Category: Parent & Family Engagement

Summer is underway and organizations in Memphis and Shelby County metropolitan area are working together to combat summer reading loss. 

Shelby County’s “Engage Me” group gave out bags of books to students in predominately low-income neighborhoods as an effort to encourage reading over the summer. These bags included books, journals, crayons, and information about online enrollment for the next school year. “The goal is to make sure that we minimize that gap,” stated Dr. Cynthia Alexander Mitchell of district’s Family and Community Engagement Office to the Commercial Appeal.

It’s important for children to read during the summer—especially for minority children who live in poor rural areas of the city. Statically, most of these students fall behind during the summer and have a difficult time catching up when the next school year starts. To help prevent summer reading loss, Stand for Children has organized a Summer Reading Challenge to engage both students and parents. 

Read more on how you and your child can participate. 

Stand for children is excited to announce the graduation of 20 parents from Douglass Elementary from our first ever, Stand UP University for Parents.    Graduation of these committed and engaged parents occurred on Wednesday, May 16th in conjunction with the Douglass Middle School promotion service.  These 20 parents learned what they can do at home and at school to make sure their child is prepared for school everyday, prepared to enter college, and prepared for life.  Watch a short news clip about the event here.

Stand UP parent Beverly Goliday adresses the audience.

Stand UP focuses on student achievement and the importance of parent engagement in this process.  Schools, like Douglass Elementary (led by a reform-minded principal, Lionel Cable),  understand the importance of engagement that leads to higher self esteem among students, higher test scores, and the understanding that parents are the first and most important teacher and advocate for their child.   Parents committed to attend 5 out of 8 total 1.5 hour classes. 

Because of our success, Stand for Children plans to offer Stand UP at sixschools in Memphis and reach over 450 parents in the fall and spring of 2012-2013 school year.  Our hope will be that the engagement of our parents in memphis  will bring parent reform efforts to the many state and district reforms that are focused on student achievement.