Realizing the American Dream: A Parent Education Program Designed to Engage Marginalized Families

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Realizing the American Dream A Parent
Education Program Designed to Engage Marginalized
Families Involvement

• Joan Walker, Ph.D.
• School of Education
• AERA 2013 Annual Meeting

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Abstract

• Since 2006 more than 21,000 Arizona parents
  in over 190 unique schools in more than 45 school
  districts have completed the Realizing the
  American Dream program. RAD has been offered more
  than 425 times.
• Grounded in Hoover-Dempsey and Sandlers
  (1995,1997, 2005) model of the parent involvement
  process, the program targets parents involvement
  beliefs, knowledge and behaviors.
• This presentation shares
• pre- and post-program survey results for two
  cohorts of parents who completed RAD in 2011-12
• program implementation fidelity ratings for three
  sites.

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The Research Team

• Realizing the American Dream is the signature
  program of the American Dream Academy (ADA) at
  Arizona State University.
• In 2008, ADA commissioned private industry
  partner the Parent Institute to create the free
  7-week intervention program.
• Offered in both Spanish and English Latinos are
  the majority of program completers.
• In 2011, these partners asked the developers of
  the Hoover-Dempsey and Sandler model to undertake
  an evaluation of the Realizing the American Dream
  program.

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Program Evaluation Questions

1. Does the Realizing the American Dream (RAD)
   program impact parents involvement knowledge,
   beliefs and behaviors?
2. If positive differences are observed in parents
   involvement behaviors, what predicts these
   changes?
3. Is the RAD curriculum being fully and
   consistently implemented across classes?

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Theoretical Framework
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RAD Curriculum

• Class Topics
• 1. YOU make the difference!
• 2. Being a partner with your school
• 3. Academic standards and performance
  requirements
• 4. Success factors Communication discipline
• 5. Success factors Self-esteem motivation
• 6. Success factors Reading spending time
  together
• 7. Your academic success plan
• Orientation and Graduation ceremony
• Principals Forum
• http//www.parent-institute.com/rad.php

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RAD Participants
Fall 2011 Spring 2012
Ethnicity N 1245 N 1126
Hispanic 91 91
Caucasian 5 4
Gender  
Female 86 72
Male 14 21
Age
25-35 43 32
36-45 42 49
Education
High school or less 73 32
Some college or college degree 26 68
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Methods Survey

• 31-item survey about involvement beliefs,
  knowledge and behavior developed in English and
  translated into Spanish by native Spanish
  speakers.
• Items rated on a 4-point scale (agree-disagree)
• Administered at first and final RAD sessions.
• Demographics survey completed mid-way
• All scales available in Spanish and English

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Analyses Survey Data

• Factor analysis confirmed a 3-factor structure
• Beliefs, knowledge, behavior
• Scale reliabilities gt.74, pre and post
• Missing data lt 5
• Replaced with item mean
• No significant correlations between missing data
  and demographics
• Paired samples t-tests on pre-post responses
• Cohens d
• Corrections for multiple tests

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Question Does RAD Influence Parents' Beliefs,
Knowledge Behavior? (Avg ES)
ES 1.21
ES .72
ES .34
p lt .05 p .01
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Results Beliefs

• RAD impacts parents beliefs about the role of
  the home in childrens education.
• Of the 13 items in this scale (a .75 -.79), one
  showed meaningful change across cohorts
• My child spends more of his/her time learning at
  home than at school. (ES .64 for 2011 and .76
  for 2012 cohorts)

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Beliefs, continued

• Items that did not change were high at pretest
• Suggests parents already held strong beliefs
  about their role in some aspects of involvement
  (e.g., Its my responsibility to make sure my
  child finishes high school).
• Program participation is voluntary and thus
  attracts parents who believe they can make a
  differencehowever, they may not know how to put
  their beliefs into action.

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Results Knowledge

• All 10 items changed (a pre .85 post .90)
• Effect size range . 44 1.31
• Largest effects found for
• academic terms and concepts
• academic requirements and standards
• how to build reading skills at home
• steps required to succeed academically and go to
  a university
• how to work with my childs teacher principal,
  counselor, or parent liaison.

