Engaging the public in its schools- How can you help?

Public engagement is different from parental engagement in that it is motivated by a commitment to secure a quality education for all children rather than for one’s own children only.

While directing the Virtual Volunteering Project
(http://www.serviceleader.org/vv) at a research unit at the University of
Texas at Austin, I also participated in other programs managed by the unit
that were focused specifically on community engagement in public schools.
One of the projects I helped coordinate was identifying online resources to
promote community engagement in schools. This information is at:
http://www.serviceleader.org/schools/

My favorite section of this resource was "Inviting the Community Into the
Classroom." We found a huge range of freely available online resources, from
a literacy volunteer program model that included 34 sample task descriptions
for literacy volunteers; to guidelines from the U.S. government for school
officials, volunteers and mentors participating in public school/community
partnerships.

Working on these resources helped me tremendously in later launching an
online mentoring program for the fourth graders of a school on the East Side
of Austin; it helped me in training the teachers on how to communicate with
parents about the program, and in encouraging community members to
participate in the program (although finding quality mentors never seem to
be the real problem in an online mentoring program; finding teachers with
the time and support to manage such programs is far, far bigger).

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Jayne Cravens [[email protected]]
Online Volunteering Specialist
United Nations Volunteers [http://www.unvolunteers.org]
Bonn, Germany