Engaging and Empowering Families Collaboration of an SEA and PTI

Shasta: [00:00:00] Hello, everyone. Welcome to this OSEP poster session on Engaging and Empowering Families: Collaboration of a State Education Agency or SEA and Parent Training and Information or PTI center.

Thank you so much for your interest in this session, but before we begin, let us introduce ourselves in case you’d like to chat with us later. Rhonda, go ahead and get us started.

Rhonda: [00:00:27] Hi, y’all I sure hope you’re doing good. I’m Rhonda Logsdon with Kentucky Special Parent Involvement Network or Kentucky SPIN. We’re the PTI for Kentucky. And I am first and foremost, a sister, and three of my siblings have disabilities from the seen to the unseen and smarter than I could wish to be.

Shasta share about you.

Shasta: [00:00:50] My name is Shasta Hensley. And I’m an exceptional child consultant with the Kentucky department of education or KDE, which is a SEA or State Education Agency. One of my key roles at the department is to support strong family school partnerships among schools and families that serve and support our students with disabilities.

Rhonda: [00:01:12] Well, so you probably already know the why strong family school partnerships are important. And you probably already know that Every Student Succeeds Act and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act have specific requirements around family engagement. However, you’re probably thinking, yes, I know that Rhonda. But how do you do that?

Well, we’re going to share with you a strategy that we use and works for us. It’s intentional collaboration between the SEA and the PTI center. So we’re going to share some of the key practices and lessons that we’ve learned. And you could consider a connection to your own practice.

Shasta: [00:01:56] Yes. So our collaboration has helped us increase our ability to support strong family school partnerships through some key evidence-based practices.

One key practice has been building the capacity of staff and families. So for example, as federal and state guidance around education, during the pandemic emerged, we provided parallel guidance for families and districts. And that’s a practice we plan to connect.

Another key practice is fostering communication between families and schools. As an example, both at KDE and the Kentucky SPIN offered direct technical assistance to families and districts. Through our partnership we share trends and data, and this helps us make informed decisions about needed guidance and supports.

A final key practice is providing learning opportunities for families and schools that enhance their capabilities, connections, confidence, and understanding for partnerships. Through collaborative efforts we are providing resources for families and schools around family engagement in special education.

One example is our work with our National Family Engagement Center the Kentucky Collaborative for Families in Schools.

Rhonda: [00:03:08] So through this collaboration, we’ve learned a few lessons, and the lessons that we kinda like to share that have worked for us. KDE has designated a family engagement consultant. And that works with schools, agencies, and families across the state.

These partnerships have been extremely valuable as we develop guidance and resources for stakeholders. We also have ongoing, open communication, through emails, phone calls, meetings. In addition to our ongoing project collaboration. We lean on each other for our expertise. None of us have all the answers, but working together there’s few problems, we can’t solve.

Lastly, but not least, is peer to peer connection while we have not walked the exact same roads, we have walked very similar roads. And we trust one another, feel a sense of belonging and we value one another’s unique experiences. Shasta.

Shasta: [00:04:14] Well said Rhonda.

And just as a final word, the KDE and Kentucky SPIN will continue to grow and strengthen our partnerships so that we can model strong stability to support strong family school partnerships for students with disabilities.

We hope that as we shared tips and lessons learned, you too considered how to promote meaningful engagement for teachers and families of students with disabilities through effective partnerships between your SEA and PTI center.

If you have any questions or feedback, email us. We would love to hear from you. And again, thank you for sharing your time and energy with us. Have a wonderful remainder of your day.