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Results Behaviors

• All 9 items increased (a, pre .80 post .87)
• Largest effect size found for
• I have made a plan to make sure my child
  succeeds academically and graduates from high
  school. (ES .93 for 2011 cohort, .90 for 2012
  cohort)
• Other items with meaningful change related to
• parent-teacher communication, a central concept
  in the curriculum.
• e.g., I keep in touch with the teacher about my
  childs academic performance. (ES .48, .51 by
  cohort)
• home-based behaviors
• e.g., I talk with my child about my expectations
  for success. (ES .53, .47 by cohort)

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Analyses Predicting Behaviors

• Hierarchical regressions were conducted using
  factors in the following blocks
• Block 1 demographics (education, annual family
  income, and ethnicity)
• Block 2 parents beliefs, knowledge and
  behaviors, pre-RAD
• Block 3 self-reported involvement-related
  beliefs and knowledge, post-RAD

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Results Factors Predicting Behavior
Fall 2011 F Adj. R2 B SE B b p lt
DV post-RAD behavior 181.02 .63
Education .00 .01 .01 .69
Annual income .01 .01 .02 .33
Ethnicity -.01 .02 -.01 .50
Beliefs-pre RAD -.07 .02 -.06 .01
Knowledge-pre RAD -.02 .02 -.03 .25
Behavior-pre RAD .13 .02 .19 .01
Beliefs-post RAD .23 .03 .18 .01
Knowledge-post RAD .58 .02 .63 .01
Spring 2012
DV post-RAD behavior 91.8 .50
Education .00 .01 .00 .99
Annual income .01 .01 .06 .03
Ethnicity -.02 .02 -.02 .48
Beliefs-pre RAD .04 .03 .04 .20
Knowledge-pre RAD -.06 .02 -.10 .01
Behavior-pre RAD .07 .02 .10 .01
Beliefs-post RAD .25 .05 .17 .01
Knowledge-post RAD .64 .03 .59 .01
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Question 3 Is the RAD curriculum being fully and
consistently implemented?

• Sample 3 RAD courses (in Spanish) at 3 separate
  elementary schools in Fall 2011
• 35 programs total offered , 10 of population
• Taught by 3 different RAD facilitators
• 3 trained, bilingual observers completed
  identical observation rubrics for each RAD class
  at each school
• One observer completed the rubric on-site, in
  real time
• The second observer cross-evaluated a video
  recording of the classes

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Demographics Fidelity Study Team

• Facilitators

• Observers

• Facilitator 1 Medical degree previously taught
  12 RAD classes
• Facilitator 2 MS in education previously taught
  6 RAD classes
• Facilitator 3 BA previously taught 12 RAD
  classes

• Evaluator 1 BS in Film Production 3 years with
  ADA
• Evaluator 2 RAD facilitator K-12 Teacher 3
  years with ADA
• Evaluator 3 RAD facilitator BS in Engineering
  2 years with ADA

Facilitators and observers were female, native
Spanish speakers in their 30s and 40s. All had
completed RAD as a family or community member.
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Assessing Treatment Fidelity

• Rated fidelity of curriculum for each class as
• fully met (2), partially met (1) or unmet (0).
• If both raters did not agree that the component
  was either fully met or unmet, coded as partially
  met.
• Compared curriculum as outlined in Facilitators
  Guide to real time observation (rater 1) and
  video recording (rater 2)
• Agreement between raters
• School 1 r .85
• School 2 r .81
• School 3 r .79

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(No Transcript)
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Percentage of Curriculum Met by Class by School
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Fidelity and Parent Ownership of RAD Curriculum

• Created their own curriculum
• Parent additions, suggestions, adaptations
• Parent networks
• Sharing of information, facilitator ?
  participants
• Participant ? participant communication
• Linguistic, cultural idioms within curriculum
• e.g., It takes a village vs. concept of aldea
• Analogy between Ladder of Success and planning
  for quinceanera

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Summary Research Findings

• Surveys showed meaningful changes in
  participants knowledge, behaviors and (some)
  beliefs targeted in RAD curriculum.
• Post-RAD behaviors are a function of parents
  knowledge and beliefs, not family demographics.
• Observations indicate RAD curriculum was
  implemented with an acceptable degree of
  fidelity.

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Significance

• RAD program enhances parents knowledge of US
  school system
• RAD also influences parents behaviors
• Home-school communication and home-based support
  for academic skill development
• Basic parenting skills (communication,
  discipline)
• RAD impacts parents beliefs about the role they
  play in their childs education.

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Limitations

• Self-report bias (parent survey)
• Small sample of classes observed (10)
• Cannot directly attribute changes to RAD given
  complex set of factors that influence the parent
  involvement process.

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Future Directions

• Follow up study of RAD graduates to track their
  children's outcomes relative to peers whose
  parents did not complete RAD
• Capture individual parent narratives
• Replication
• Implement RAD alongside teacher professional
  development targeting family engagement
• TIP http//www.parent-institute.com/product/5P02B