| Registration Rates | |
|---|---|
| CEC Members: | $59 |
| Non-Members: | $99 |
Overview
Three CEC leaders who focus on family and school engagement will present a 3- part webinar series on culturally responsive family engagement. The series expands on the 2025 TEC Special issue on Families (Vol 57 # 3), which highlights the growing requests by many teachers and school leaders for strategies to engage families of children who struggle in school, due to learning concerns, English as a second language, immigration status, or cultural differences. The webinar series presents practical and useful ways to engage families with their children’s learning at the classroom level, at the school level and community level. Evidence-based action steps are offered for teachers and school and community leaders to encourage and sustain family school partnerships.
Schedule
All sessions offered at 6:00 pm - 7:30 pm EDT.
| October 23, 2025 | Engaging Linguistically Diverse Families through Enriching Science Mary Ruth Coleman, Martha Lopez, German Diaz |
| October 30, 2025 | Developing Relationship-Rich Partnerships with Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Families to Improve Students’ Long-Term Life Outcomes Cathy Kea |
| November 6, 2025 | Making Meaningful Connections: Facilitating School-wide and Community-based Family Engagement with Culturally Diverse Families Joy Banks |
About the Sessions
High-interest, hands-on, interactive science activities offer an ideal way to connect classroom and home learning experiences for elementary school students. This session will explore the use of enriching science take-home activities that promote academic dialogue and discovery to support student’s success. Concrete examples and practical strategies will be share for connecting with families whose primary language is not English. Building academic bridges between home and school is essential because it takes a team.
| Learning Objective: | Educators will deepen their understanding of how to involve linguistically diverse families in science-based learning and activities. |
| Participants will be able to: |
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Mary Ruth Coleman, PhD
Dr. Coleman is a Senior Scientist Emeritus, FPG Child Development Institute, University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill. She is the director of U-STARS~PLUS a science-base program for enrichment and talent-development with culturally linguistically different students and their families. She served as president of CEC in 2007.
Martha A. Lopez, PhD
Dr. Lopez is a Javits Grant Coach for the 2E Milwaukee Javits Projects RISE and LEAD, within the Advanced Academic Programs Office of College and Career Readiness, Milwaukee Public Schools. Her research focuses on understanding how Latino parents use parental academic socialization (Hill & Tyson, 2009) and consejos (Delgado-Gaitán, 1994; Alfaro et al., 2014) as forms of home-based parental involvement to converse about education. Dr. Lopez is a U-STARS~PLUS leadership cadre consultant.
German A. Diaz, PhD
Dr. Diaz is a teacher and coach with the Department of Advanced Academic, Milwaukee Public Schools. His research focus is on urban education with an emphasis on underrepresented Latinos in programs for gifted and talented students. He has over 21 years of experience supporting students and families with talent development. Dr. Diaz is an adjunct faculty member at the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee’s School of Education. Dr. Diaz is a U-STARS~PUS leadership cadre consultant.
This presentation provides a pragmatic illustration of how school leadership can build relationship-rich partnerships with families using the four fundamental high-impact family and community engagement strategies (relationships and trust, communication, culture and diversity, and collaborative partnerships). Actionable steps and examples are offered for facilitating effective collaboration with culturally and linguistically diverse families and those of students with special needs to improve student learning outcomes.
| Learning Objective: | Educators will deepen their understanding of students’ communities, families, and lived experiences to support meaningful and inclusive family engagement practices. |
| Participants will be able to: |
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Dr. Cathy Kea
Dr. Cathy Kea is Professor Emerita at North Carolina Agricultural & Technical State University. With over three decades of experience, she has dedicated her career to preparing culturally responsive Black preservice teachers for success in urban classrooms. Her research examines how these educators integrate cross cultural experiences and culturally responsive strategies into their teaching. More recently, she has expanded her focus to the retention and sustainability of Black special education teachers, specifically during their induction years in urban schools and beyond the classroom setting.
The importance of strong family partnerships has long been considered essential to supporting the success of students with disabilities. Special educators are uniquely positioned to enhance school-wide family engagement strategies. The focus of this practitioner-based presentation is to provide building-level school administrators and other school personnel with planning tools to implement culturally sustaining family-engagement for families with children with disabilities.
| Learning Objective: | Educational leaders and educators will deepen their understanding of students’ communities, families, and lived experiences to support meaningful and inclusive family engagement practices. |
| Participants will be able to: |
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Joy Banks
Joy Banks is an Associate Professor at George Mason University in the Division of Special Education and disAbility Research. Through her research she examines the intersection of race and disability and ways to make special education services more equitable for Black students with disabilities. Her primary area of research focuses on the lived experiences of Black college students with disabilities.