Chapter 7, Part VIII: “Spinning a Family Web Among Agencies, Schools” Outline

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he September, 1992, issue of The School Administrator, a magazine published by the American Association of School Administrators, carried an article titled “Spinning A Family Support Web Among Agencies, Schools.”? It stated “When possible, funds? should be shifted from narrow categorical programs to more inclusive, school-linked services–specialized funds to combat drugs and smoking might be included in a broad preventive approach to children’s health problems.”? Most people don’t realize that “broad” includes pregnancy “prevention” i.e., making contraceptives? available to minors.? This may be done without parental consent.?

1. “San Diego’s? ‘New Beginnings’ Shows What School-Linked Services Demand from Educators.”

A) Collaborative effort involving the city and county, the school district, the community college district, and the Housing Commission

B) Center for Children and Families located at Hamilton Elementary School, where about 200 families received comprehensive family service planning and counseling? and all families can receive prevention? and referral? services and health education.

2. DISTRICT LEADERSHIP

A) The district superintendent and Board of Education MUST be involved from the beginning.? See themselves as equals with other community agency executives in the collaboration process.

B) Superintendent and board cannot try to dominate these relationships. (Doesn’t this silence the voice of elected officials?? See the chapter titled “Advisory Council Or Unelected Representation?”).

C) Develop a statement of common philosophy and an agreement for shared governance.

D) Monthly meetings rotate to each agency’s home site.? The host chairs the meeting.

E) Due to collegiality developed in the executive committee, the school district receives data? electronically from the Department of Social Services? to automatically establish the eligibility? of AFDC? families for free school lunches.

F) Many county Board of Supervisors and boards of education have developed and approved a joint legislative policy statement on children and families.

3. ASSESSING NEEDS

A) Conduct a needs assessment: demographics, racial composition, culture, language diversity, poverty levels, indicators of risk factors for students.

B) Agencies share information among themselves about services provided in the school district.

C) Action research

C1) Social worker from the Department of Social Services? worked intensively with 20 families IDENTIFIED BY SCHOOL STAFF.? (See the chapter titled “What Is a ‘SAP’?”).

C2) Interviews by public health nurses to learn of families’ needs and perceptions of “New Beginnings.”

C3) Data-match study to determine the extent to which families in the school district were served by multiple agencies and programs within those agencies.

C4) Focus groups = determine attitudes? toward existing “system” and suggestions for fixing it.?

C5) Migration study = look at families’ patterns of moving from one neighborhood and school attendance area to another.

4. FISCAL STRATEGIES

A) School district leadership and agency executives begin to define their common plan.

A1) Scope and purpose of the collaboration.

A2) Which children and families to serve.

A3) Breadth and depth of services.

A4) What outcomes? are expected.

A5) What funding will be used.

B) Agency executives must revamp fiscal strategies to support the tenets of the common mission.?

B1) Agency executives must review current costs on children’s services and identify funds? that can be redirected to support the new priority of the collaboration.

B2) Such redirected funds can also leverage more federal dollars by providing the matching funds necessary to make schools eligible for MEDICAID, or to provide school-based child care under the federal welfare reform program.

B3) Funds should be shifted from narrow categorical programs to more inclusive school-linked services.? FOR EXAMPLE: specialized funds? to combat drugs and smoking might be included in a broad preventive approach to children’s health problems.? [Such as teen pregnancy?]

B4) If service interventions are more effective, then funding mechanisms should be redirected to “front-end” priorities.? This would include teachers, social workers and public health nurses.

B5) When possible, “back-end” treatment funds? should be shifted to increase preventive interventions.

C) Results from San Diego? County data-match showed:

C1) County’s Department of Social Services? was spending 5.7 million in services, including 1/2 million in administrative costs for Hamilton families.

C2) the school budget, relying on categorical funds? provided more than $200,000 for support staff, including a nurse practitioner? counselor, paraprofessionals and clerical staff.

D) Team members were frustrated over the fragmented funding of education and social services.

D1) Team members researched each agency’s funding streams.

D2) Looked for flexibility in determining HOW these existing funds could be spent differently.

D3) “New Beginnings” initially redirects funds by repositioning employees from each participating agency to the center at Hamilton Elementary to create a team of family service advocates.

D4) The school nurse practitioner, who was funded through a combination of district and categorical funds, has moved to the center and works in an expanded role under the supervision of physicians from the University of California? at San Diego.

D5) The county Department of Health Services is using funds appropriated for MULTICULTURAL mental health component at the center.

D6) Each participating agency assumes a portion of the overhead costs connected with the employees who are assigned there.

