer, is Conway's new PTSA president. She brings valuable experiences to the job - including membership on the district-level Middle School Coalition. Working in close partnership with St. Clair and Linker, Kennison envisions a much more proactive role for the PTA organization that it's had in the past.

"Our PTSA's mandate is to help with student achievement," she says. "We're asking our members to step out of the traditional box and get involved with learning in our school."

As Conway's educators reach out to the community, parents have to accept their share of responsibility for student success. "Teachers are struggling to find ways to help students take more ownership for the work they do in school," she says. "They're realizing that they can't do it alone. Parents have to realize that, too."

Evidence of Conway's "reaching out" can be found in a groundbreaking activity carried out last February. The school invited parents to spend a morning examining examples of student work with teachers. Kennison, Linker and science department chair Beth Sanders helped organize the session. Students at every grade level completed a KERA "released" science question that required them to demonstrate an understanding of scientific research methods.

The over-arching purpose of the activity was to generate a dialogue among teachers about expectations, grading, and the definition of "quality work." "And then we thought, why not get the parents in on the conversation?" St. Clair says. More than 20 parents showed up for the teacher work day. After an introductory session led by Sanders and Kennison, teachers and parents spent the morning together in small groups analyzing more than 700 student papers.

"The language arts teachers and the math teachers were just as initimidated by the idea of analyzing a science assessment as the parents were," Sanders says. "So we spent some time discussing sample papers and talking about quality until we were pretty well agreed in principle on what was outstanding work, what was good work, and what was not-so-good work."

Some parents were quiet and a little nervous at first, "but once they heard teachers expressing their own difficulty in interpreting the work, they felt more comfortable," Sanders says.
"Everybody was learning together. We got on a first-name basis, and we joked and relaxed. We weren't talking about 'your' kid - we were discussing everybody's work. The papers were blind, so nobody knew who was who."

The parents went away with a much better idea of what JCPS, through its academic standards, expects student to know and do. "If you're a parent, how do you know what your kid can do, and what they're expected to do? It's hard for parents to answer those questions sitting at home."

Moving Beyond Intimidation

For Steve St. Clair, the activity accomplished a double purpose. A strong advocate of standards-based teaching, St. Clair campaigns tirelessly among his faculty, urging them to post examples of complete, standards-based lessons on Conway's walls. Displays that meet St. Clair's approval include the special standards addressed by the lesson, the rubric (a guide telling students what they must do to earn top grades), and samples of "Top Cat" work - student efforts that meet the district's highest expectations. The professional development day (and others like it) was one more way to advance the discussion among teachers about the meaning of "quality work" at Conway.

But the parent involvement added extra flavor and meaning, St. Clair says. Not only did teachers and parents explore the school's most important product - student work - together, they got over what many in the school describe as the "intimidation factor."

"We often hear that parents are intimidated by teachers. That can stand in the way of parent participation," St. Clair says. "But we have to work with the comfort level of the teachers, too. I know that some of them feel just as intimidated by parents coming into the school as the parents feel when they come. I think teachers have to be used to seeing folks in here all the time."

After the parent participants left the February meeting, teachers gathered to consider the event and discuss the school's academic direction. "They talked about different issues we face as a school and a community," Linker says. "The teachers were asked, 'what do you see as the answers?' And over and over, their answers were, 'Let's get those parents in here. We need to let the parents know what's going on."

"It did my heart real good," Linker remembers. "That day was like a dawning for both sides. We all just want our kids to do well. And the parents went out and shared the positive experience with the community."

Getting on the Bandwagon

One Conway teacher tells of walking anonymously through the grocery store, listening to parents talk. "One will say 'I'm going to send my child to Conway. I'm hearing good things,' and the other will nod affirmatively." It's a sign, the teacher believes, that Conway has broken free
of inertia and is gaining momentum.

"If the word in the community is that a school is not a good school, pretty soon that just rolls over you," St. Clair says. "You have to go through a total facelift to change that. But I think success creates success and you get a bandwagon effect."

Conway is beginning to hear the band. Four years ago, the school had the district's worst record for "holding power" - measured by the rate of transfers out of a school. Two years later, St. Clair says, "we completely turned that around. Our attendance has gone through the roof."

The school's biggest disappointment to date, St. Clair admits, is its "flatline" test scores. "We just haven't seen big results yet. But it's going to happen. It would happen if for no other reason than free lunch is dropping, attendance is going up, those kinds of things. Our clientele is changing." But St. Clair expects more than a demographic jump. He's convinced that the school's sharp focus on raising expectations will pay off. "It's the three-legged stool," he says. "It's commitment from teachers, parents, and kids."

Algebra teacher Paula Broyles agrees. "Our kids are learning more. I've got kids doing high school algebra in my classroom successfully. So it may not show up on the test scores this year, because change takes time, but kids are learning, they're showing up for school, and their parents are interested in what we're doing here. We're doing something right."

For Jeannie Linker, the parent involvement piece is paramount. "I'm not saying that everything's absolutely perfect here, because not everybody here is anxious for change. It's too safe and familiar to stay with the way things have been, even if change might help kids. But as a whole, across the board, the vast majority want what they feel is best for the kids, and over and above anything else, parent involvement is what they see is going to put children on the right road. And they've begun pushing for it."

JEANNIE LINKER:

Dedicated Mom Champions Shared School Leadership


Jeannie Linker considers herself a parent first, and a JCPS employee second. Little wonder. She's been on the payroll at Conway Middle School for little more than a year - but she's been a "professional parent" in the district for nearly two decades.

Linker has always spent her holidays and vacation time helping out in her children's schools. "Some people thought I was crazy," she says, "but why not? When you take your vacation, you do what you want to do."

Here, Linker talks about her strong belief that parents must be full partners in school reform.

~~~

"I request everything that's available about school improvement. It's important to me to know what's going on. There's nothing worse for a parent than to walk into a school and feeling like you're in a foreign country because you can't understand what people are talking about. If you read enough and talk to enough people, you pick up the terminology, and you don't feel like you're an outsider anymore. You can have a conversation about school that's informed."

~~~

"The law says parents have a voice in what's going on in our schools. It's important to me that parents know about this and that they exercise their rights and get in there and have their say. Some educators resist change, saying "this is how things have always been." And a lot of the way things "have always been" is that parents have been ignorant of the way schools run. It was a relief to come to Conway, because it's not a struggle here. They've made real progress with meaningful parent involvement, and it gives me a lot of the enthusiasm and stamina I need to keep going and to keep encouraging people outside our school that good things can happen at their schools, too."

~~~

"A lot of times, I think, teachers have felt it is the PTA's responsibility to get parents involved in more meaningful ways. But a lot of PTAs, sadly, have had the notion that they were only there to do chores for teachers or to raise money for the things teachers and kids needed. Not to actually be active in the running of things. I don't mean to say that parents shouldn't do chores for teachers. But that work takes on a totally different meaning if the parent has been a part of a policy discussion about finding more time for teachers to meet together to discuss student work, for example, and then says "I'll do this or that for a teacher so she or he can participate." Even though they're doing the same chores, it has a different meaning, and they will do it gladly. Because now you're working with the teacher, you're freeing her up to spend more time with other teachers, or with the students, or with their planning. It's the attitude that makes all the difference."

~~~

"I think most parents want to do what's right by their child. But a lot of them have the attitude that, when the child goes to school, it's the teacher's job, let them handle it. I think if most parents were given the right information, and understood what a difference they could make in their child's success and their future, then they might feel a little differently and might become more involved."

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