Shifting Mindsets: Moving from Community Engagement to Ownership
As has been noted in other modules, community partnerships are foundational to the success of students, families, and schools. Partner organizations, community leaders, and elected officials can provide a vast range of additional support, services, and opportunities for students, families, and educators. Moreover, engaging community partners provides a strong platform for creating a shared sense of responsibility for the success of students and schools. Community partners include residents, voters and nonvoters, in the surrounding areas, nonprofits and community-based organizations that work in partnership or around schools, and the broader community (e.g., elected officials, business, foundations, etc.) who may interact with the school and district system.
Just as there are various entities that comprise community partners, there are various approaches schools and districts take to engage them. For this lesson, we assert that community engagement requires more than partnerships with organizations. When schools and districts truly engage and partner with communities, they create spaces for communities to be honored and heard, shift power, and defer to the community as experts. They move away from “planning for” and move toward “planning with” communities.
In 2023, the Community Engagement Initiative commissioned the development of a Community Engagement Best Practices Self Assessment Tool to build the capacity of school districts to facilitate meaningful engagement that outlines a series of competencies that fall under the seven domains described in the table linked in Module 7, Section 2. In this section, we will do a deep dive into Domain 7: Community as Collaborators.
Domain 7: COMMUNITY AS COLLABORATORS
Community partnerships are an important component of student and school success. Schools and districts are stronger when they bring together community partners alongside educators, parents, and students to act as decision makers. Research also shows that when schools and districts adopt a community-centered model where community resources (academics, health and social services, youth and community development, early learning and care, and expanded learning) are integrated into school sites alongside community engagement, this leads to improved student learning and stronger communities.
There is a designated point person, district wide team, or a team at each school site that coordinates all community partnership programming and evaluation. The partnerships are culturally responsive, serve a clear purpose for students, and are deeply integrated into district planning structures.
The district and school sites play a central role in convening and aligning their neighborhood or the broader ecosystem of community partners behind multi-year and annual district plans aligned to school and district continuous improvement efforts.
School staff and community members have strong, cross-cultural networks built on trust and respect that increase their capacity to support students’ development and school system operations.
The district collects, makes use of, and shares data from families and community partners about the assets that exist in the community and discusses with them how community resources can help meet the academic, social-emotional, health, and financial needs of students and families. This process takes place annually.
There are strong community networks across the district that provide community members with multiple entry points to engage with the district. This includes community organizing groups that operate independently of the district and formal district channels (school site councils, regular district community convenings). These are open and effective channels for community members to engage in decision-making.
Assessing Your Community Engagement Efforts
The CEI Community Engagement Self-Assessment Tool allows schools and districts to identify where they are on a spectrum in each domain categorized by stages that go from “not evident” to “advanced.” Each stage demonstrates a trajectory of community engagement goals and describes the implied messages sent to communities in each stage (see diagram below). It is a powerful tool to acknowledge marginalization of communities, especially low-income communities and communities of color. The assessment also asserts a clear vision for reimaging what engagement can look like through inclusion and equity practices. Most importantly, it helps schools and districts assess their progress toward goals.
Spectrum of Engagement
It is important to note that there are many historical and contextual factors contributing to where schools and districts find themselves on the community engagement trajectory. It is also important to move away from shame, or blame, as we commit to working toward community ownership models. All communities, regardless of their privilege and status are part of a larger ecosystem that either promotes or oppressesses genuine community engagement and ownership. The challenge for educators and communities is to reimagine and rebuild a collaborative that advances the collective vision of the school community.
Educators and school district administrators have a significant role to play in breaking down barriers to engaging communities. The following reflection questions can be useful for educators to examine in order to move along the Spectrum toward community ownership.
Reflection
Review the competencies in the tabs above. If you were to assess your school or district using the Self Assessment Tool, how would you rate your efforts on the scale from not evident to advanced?
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Domain 7: COMMUNITY AS COLLABORATORS COMPETENCIES |
NOT EVIDENT Ignored, marginalized, dismissed, excluded, tokenized |
DEVELOPING Informed, consulted |
MATURING Involved, engaged |
ADVANCED Partnered with, developed as leaders, empowered, involved in co-creation, shared power |
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7.1 Integrate resources and services from the community into schools |
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7.2 Convenes and aligns ecosystem of community partners |
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7.3 Schools are seen as neighborhood hubs (i.e. deliver a range of services beyond education in order to prepare their students to learn and to assist families) and there is a high degree of trust between the community and the district |
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7.4 The district regularly collects, makes use of, and shares data on the impact of community partnerships |
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7.5 Strong multi-directional channels of community engagement |
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