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Rita Soledad Fernandez

Dr. Recendez

Culture and Inclusion

27 October 2017

Parents and Students

Approximately ninety-seven percent of my middle school students are Latinos. About fifty-

percent of them were born in the United States with immigrant parents who speak exclusively in

Spanish. Thirty-percent are second generation with parents who speak English and Spanish and

the remaining twenty-percent of the students immigrated here as children. Many of the families

are practicing Catholics with a few Pentecostal Christians. The educational backgrounds of the

parents vary, some of the immigrant parents attended college in their native countries while other

immigrant parents only attended elementary school before working to support their families.

Many of the second-generation students have parents who either struggled to obtain their high

school diplomas, earned a GED instead of a high school diploma, or attended some community

college and a select few graduated from college here in the United States.

Since I have good communication with parents and strong relationships with my students, I

am usually the first staff member that parents contact with concerns. Parents have come to talk to

me to get my help with various issues regarding their child. However, the one concern that I

most often address is the need for additional academic support that most parents are unable to

provide themselves. As a result of knowing and respecting their time restrictions and limited

financial resources, I offer free tutoring Monday through Friday for an hour before school starts

and free after-school tutoring once a week.

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Yet, I believe one way I can be more responsive to parents and students is by revamping my

homework policy. Over the years, I have tried various methods to provide support for students

struggling to complete homework independently. Last year, I required students to answer daily

math reflection questions and problem sets. I found the homework reflection questions

sufficiently provided me with data about student understanding of content while also developing

my students’ writing skills. While the problem sets were a source of additional stress on students

and their families because they lacked the resources to successfully complete them without my

intervention. I would like to survey parents about the expectations they have for my math

homework assignments and how best we can make sure that the homework is completed daily. I

can gather this information by sending home a survey to parents and inviting them to participate

in a focus group. I believe by encouraging this type of dialogue I may also gain critical parent

insight on how I can successfully make sure each student leaves my class mastering the grade

level content.