Family Involvement

Families are key to the success of all of your SS/HS activities. Partnering with families can strengthen programs and services; bring important voices to the table to address student challenges and help to ensure program sustainability. Research has shown that students who have involved families are more likely to stay in school and perform better academically.

The most successful sites focus on involving families by:

• Ensuring that families are engaged in meaningful partnerships with their SS/HS initiative
• Involving them in leadership positions on their partnership groups
• Ensuring that their outreach to families is culturally and linguistically appropriate

Local SS/HS initiatives understand that there can be many barriers to family engagement in schools and other community agencies and develop targeted and systematic approaches to addressing those barriers.