Karen Long's job in downtown Washington, D.C., doesn't allow her as much time to spend with her two elementary-school-age children as she would like.
A program provided as an outreach of Springfield Estates Elementary has revolutionized her thinking about homework.
"My thought was when you get home, you start your homework," said Long, a single mother of a third-grader and a kindergartner at Springfield Estates. "For them to say to give (my children) a little break was foreign to me."
Long learned the homework tip — allow your children a short time to unwind after they get home from school — along with other pieces of advice in a parent-workshop outreach program designed specifically to meet the needs of Long and other residents of the Springfield Crossing apartment complex, whose students attend Springfield Estates.
Through the outreach program, nearly a dozen staff members traveled to the apartment complex, where they put on a 90-minute workshop.
Assistant principal Carolyn Fischer and guidance counselor Carolyn Gibson hatched the program as a way to reach out to the 75 students who live at the 3-year old Springfield Crossing complex. Along with the Gifted and Talented (GT) students, the students from Springfield Crossing are the only students bused to school. According to Fischer, many of the students come from families where English is a second language, or where parents work two or three jobs.
"What I was hearing from teachers is we couldn’t get them to come here, they weren’t coming, and that was the population the teachers were saying they needed here," said Fischer.
FOR LONG, coming to school for conferences or other events wasn't a problem, but Fischer said crammed schedules, a lack of transportation and other factors meant that many other parents in Springfield Crossing haven't been able to become involved in life at their students' school.
"These are very dedicated parents who for a variety of reasons are not able to be as involved as they would like to be in all aspects of their child's schooling," said Fischer.
Sponsored by the school's Community of Caring program and the Parent-Teacher Association, three workshops at Springfield Estates were scheduled for this school year. The first, which took place in December, focused on the topic of homework, addressing ways for parents to help their students, the school's expectations, and an introduction to the new "Blackboard" software available via the Fairfax County school Web site. This software allows each classroom to have its own Web page, where teachers can leave information for parents and students to read.
"If a parent is not sure what a homework assignment is, they can get on themselves and see what homework their child should be doing that night," said Becky Yurasko, a kindergarten teacher who led a workshop on the Blackboard software.
In order to encourage parental attendance at the workshop, the school sent letters home with all students, not just those in Springfield Crossing. Follow-up phone calls, and even stickers on students' clothing, made sure all parents knew the event was happening.
AT THE DECEMBER workshop, 30 families were represented, five of which included parents from the neighborhoods surrounding the school. That was important, said Fischer, since the information they were addressing was important for all their parents to hear.
"We were very open to anybody coming, although our target population really was the families at the apartment complex," Fischer said.
All the workshops take place in the apartment complex's community room, and Fischer said she has noticed results from the first workshop.
"A handful of parents have started to venture over here and are helping in the classrooms, doing things they weren’t doing before this," she said.
The next workshop, on March 1, will deal with math, and the final workshop in June will focus on summer programs.
"There were a lot of good nuggets that I took from it that were essential," said Long. "I liked it, and I can't wait to go back to the next one."