How to advocate for your child in school and win

I find it both fascinating and frustrating how being a parent foists many roles upon you whether you are ready, interested or not. Become a parent and you will find yourself thrust into snot sucker-in-chief, NoseFridaing your way through your infant’s congested nasal passages. You become the Captain Consoler and Constrainer who ensures smooth sailing through your child’s inoculations and medical procedures. You’re the Uber driver dashing for errands and extracurriculars. You’re the ghostbuster eliminating fear-inducing figments under beds and in closets. You’re the party planner, social calendar scheduler, homework helper, boo-boo kisser, and the all-knowing sage who eats “why” questions for breakfast. 

These various roles all serve important functions in child-rearing and many of these roles start and stop at various points in our children’s development. But I find one role parents play to be of particular significance: being your child’s advocate. From pre-natal to perpetuity, parents cannot help but find themselves giving voice to their children’s needs as they come into contact with the institutions and individuals that impact their journey. And the education system is a venue where parents’ advocacy role is particularly prominent. Yet, with advocacy, like so many of the parenting roles that choose us, many parents proceed even though they aren’t completely sure how to be most effective. 

Why do I need to advocate?

If you’ve ever expressed your child’s needs to individuals in the school system or attempted to influence people or institutions to do something you want, you’ve engaged in advocacy. You might be the type who only steps into this role when there is a problem or you feel its absolutely necessary. Or you might be someone who advocates sparingly or reluctantly. However you feel about being an advocate in the school system, it is absolutely necessary if you want the education system to best serve the needs of your child. 

It is necessary because good people working in schools make mistakes. They misread their own policy, they give your child an incorrect grade, they forget to share an important deadline with you, they leave your 5-year-old child on a bus, and they make many more errors that have real implications for your child. The stakes are always much higher for you and your child. Your attentiveness and advocacy can ensure that some mistakes never happen and, if they do, there is accountability or some sort of redress. 

Advocacy is also necessary because racism and implicit bias are rife in the education system.  As early as preschool, blacks are suspended at rates 3.6 times more often than whites. Across the nation, black girls were suspended six times more than white girls. Studies have also found that teachers are more likely to label black students as troublemakers and black boys as “bad boys.” On average, white teachers have lower expectations for black students and are less likely to recommend black students for gifted programs than black teachers. 

Predominantly white school districts receive 23 billion more in funding than districts that serve mostly students of color despite serving the same number of students. Classrooms with mostly white students tend to have four times as many high-quality lessons as classrooms with mostly students of color. 

All parents have sufficient reason to advocate for their children in schools. But if your child is a student of color, is low-income, has special needs, is an English Learner, is undocumented, is LGTBQ, or any other identity that differs from the education system’s default setting, you must be all the more vigilant in your advocacy. 

How do I advocate successfully? 

There is no approach to advocacy that guarantees you will always be successful.  But there are approaches that will dramatically increase your chances of getting what you need for your child. The approach that I use and recommend was developed by the 50-State Campaign for Achievement Now in their Guide to Building Advocacy Campaigns. 

The most essential piece of the approach is that you plan out your goals, strategies, and tactics (in that order) before you advocate for something. This doesn’t need to be an elaborate plan and, depending on the situation, might not even need to be a plan that is written down. Rather, it is most important you use the goals, strategies, tactics approach as a set of questions you ask yourself that ensure you are being most strategic. 

Clarify your goals – Parents have a tendency to start thinking about tactics (should I fire off an angry email to my child’s teacher or principal? Should I complain at a school board meeting? Should I start a petition?) before they are even clear about exactly what they want to achieve. But the first step in successfully advocating for your child is being clear about what qualifies as success. Do you want the school to move your child into a different teacher’s class? Do you want them to add an advanced placement class to your child’s schedule? Do you want them to offer your child an apology for an injustice they experienced at school? Does your child need specific support you believe the school should offer? You have to be very detailed about what you want (what’s ideal and what’s the least you will accept) or you will easily get sidetracked during the process of advocating. 

Match strategy to your environment – After you know what you’d consider a win, you need to pick advocacy strategies that will allow you to be successful in your given environment. The four strategies that are outlined in the guidebook essentially breakdown as follows: 

• Elite negotiation strategy – making change happen through negotiating directly with decision-makers
• Social movement strategy – making change happen through mobilizing groups of people to pressure decision-makers
• Expert communities strategy – making change happen through enlisting experts and research to inform decision-makers
• Emergent network strategy – making change happen by testing new ideas through trial and error

There are situations where you might need to use a few of these strategies to be successful and others when one might suffice. For example, for many issues your child will face, going directly to those with decision-making authority (a teacher, a principal, someone at the school district, etc.) will be the most efficient and effective strategy.

Select winning tactics – After you understand your goals and strategies, you will need to decide which corresponding tactics will be most effective. If you’re using a social movement strategy are you asking other parents to sign a petition? Are you asking several parents to show up at a school board meeting to share their stories? Are you raising awareness about an issue your child is facing via social media?

Understanding which tactics work best and which you’re most comfortable using takes practice. You’ll also find that you start with one tactic (e.g. writing a letter to a school official) and then might escalate (e.g. taking your story to the media) once you notice your initial tactic is not working. 

Whatever you use, it’s just important that you remember your tactic is in service of your goal and should not become the goal. For example, if calling out your child’s school or someone at the school via social media or traditional media is a tactic that will ultimately make it harder to accomplish your goal, it might not be the right tactic. It’s hard sometimes but it can’t just be about you blowing off some steam.  

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Beyond mastering the fundamentals of your goals, strategies, and tactics there are other skills and knowledge the best advocates acquire that increase their effectiveness. The best advocates know which individuals hold power and who has the most influence over those individuals. Great advocates know how to consult policy or experts who can educate them on their rights to tip the scales in their favor while advocating. Advocates need to know how to tell their stories in compelling ways that help them garner support. They also need to know how to pick their battles and be honest about when the repercussions or risks exceed the rewards of their advocacy. 

A lot of these skills will come with practice, feedback, and reflection. So it is most important that —armed with your goals, strategies, and tactics— you get in the habit of making your child’s needs heard often. You will learn a lot from your successes, mistakes, and rejections. But whether you win or lose on any particular goal, you will be doing your part to shape the school system for the better for your child and countless others. And that is one role parents play that is extremely rewarding.