Leadership magazine Sept/Oct 2015 V45 No 1 | Page 32

scholarships in open competition with students whose home language is English.
The qualitative results are equally positive.
English 3D teacher Rachel Quintanar said,
“Most of the students entered the program
with no particular experience with speaking regularly in class, and lacked the knowledge of academic language to feel confident
speaking in academic settings. By the end of
the first year, these students were confident
and capable speakers of academic English.
They were performing at levels that rival
their native English-speaking peers.” 
Parents have become empowered by the
program as well, Quintanar said. “The family academies have also greatly benefited our
parents and have helped to foster a collegegoing home environment. Parents have
become well-informed advocates for their
children. We have had so much confidence
in the Transition to Middle School program that we used it with all our sixth-grade
parents this past year. The parents were enthusiastic and thanked us for providing the
workshops.”

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“FFC is a perfect example of
an initiative that was not topdown, but was collaborative,
well-informed, well planned, and
data driven. It has served as a
wonderful example to me, as a
newer principal, of how to make
successful change happen.”
A survey by Families In Schools during
the first project year revealed that:
• 92 percent of parents reported gaining
confidence th