Site Councils
How do schools get better? One way is through school-driven initiatives to improve curriculum (classroom materials and teaching practices), student engagement, and parent involvement.
That’s what school site councils are supposed to do. Site councils are composed of the school principal, teacher representatives, classified staff representatives, and parent representatives. Students and community members may also be elected.
In our experience, many site councils are falling short of their potential. That’s one reason why for the past seven (!) years, Community & Parents for Public Schools (CPPS) has been trying to persuade Portland Public Schools to provide training for site councils at all schools. We’ve worked with a variety of partners off and on over the years, including the District, the Portland Association of Teachers (PAT), the Portland Federation of Teachers and Classified Employees, principals, the Title I Family Involvement Team, Portland Schools Foundation, and the Latino Network.
Several years ago we developed an outline for site council training. The Portland Schools Foundation hired Margot Helphand to turn out outline into a training curriculum. Margot has been training site councils in schools around the state for over a decade.
To access the training materials, press here.
This year we are working with the District to provide site council training at Title I schools. If your site council is interested in training (whether you’re Title I or not), send us feedback using the form below.
For more information, contact us at cpps@cppsportland.org or (503) 220-0577.