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Parent program earns sweet success

By Mary Gottschalk

The tale of the origin and evolution of the Parent Involvement in Education program at Trace Elementary School is an unlikely one.

It started a few years back when a group of women, including one who was not even a parent at the time, talked to one another about how to encourage more parents to send their children to the public schools in the Rose Garden, Shasta Hanchett and Cory neighborhoods.

Specifically, they wanted parents to look at local public schools first, rather than overlook them in favor of private schools.

Moving from academic discussions to action, Marlee Benefiel and Jane Hintz founded Project Bookmark in the fall of 2002 to promote local public schools.

At the time, Benefiel had no children and Hintz's children were too young for school. Yet both women devoted time and energy and continue to do so.

The group started and continues to host an annual kindergarten information night aimed at parents who are "shopping" for the right school for their children.

Recognizing that quality is a key factor in choosing a school, Benefiel and Hintz, along with fellow volunteers Ann Du Bois and Carrie Holmberg, decided to see how they could contribute to the quality of area schools.

At the suggestion of San Jose Unified School District officials, the women organized a series of focus groups to find out what parents wanted most in their children's schools.

They met with parents who had children enrolled in schools, parents who had decided to send their children to private or parochial schools and parents with children still too young for school.

"The unifying theme was parent involvement," says Hintz.

"We got the idea of researching strong models of parent involvement schools. I knew the value of parent involvement because I put my kids in a preschool with parent involvement."

Among the schools they looked at for inspiration were Washington Open School in Santa Clara and Crista McAuliffe School in Saratoga, where parent involvement is important.

"We took the best ideas from there and modified them to meet community needs here," Hintz says.

Benefiel adds, "Most public schools welcome parent input. We helped structure a more formal approach, rather than just a general invitation. We wanted to structure something more similar to parent involvement programs in preschools."

The result was a proposal they submitted to the superintendent of SJUSD proposing a PIE program be implemented in at least one kindergarten class at Cory Elementary School for the 2004-05 school year.

Parents who wanted to enroll their child had to commit to contributing 40 hours or more during the school year.

"We wanted to make it enough of a commitment that people would be structured and put it on their calendars," Benefiel says.

In researching Washington Open, Benefiel says they found parents were expected to put in four hours a week, but that seemed too much for PIE.

"We wanted something that was not so big a commitment that it would eliminate certain neighborhood people. We wanted something that was inclusive for all families, whether they were two working parents or one working and one stay-at-home.

"We wanted a sound commitment, but not so much that it would take people out of being able to do it."

Erin Green, now principal at Trace Elementary School, was principal at Cory when the PIE program started.

"It's a great concept, a really great concept," Green says.

The first year, 20 students enrolled in the PIE kindergarten class.

When Cory closed at the end of that year, the program transferred to Trace, as did Green.

"We slowly expanded it. Currently we have two kindergarten classes, a first grade and a second grade in PIE. Next year it will expand up to grade 3," Green says. "We want to make sure we grow really slowly and deliberately."

Chris Henriques and his wife, Julie, have participated in the PIE program since it started.

Their daughter Kate is now in second grade and son Adam is in kindergarten.

"One of the major advantages is we've really gotten to know the other families whose kids are in our kids' classes, and it has developed a strong bond between the kids and kids' families," Henriques says.

"Academically, I think the kids benefit from the extra attention, the individual attention. It gives kids one-on-one attention with a person that can help them."

Henriques says his wife volunteers at least one hour a week in their children's classes. He is active in the Parent Teacher Organization, serving on the board, and both work on projects such as cleanup and beautification days.

Volunteering in the classroom is the first thing that comes to mind when PIE comes up, but there are other options for participating parents.

These include working on classroom bulletin boards, working with school clubs, assisting with yard duty and helping with field trips.

For parents who can't work in classrooms because of their own work schedules, there are evening and weekend opportunities. These include providing clerical support, assisting on phone trees calling families, fundraising and providing support for the performing arts groups by building sets, sewing costumes and selling programs at productions.

Jeanne Scheid, who is the PIE coordinator at Trace, says the value of the program is that "it makes this a really strong community. Parents are getting to know their kids' friends, their teachers and other parents.

"It helps all the students, whether they're in a PIE classroom or not. It overflows and affects the whole school positively. People are happy to be at the school.

"You see parents in the yard during recess, in the media center and helping out in the library. It's connecting people together."

Janet DeBartolo, who has been teaching for 25 years and now teaches first grade at Trace, says, "I find the parents very helpful. I have someone in my classroom almost every day and sometimes two or three people.

"I always have plenty of people for field trips, so we can have extra field trips because parents are willing to drive and pay. It brings more enrichment into their lives."

Although there have been no tests to measure the effect of PIE, those involved say it is a success.

"I've seen growth in underachieving children because there's more help in the classroom," DeBartolo says.

"Sometimes an extra adult in the room can work with children and I can pull out groups. Sometimes parents work one-on-one."

Melissa Filuk Cook, who is active with Project Bookmark, says it is the PIE program that is making her lean toward Trace for when her son Chandler enters kindergarten in fall 2008.

"We would only go there because of PIE; there's no other choice in our minds," Cook says.

"Chandler goes to a co-op preschool where we're involved in his education. We want to continue to do so. It helps to be in your child's world."

Henriques has nothing but praise for founders Benefiel and Hintz.

"When those two brought it up to the district, neither of them had children in the schools at the time. It brought a lot of credibility," he says.

"It wasn't a group of parents pushing for their own kids, it was a group of people who wanted to make the school more attractive to the neighborhood. As a result, it has attracted people who might not have otherwise attended Trace."

Henriques admits that choosing Trace over a private school was initially "a difficult decision for us, especially with your first kid. You want to make it the perfect, right decision."

Now Henriques says he feels he and his wife made the right decision.

"It's been a very positive experience for us," he says.

For additional information on the PIE program and Project Bookmark, visit www.projectbookmark.com.