Education = Family + Community + School

My experience with United Way allowed me the opportunity to see “community” as a complex system of interrelated efforts of government, business, non-profits, education, health and other organizations. People and organizations often approach a social or health issue from a limited perspective without considering all factors which would impact their issue.

Successful education, broadly defined as the preparation of our children to compete in the world, is dependent on three systems: Family, Community, and School. A child needs at least one of the systems to be working well if he or she is to have any chance to succeed. With one of the systems functioning, the other two could be overcome. If a school system does its job well, educators could overcome family strife, and could overcome a poor community, and get their students prepared. But schools are only part of the educational process. Family and community have equally important roles in education, and a student coming from a great family support structure, can live in a poor community and go to a poor school, and still have a chance to compete. Ideally our children have strengths in all three systems, but the reality is all three are being strained with some near the breaking point. Schools are feeling financial constraints, as are families, especially single-parent households. Many communities haven’t quite figured out what their role in education is. Success in education requires getting all relevant stakeholders working from the same game plan, and aligning their efforts within a common framework.

I’ll be writing about opportunities for collaboration of the three systems in the education of Delaware County’s children, but I’d like to hear from you. Send me an email (through my profile to the rigtht) to tell me about your school district. What do you see as strengths or weaknesses? How do you think family, community and the schools in your district could work together better?