North Columbus News

The Ohio Statewide Family Engagement Center at The Ohio State University will host the Ohio Family Engagement Leadership Summit virtually on September 18-19. The event aims to bring together families, educators, and administrators from across the state to discuss ways to strengthen partnerships in education.

Barbara Boone, director of the center, said the summit is designed to offer professional learning and networking opportunities for participants. “We’re going to be talking about engagement and learning about what both families and what schools can do,” she said.

The agenda includes panel discussions featuring parents who have taken on leadership roles at their children’s schools. These sessions will focus on how parental involvement can shape perspectives on education. Other topics include building stronger partnerships among schools, families, and communities to help students with career planning during middle and high school years.

A session will address how schools can encourage ongoing family engagement beyond traditional events, aiming to empower families as active contributors in educational solutions.

Generative artificial intelligence’s role in education will also be discussed. Jasmine Hood Miller, director of family engagement and community partnerships at Common Sense Media, is scheduled to deliver a keynote address on AI’s impact. Boone noted that “A big global conversation that’s going on with AI is does it help learning? Does it hinder learning? We’re working with Common Sense Media to talk about AI. They’ve done some national studies with families and students, and they have always been in that space of helping families to navigate technology and media.”

Another panel moderated by Susan Bodary, director of the Stay in the Game! Attendance Network—a partnership involving the Ohio Department of Education and Workforce, Cleveland Browns Foundation, and Harvard’s Proving Ground program—will discuss strategies for engaging families in efforts to improve student attendance.

“We’re partnering with Stay in the Game! and others for several sessions about attendance and how families and schools are working together to support that,” Boone said. “There will be lots of examples from different districts around Ohio to give people practical ideas for schools and for families.”

Tracy Hill from Cleveland Metropolitan School District emphasized how previous summits have helped her district adapt its approach: “You can … look at the ways that you communicate with families – thinking about families who might not be proficient on the computer or families who don’t speak English as their first language,” she said. “We have to take that into account – that every family is unique and every family has something to contribute to the education of their child. It’s up to us as school districts to adopt strategies so that we can be a good fit for families and their students.”

Rebecca Winthrop from Brookings Institution’s Center for Universal Education will give a keynote address focusing on student engagement based on her book “The Disengaged Teen: Helping Kids Learn Better, Feel Better, and Live Better.” Boone commented: “In that book, she recognizes the research around what families do at home that supports their child’s engagement and learning, whether that’s learning outside of or in school,” Boone said. “We want engaging instruction, but families play such a critical role.”

Registration details are available through the event's website.