Family engagement is a system: Leading with CARES and the ABCs

By: Jenni Torres

For more than 30 years, I have invested in education across classrooms, systems and communities in five states, Puerto Rico and Colombia. I have poured my heart into this work as a teacher, leader, curriculum developer, researcher and a parent in a bilingual family. Across these experiences, one truth remains: Families want to partner in their children’s learning. The question is whether our systems make that possible.

Family engagement is essential to creating welcoming, effective learning environments. Families bring knowledge, lived experience and cultural insight that strengthen both curriculum and instruction. Decades of research show that strong partnerships between educators and families improve student outcomes, especially when grounded in trust, shared responsibility and an asset-based perspective. More recent research continues to highlight the importance of centering family voice, mutual trust and co-learning as drivers of equity and success.

There is broad agreement: family engagement is not supplemental. It is foundational. Educators and families must work as partners to build systems where all children can thrive. Families need to feel genuinely included, and schools need family support to ensure that children see connections between learning content and their daily experiences outside of school. Learning does not stop when a child leaves the school building. Experiences from the community and home are background knowledge and context that help build connections to new ideas.

Moving From Activities to Systems

Despite this shared understanding that engaging families leads to better long-term outcomes for students, family engagement is often treated as an add-on, an event, a checklist or the responsibility of a few staff members. Schools plan goals, review data and then consider how to “fit in” family engagement. When engagement lives at the margins, so do many families.

If you want strong outcomes for multilingual learners, you need to move beyond programs and design consistency across your system. This starts with shifting mindsets and building structures that center family voice.

Too often, educators hear or use statements such as:

• “Some families just don’t show up.”
• “We need to fix engagement numbers.”
• “Families are not interested.”

These statements reflect deficit thinking. Beginning with these assumptions can create an expectation of limited participation causing limited results. Instead, start with this: all families care deeply about their children’s success. When you start there, you can build from a position of shared strengths and partnership.

At WIDA, we define family as a dynamic network of people connected through care, support and shared responsibility for a child’s learning. This handout gives more information on how we define these terms. Families engage in many ways, even when systems do not always recognize those ways. Some prefer text messages; others email or in-person conversations. Some join group settings; others prefer one-on-one discussions. Participation varies by schedule, language and comfort.

All families hope their children are seen, supported and given opportunities to thrive. All families deserve clear communication with plenty of options to influence how schools choose to build a highly skilled, curious and capable next generation.

Utilizing the CARES Framework

If you want different results, you must question your assumptions. Listening is the first step. It creates the conditions to reimagine systems where children see their families, languages and cultures reflected in their learning.

The CARES Framework offers a practical way to begin. Developed through extensive family feedback and validated by more than 2,000 families, CARES reflects what families consistently say matters:

• Communication that is clear, timely and respectful
• Academic content that connects to students’ lives
• Relationships built on trust
• Expectations that are clear and achievable
• Support that is easy to access

These ideas are not new. The challenge is not identifying them but applying them consistently. Leadership means embedding these elements into everyday practice, so families experience them across classrooms, schools and systems.

What This Looks Like in Practice

You do not need to launch a new initiative. You can strengthen existing work by starting with reflections about educator mindsets and then applying CARES to what you already do:

• Communication: Build ongoing, two-way conversations that reflect family needs and student goals.
• Academic content: Share what students are learning in ways families can understand and connect to real life.
• Relationships: Create space to listen and show how family feedback shapes decisions.
• Expectations: Be clear about goals and offer flexible ways for families to engage.
• Support: Make it easy to find help and respond in a timely way.

When these practices align, families experience something powerful: trust.

Connecting CARES to Systemwide Change

The overlap between CARES and the WIDA ABCs of Family and Community Engagement points to the key components of systemwide impact. Both CARES and the ABCs emphasize that meaningful family engagement is built through ongoing communication, trust, responsiveness, advocacy and shared responsibility across levels of the system. For example:

• On-going, clear communication is tied to Collaboration and Building Trust
• Sharing academic content is key to helping families Connect to Learning
• Fostering relationships is tied to Building Trust and Awareness
• Being clear about expectations helps prompt Advocacy
• Offering support is essential for Breaking Barriers and Advocacy

Together, these frameworks support coherence across your system. They also prompt critical questions:

• Who has access to information, relationships and opportunities to participate — and who may be unintentionally excluded?
• How do our communication practices, language supports and relationships build trust and create meaningful partnerships with families?
• In what ways do families’ experiences, feedback and goals shape decisions, engagement, opportunities and support for student learning?

These questions help you identify barriers and redesign systems, so access is not dependent on a family’s time, language or resources. Using both the CARES approach for examining school and classroom practice alongside the system-wide examination in these questions, you can begin to build a fully integrated culture of engaging families.

A Practical Starting Point

If you are looking for a place to begin, start with reflection:

• Do staff share a clear, inclusive definition of family engagement?
• Where do families experience consistency—and where do they not?
• What barriers are families navigating on their own?

Then take small, aligned steps:

• Use shared, asset-based language across your team
• Support staff in building communication and relationship practices
• Invite families to co-design, not just participate
• Simplify how families access information and support
• Ensure communication is accessible across languages and formats

This work takes time. It requires reflection, alignment and persistence.

Belonging Does Not Happen by Chance

As a military spouse, my family moved 14 times in 26 years. I experienced many school systems as both a parent and an educator. The strongest experiences were those where I was seen as a partner from the beginning and where expectations were clear.

When I had to figure things out on my own, it was harder and took longer to feel connected. When our family was welcomed as an asset to the community, we thrived, and my children learned more.

As a leader, you shape this experience before a family enters your school.

When families experience belonging, students are more likely to succeed.

Continuing the Work

The CARES Framework and WIDA ABCs of Family Engagement offer clear starting points. Your role is to make it visible every day, in every interaction.

Consider this question: What would it take for every family in your system to feel that they belong?

To deepen this work, explore WIDA’s Engaging Families and Communities webpage where you’ll find examples of the ABCs of Family and Community Engagement in action, letters and handouts for families, flyers in several languages and more.

References

Bronfenbrenner, U. (1979). The ecology of human development: Experiments by nature and design. Harvard University Press.

Grace, R., & Giles, M. (2019). Family engagement as a partnership: Building relationships for student success. Journal of Educational Change, 20(3), 345–362. (Please verify this source matches your intended citation.)

Hoover-Dempsey, K. V., & Sandler, H. M. (2005). Final performance report for OERI grant #R305T010673: The social context of parental involvement: A path to enhanced achievement. Vanderbilt University.

Hoover-Dempsey, K. V., Walker, J. M. T., & Sandler, H. M. (2005). Why do parents become involved? Research findings and implications. The Elementary School Journal, 106(2), 105–130. https://doi.org/10.1086/499194

Mapp, K. L. (2003). Having their say: Parents describe how and why they are engaged in their children’s learning. School Community Journal, 13(1), 35–64.

Mapp, K. L., & Bergman, E. (2021). Everyone wins! The evidence for family-school partnerships and implications for practice. Scholastic.

Mapp, K. L., & Kuttner, P. J. (2013). Partners in education: A dual capacity-building framework for family-school partnerships. U.S. Department of Education.

Torres, J. (2022). Centering family voice in educational design and organizational learning (Doctoral dissertation). ProQuest Dissertations Publishing.