Downsville Central School District

Board of Education

Parental Involvement Policy

The DCS Board of Education encourages participation of parents of students eligible for Title I services in all aspects of their child’s education. In order to facilitate parental participation, the District will:

1. Involve parents in the joint development of the DCS Title I plan. If the plan is not satisfactory to the parents of children participating in the Title I programs, the district will submit any parent comments to the State Education Department at the time the Title I plan is filed;

2. Provide necessary coordination, technical assistance, or other support needed to assist DCS in planning and implementing effective parental involvement activities in each building to improve student academic achievement and school performance;

3. Build DCS’s and parents capacity for strong parental involvement through implementing and encouraging participation in appropriate parental involvement activities;

4. Coordinate and integrate parental involvement strategies with parental involvement strategies under other programs including but not limited to the Headstart program, Reading First Program, Early Reading First Program, Reading Recovery, Even Start Program, Parents as Teacher’s Program, and Home Instruction Program for Preschool Youngsters and state run preschool programs;

5. Conduct, in conjunction with parents, an annual evaluation meeting of the content and effectiveness of the parental involvement policy in improving the academic quality of DCS. The evaluation shall include identifying barriers to greater participation by parents in the district and using the findings of the evaluation to improve and to revise the parental involvement policies of the District;

6. Involve parents in school activities of DCS;

7. Involve parents of children in Title I programs in decisions regarding how funds designated for parents involvement activities are to be spent;

8. DCS developed jointly with parents a written parent involvement plan for our one- building district, which will be distributed to parents annually in an understandable format and in a language parents can understand when possible;

9. Make all parents’ involvement policies and plans available to the local community via the school website and update them periodically to meet the changing needs of schools and parents. Updates are to be done jointly with parents;

10. Assist parents of children in DCS in understanding such topics as the state’s academic content, student achievement standards, state and local academic assessments. Title I requirements and how to monitor a child’s progress and work with educators to improve the achievement of their children;

11. Provide materials and training to help parents of children in DCS to work with their children to improve their academic achievement, such as literacy training and using technology as appropriate to foster parental involvement;

12. Educate teachers, pupil service personal, principals and other staff in DCS with the assistance of parents about the value and use of parent contributions and in how to reach out, communicate with, and work with parents as equal partners, implement and coordinate parent programs, and build ties between parents and school;

13. To the extent feasible and appropriate, coordinate and integrate parent involvement programs and activities in DCS with Headstart, Reading First Program, Early Reading First Program, the Home Instruction Program for Preschool Youngsters, Parents as Teacher’s Program and public preschool and other programs;

14. Conduct other activities in DCS such as parent resource centers that encourage and support parents in more fully participating in the education of their children.

The Board of Education hereby directs the building principal of DCS to ensure that a building level parental involvement plan is generated with the participation of DCS parents. In addition to those goals stated above, each such building level plan will describe the details for:

1. All parents will be invited to the annual Spring Informational Meeting of Title I parents to explain the Title I requirements and the rights of parents relating to Title I.

2. Offering a flexible number of meetings including morning or evening. The building level plan may provide, with funds available under Title I, for transportation, child care, or home visits as such services relate to parental involvement;

3. Involving parents in an organized, ongoing and timely way in the planning, review and improvement of Title I programs including the planning, review, and improvement of the school’s parent involvement policy;

4. Providing parents of participating children with timely information about programs, a description and explanation of the curriculum in use in Title I programs, the forms of academic assessments used to measure student progress, the proficiency levels the students are expected to meet, and if requested by parents, opportunities for regular meetings to formulate suggestions and to participate as appropriate in decisions relating to the education of their children or respond to any such suggestions as soon as practicable;

5. Developing a school-parent compact jointly with parents, that outlines how the parents, school staff and students will share responsibility for improved student academic achievement and detailing the means by which the school and parents will build and develop a partnership to help all children achieve the state’s standards.

6. The compact must include:

   • A description of the school’s responsibility to provide high quality learning curriculum and instruction in a supportive and effective learning environment that enables children served in Title I schools to meet the state’s student academic achievement standards;

   • Describe the ways in which each parent will be responsible for supporting their child’s learning such as monitoring attendance, homework completion, television watching, volunteering in their child’s classroom, and participating as appropriate in decisions relating to the education of their child and the positive use of extracurricular time;

   • Addressing the importance of communication between teachers and parents on an ongoing basis including, but not limited to, annual parent teacher conferences including a discussion of how the compact relates to the individual child’s achievement, frequent reports to parents on their child’s progress, reasonable access to staff, opportunities to volunteer and participate in their child’s class, and observation of classroom activities.