Leaders and experts weigh in on involvement and communication strategies that can bring people together effectively.
by Elizabeth S. Leaver
07/08/2020
What is your PTO doing to be more racially equitable? How are you reaching out to parents who don’t speak English? How do people of different cultures and backgrounds know you want them to have an equal voice?
School parent groups are asking these questions, but the answers aren’t simple. While the ethnic backgrounds of Americans and their children are ever more diverse, change in parent groups can be slow to happen because of cultural, historical, or sensitivity issues that have to be addressed.
Some robust conversations with leaders in PTO Today’s PTO and PTA Leaders & Volunteers Facebook group and an expert on equity in education have pointed toward earnest paths for moving forward with inclusiveness within parent groups.
Adjust Thinking and Goals
If you’re thinking in terms of inclusion, it’s a fair and well-intended start—but there’s a difference between just “inviting” and true inclusion.
“Being ‘included’ in a system that was not designed for your family’s goals and edification is not a gift,” says Jennifer Malone, PTO copresident at Longfellow Elementary in Oak Park, Ill. “Be sure you ask what your Black and Brown families want to see and need to see change. Just inviting is not necessarily welcoming. People who are disenfranchised are not going to just show up unless they believe they will actually get a seat at the table.”
Allyson Criner Brown is the associate director at Teaching for Change, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit that coordinates a variety of programs to encourage teachers, students, and parents to build a more equitable, multicultural society through education.
“Inclusion and inviting are two different things,” she tells PTO Today. “There’s a difference between saying you are invited and ‘this has been created with you in mind.’”
Instead, says Criner Brown, consider the big picture of how your parent group is structured. Not everyone uses email or can attend an evening meeting. Finding ways to encourage and engage those parents is a key step toward true inclusion.
“How do your meetings look? How does your outreach look? How do you change these structures of your group? That’s when you get into real inclusion,” she says.
For Tonisha McNish Walker, PTA vice president at Dolphin Bay Elementary in Miramar, Fla., putting a focus on authenticity and building bonds leads to the type of inclusion that makes parents feel welcome in the group.
“It has been my experience as a Black woman in America that no matter what organization I am a part of, when people are authentic everything falls into place,” she says.
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