Turning the Page

Turning the Page, founded in 1998, conducts family engagement programs in our Washington, D.C. and Chicago partner schools, helping parents and other caregivers in D.C.'s Ward 8 and Chicago's North Lawndale become more active, effective participants in their children’s education, ultimately improving the educational experiences of the students. Parents learn how to best support their children’s learning at home, form positive relationships with their children’s teachers, gain educational resources, and become leaders in their school communities. Turning the Page programs include Community Nights, Author Visits, and Summer Learning Trips, as well as Parent Leadership programming, and we also distribute thousands of new books for families’ home libraries each year. Turning the Page programs will build on each other over time, and ideally, the practices Turning the Page instills and supports within partner schools will remain in place for many years to come.

 

Community Nights, eight of which take place at each Turning the Page partner school per year, occur weekday evenings and consist of educational parent workshops, literacy-based child mentoring, book distributions, and a healthy family dinner. Turning the Page integrates the latest reading and educational research into interactive, engaging workshops that enable parents to more effectively support their children's educational development both in collaboration with their children's teachers at school, and at home. Broken into groups based on children’s grade level, parents learn strategies to support children's learning in every subject and gain critical, school-specific information directly from school faculty and staff. Meanwhile, students are mentored in literacy-based activities by volunteers, Turning the Page staff, and local university students.

 

Two Community Nights at each school per year are special Author Visits, where families hear directly from renowned children’s book authors their inspirations, writing and publishing processes, and tips to encourage a lifetime love of reading. At the end of each Author Visit, families receive a signed copy of the visiting author's latest book.

 

Turning the Page facilitates at least five free Summer Learning Trips in each city for families in our partner schools, to local museums and other cultural and educational sites. The field trips are both fun and educational, actively combating summer learning loss while bringing families to sites they may not experience otherwise. Using the cities themselves as classrooms, we help ensure that resources such as museums can be accessed by all regardless of income or neighborhood.

 

Turning the Page’s Parent Leadership programming brings our most active parents from all Turning the Page partner schools in one particular city together in two full-day Saturday Parent Leadership Conferences. At the Conferences, parents learn about current issues facing the public school community, as well as brainstorm for school improvement and community resource projects. Turning the Page also provides year-round support at each individual school to help these parent leaders plan and implement larger, sometimes ongoing projects within their communities. Parent leaders also learn about school improvement teams and the critical role that active and well-informed parents can have on these local school advisory bodies.

 

Books and reading are integral to all Turning the Page programs. At Community Nights alone, topical books introduce each parent workshop and each mentoring session for students, parents gain understanding of the importance of at-home reading, and also gain tips on how to encourage a love of reading in their children at all ages. We also distribute high-quality children’s books for families’ home libraries at the conclusion of each Turning the Page event throughout the year. Turning the Page understands that building families’ home libraries contributes greatly to parents’ capacity to support their children’s reading progress, in turn contributing to student success.