FAMILY ENGAGEMENT AND PARTNERSHIP MANAGER

Holyoke Public Schools (HPS) serves 5,400 students in 11 schools and employs nearly 1000 people.  The District was placed into receivership by the State of Massachusetts in Spring 2015, due to struggling performance well below the state average.  Dr. Stephen Zrike Jr., a seasoned Massachusetts educator, was selected as Receiver to lead this exciting turnaround effort, which includes significant autonomy and flexibility from the traditional school system.  Since being in receivership, the District has experienced many promising successes.  In school year 2015-16, the District saw a 7-percentage point increase in proficiency in English Language Arts and a 4-point gain in Math, and attendance rates are up across the District.  HPS has also extended the school day for students in preschool to 8th grade, expanded choice programs such as dual language and personalized learning, and offering new opportunities to students, such as computer science. For more information about the HPS Turnaround Plan, please visit: http://www.hps.holyoke.ma.us/turnaroundplan.htm. 

HPS is looking for a highly motivated and skilled leader to serve as the Family Engagement and Partnership Manager. This position will focus on developing, implementing, and sustaining programs aimed at family and community engagement. The Family Engagement and Partnership Manager will oversee all District efforts to establish and strengthen relationships between Holyoke families and HPS; oversee systems and programming designed to provide relevant and timely information and resources to ensure that all families can effectively partner with HPS and work to connect both students and families to support services that will help address barriers to successful participation within HPS. Success will be measured a reduction in chronic absenteeism, strong engagement of parents in leadership opportunities and increasingly higher satisfaction indicators on the culture and climate survey.  

Responsibilities are aligned to the Turnaround Plan and include, but are not limited to:

Priority 1: High Quality Instruction for All Students

• Promote strong relationships between families, students and school so that all students can learn successfully at school
• Partner with the Enrollment Center Manager, principals and other staff to promote strong attendance and ensure that school-based Family and Community Engagement staff dedicate significant time to support school attendance efforts

Priority 2: Personalized Pathways

• Understand and communicate to families the various pathways for students within Holyoke Public Schools, particularly dual language and middle school opportunities in personalized learning, STEM, an in-district operator and Linked Learning academies
• Work with schools and families to advocate for student success to achieve our vision of a pathway for every student
• Represent Holyoke Family Engagement on the Holyoke Early Literacy Initiative workgroup and leadership team.

Priority 3: Engaged Students, Family and Community

• Facilitate the strengthening of family-school relationships and increase opportunities for family-family collaboration
• Support and train school leaders in their efforts to strengthen relationships with families.
• Oversee a collaboration to establish a Family Resource Center for families to receive accurate and timely school information, as well as direct referrals to community and basic needs resources.
• Oversee regular and varied family communication strategies, including mass-texting, social media, home visiting and opportunities for family-school dialogues.
• Develop and steward key community partnerships, in coordination with many district leaders
• Develop a campaign to increase an promote opportunities for volunteer work in the district
• Steward an improved process and approach to family concerns and/or parent complaints
• Publicize the Student Enrollment and Family Empowerment Center as a destination for community organizations and businesses to come and offer and/ or promote their services and events to families, in coordination with the Enrollment Center Manager
• Lead the city-wide Parent Advisory Group and support the Special Education Parent Advisory Group, with an emphasis on promoting parent involvement around students’ progress
• Advise the Receiver and district and school leaders on all matters related to Family Engagement and Family-School relationships
• Update the Family Handbook annually and ensure its being followed

Priority 4: Effective and Thriving Workforce

• In partnership with principals, train and support school-based Family Engagement staff, including Family Access & Engagement Managers, School Family Promoters and/or related employees
• Lead professional development program around family engagement for HPS staff and external stakeholders

Priority 5: Supporting Empowered Schools

• Steward relationships to develop additional resources to support the district’s turnaround effort
• Lead the team to develop and host engaging family and community activities for a variety of purposes, including general engagement, fun and social, informative and educational
• Collaborate with school teams to develop and execute a Parent Leadership Development program that includes a Parent University day and mobilizes 100+ parent leaders to support their schools and the district’s turnaround efforts
• Support schools in administering culture and climate surveys and other communications in English and Spanish to families

Other duties as required by the Receiver or as required.

CANDIDATE REQUIREMENTS:

Experience, skills, traits, and beliefs:

• Bachelor’s Degree
• Fluency in English and Spanish
• A proven track record of working collaboratively and productively with all stakeholders – students, teachers, school staff, parents and community-based groups, particularly in an urban environment
• A strong understanding of school and district level systems
• Highly organized
• Strong communication verbal and written communication skills
• Exceptional interpersonal skills, with a track record of working collaboratively with staff at all levels, parents and community
• Demonstrated ability to manage and develop capacity in adults
• Must be able to work a flexible schedule to accommodate family and community outreach and/or events on evenings and weekends
• A commitment to high performance standards and unwavering belief that all students can excel
• Alignment with the HPS core values

COMPENSATION AND BENEFITS:  Salary and benefits will be competitive and commensurate with experience.