The Families Improving Education (FIE) Initiative of the James Irvine Foundation seeks to support organizations engaging families—particularly those in low-income, ethnic, and immigrant communities—in educational policymaking at the state and local levels. 

The initiative supports organizations undertaking a variety of activities that facilitate family input into educational decision-making and is designed to foster more responsive and appropriate educational policies that ultimately yield better academic outcomes for children and youth.  

In 2006, Families In Schools was selected by the Foundation to serve as the intermediary between the Foundation and five FIE grantees located in California’s San Joaquin Valley.  These five nonprofit organizations include:  

• California Rural Legal Assistance Foundation (Sacramento, Sacramento County)

• Community Services & Employment Training (CSET) (Visalia, Tulare County)

• Community Partnership for Families of San Joaquin (Stockton, San Joaquin County)

• Fresno Center for New Americans (Fresno, Fresno County)

• Reading & Beyond (formerly Fresno Covenant Foundation) (Fresno, Fresno County)

As the technical assistance provider for these agencies, Families In Schools (FIS) aims to assist grantees in successful implementation of their proposed projects by providing access to organizational development opportunities and resources and tools designed to help agencies build stronger partnerships with and between families and schools.  FIS draws upon its rich experience providing similar capacity-building opportunities to agencies, schools, and families in Los Angeles County.  The mission of Families In Schools is to involve parents in the education of their children as skillful, knowledgeable, and effective partners, capable of ensuring that their children receive the quality of education to which they are entitled, and must have, to achieve life long success.

For more information, please contact:

Lisa Danielson

Project Manager – Special Initiatives

Families In Schools

1545 Wilshire Boulevard, Suite 811

Los Angeles, CA 90017

(213) 484-2870 x236

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Or visit the following websites:

FIE Initiative:  www.familiesinschools.org/fie

Irvine Foundation: www.irvine.org

CRLAF:  www.crlaf.org

CSET:  www.cset.org

CPFSJ:  www.cpfsj.org

FCNA: www.fresnocenter.org

R&B:  www.fresnocovenantfoundation.org