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The United States is a society made up of many ethnicities, classes and races. Our country is considered by many to be the world's most successful mixed society but our education process in serving the children of this society is far from perfect. All student’s regardless of race or class deserve to have their needs addressed and met. As educators we must realize that for today's student to be successful, the educational process is one that now must incorporate the student's social and emotional needs, family and community. The failure in this process is at the heart of our nation’s school/community disconnect.

Parental involvement is a vital link in the school/community connection and an important step in including families in the educational process. Since family and school are a child’s first societal experiences, parents, schools, the community and the whole of society should agree on one idea: a child’s life success depends strongly on strengthening all areas of literacy, including social-emotional skills.(Allen and Cosby 2000). When home collaborates with school to implement Social Emotional Learning programs, students gain more. Because students are constantly being exposed to and bombarded by mass culture messages from television, the Internet, music videos and other outlets unsupervised by adults, it’s important for parents and other caregivers in a child’s life to send opposite messages.(Elias 2006). For this reason, school and community resources have to be mobilized in assisting parents in providing home atmospheres conducive to education. This is the most basic form of parental involvement in the education of their children. Parent should be given regular overviews of the academic and social-emotional skills students are learning at any time, arranging opportunities for parents and guardians to meet and exchange ideas on how to support their schools teaching, how to parent and raise their child and how to organize homework routines, etc. (Elias, 2006)

Family composition needs to be recognized by schools as having an affect on a child’s learning ability and focus. Family composition affects the amount of time children and their parents have to share with one another and can also affect how that time is spent. A student from a single parent household knows their parent has to contend with the combination of working and maintaining a family. (Cooper and Ryan 2000). For working parents, time constraints often prevent school involvement. Educators should make every attempt to plan school meetings, activities, and conferences at times when parents are available to attend. These parents may not have a great of time to spend supervising homework enjoying their children. A school community connection of homework assistance by telephone, email or an after-school appointment would greatly benefit a student in this situation.

Some parents may have other reasons for not being as involved in their children’s schools. A growing number of parents do not speak English or read it well enough to communicate with teachers and school staff. Because of cultural differences, many parents are not familiar with the expectations of the school their children attend and don’t quite understand how to go about getting involved even they desire to.(Mapp 1997) Still others parents feel they lack the education or skills needed to interact with their child’s teachers or staff personnel or have negative experiences from their own school days and are intimidated by and uncomfortable about going into schools.(Mapp 1997) There will be problems in school due to the language barrier for parents or guardians who do not speak English. A solution is to have a resource person at the school who can communicate with the parents in their first language. The resource person could be either a teacher or a parent. Educators also need to realize that some parents lack the ability to read or are embarrassed about their lack of schooling. Teachers and staff should know that not all parents are able to read newsletters, school correspondence, field trip permission slips or (most importantly) homework assignments. Teachers, therefore should not depend on the written communication as the only link to home. Conferences, phone calls, home visits and other personalized contacts with parents are important. (Mapp 1997).

Another disconnection is school staffs’ failure to recognize or legitimize parents’ role in their children’s education. Principals and teachers may claim interest in parental participation, but, in fact, grant parents only limited roles at the school and give signals that their feedback, time and opinions are unwelcome. School staff are rarely trained on how to collaborate with parents and respect the diversity that all children bring to the school. (Mapp 1997)

In addition to fostering parental involvement and focusing on a student’s social and emotional learning, schools and communities may also be connected through community service. Community service can play an important part in fostering a sense of belonging within a student. Properly conducted community service begun at the earliest level of education, provides an opportunity for children to learn life skills and integrate them into their daily lives. Service opportunities usually are ways for students to encounter other people, ideas and circumstances in ways that broaden their sense of perspective and can build emphatic understanding and caring connections to the world around them. (Elias 2006). For many students community service is an opportunity to nourish a human need to be a generous and contributing member of important groups.

There are many ways and reasons for developing school, family and community connections. These connections improve school programs and school climate, provide services and support to families, increase parental involvement and parent skills and leadership while connecting families and students with others in their schools and communities. (Epstein 1995) These connections also assist teachers with their workload. Alleviating the disconnections create partnerships that assist students in succeeding in school and later life.

The way our schools care about our children is reflected in the way schools interact with and care about their families, social emotional needs and communities. If we, as educators, view students only as students we are likely to see the family as separate from the school. We will then expect the family to do its job and leave the education of the children to the schools. However, if we look at students as children, we will be more likely to see both the family and the community as partners with the school in a child’s education (Epstein 1995.) Making sure schools and communities stay connected will help us to realize our shared interests in and responsibility towards the children.