D7) Agency executives must review their categorical funding streams and work for more flexibility in using these funds.? Many schools, especially those serving the most DISADVANTAGED students, currently use categorical funds to provide support staff for narrowly defined projects. Schools need to be able to use these funds and staff for the broader purposes for the collaborative project.? For example, to take the time a clerk spends determining eligibility? for free lunch, and apply it to a larger assessment? of initial family eligibility for health and social services.

D8) Financial linkages among agencies can reinforce the common mission of a collaborative school-linked services project.

D9) A California-based consultant on integrated services, has described these as “hooks,” “glue,” and “joint ventures.”
HOOKS = formally link a child’s participation in one program with eligibility? and participation in another.?
GLUE? = glue money allows one agency to subcontract with other agencies to ensure children can receive services in one place.? The lead agency becomes the “broker”? for the child.? Glue money might allow each child to be assigned a CASE MANAGER who could procure resources from other agencies.? (See the chapters on Medicaid? and MO SAP).
JOINT =? PARTNERSHIPS, Joint ventures, several agencies create partnerships? to raise funds for jointly operated programs.

E. Developing a common mission and the fiscal strategies? for reinforcing it is the central task for school district leadership and other agency executives.?

5. MIDDLE MANAGEMENT = serve as the link between a change in policy at the executive level and a change in action.

A) School district’s middle management supported the leadership throughout the process of needs assessment? and the formulation of the common mission and financing strategies.?

B) Mid-level administrators have the clearest understanding of how the schools and other agencies were operating and how funds? were being spent.

C) Role of middle management:

C1) providing information

C2) provide staff assistance to agency executives

C3) act as liaison with the principals and teachers of the district and with the line staff and middle managers of other agencies.

C4) work out the practical requirements for implementing the policy change.

C5) They will need to develop governance? agreements to define responsibilities among the participating agencies and to negotiate changes in personnel policies.?

6. THE PRINCIPAL

A. must assume new roles and use new skills to implement a school-linked services effort.

A1) Skills of collaborative leadership and shared decision-making with other community agencies.

A2) Actively participate in developing plans for whatever is to happen on or near the site.

A3) Share information about the children and the community, connecting the planning group to parents and teachers.

A4) Provide a reality check for planners who may not be well- grounded in the day-to-day workings of school and community.

B. Serve as an advocate for an expanded school role in working with families and other agencies, making the case with his or her peers, communities, and school staff.

B1) Teachers need encouragement and assistance from the principal to expand their agenda to work more actively with families while maintaining their primary focus on academic success.

C. Principal must link key teachers and other staff members on campus with staffs from other community health and social services agencies.

D. The principal must act as an “ENABLER” promoting the involvement of other staff and community members in planning and monitoring a school-linked services effort.

D1) As a member of the project’s executive committee, she organized two major meetings to acquaint parents with “New Beginnings” and get their ideas about what services the center should provide and how it should be organized.?

7. CLASSROOM TEACHERS = Teachers traditionally have communicated with outside agencies only in times of crisis.

A. At the school site, teaching and support staffs need to be actively involved in assessing the need for school-linked services, adapting and adopting the philosophy.

B. Prepare for solid working relationships among members of the same staff and with those from other agencies.?

C. Teachers need time to think, talk, and plan with the health and social services professionals who are involved in the collaborative effort.

C1) They may fear: they will be expected to give up their primary focus on teaching and learning to become social workers, they will not be treated as equals by those in other professions, school-linked services programs will become another source of pullout programs to disrupt instructional time for the neediest students.

D. Teachers may have unrealistic expectations about the length of time it will take to work through problems of the families.?

8. Shared Governance

A) Teachers are involved primarily through the school’s shared governance? process.

B) Building governance committee = Teachers from each school select a representative.

C) Staff members from all the agencies involved in “New Beginnings” discuss with all the teachers the needs of the families and ways to meet those needs.

D) In small groups, teachers talked about their concerns in working with other agencies, especially their concern about developing a good relationship with the “outsiders” who would be working with “their” students and families.

E) Teachers and center staff (“New Beginnings” operated from a center at Hamilton Elementary) have formed a task force to design and implement changes in school practices.?

9. Wholesale Change = EDUCATION REFORM

A) Imposes different roles and responsibilities on personnel at every level of the school system.

B) School-linked services require a restructuring? of the way schools and their staffs operate both internally and within their community.

C) Education personnel must learn to work with other agencies and to expand the boundaries of their efforts on behalf of students.

? ? ? D) Educators and the public must understand that for

? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? millions of AT-RISK? students, the goals of education

? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? cannot be achieved without a broader collaboration and

? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? reallocation of resources to meet the needs of children

? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? and families.