North Cook News

The Glencoe Board of Education heard a presentation at its Jan. 12 meeting detailing recent efforts to improve parent engagement at one of the district's schools.

At the meeting, which was streamed on YouTube, South School Principal Kelly Zonghetti discussed efforts at the school to get parents to participate in the education of their children. She explained how research shows that having engaged parents can have a positive impact on students, and she noted that efforts are ongoing at the school to boost participation levels.

"At South, we're going to continue to work at building teams across the different areas in the building to really build capacity for both our families and our teachers on how to engage our parents in more of a collaborative culture," she told the board during the meeting.

As a drop-off in attendance at parent outreach events had already been noticed, Zonghetti noted that the school had taken a proactive approach even before COVID-19 to head off the issue.

The first thing school officials did, Zonghetti told the board, was to expand intake conferences to include students in grades 1-4. She noted that teachers have expressed gratitude for the chance to meet with parents as a new school year starts.

The principal added that parents can also get involved as mystery readers, at birthday lunches and in other volunteer activities, from working in the library to helping out in literacy and math centers.

Zonghetti also explained that the school has adjusted its literacy night to shift the focus. They will invite families to the Jan. 26 event, which will include reading to students and thereby showing parents what the literacy behavior looks like. Parents will be able to learn more about the program at the school and how they can support their children at home.