The success or failure of California’s educational system is shaped by many factors, including the availability and allocation of adequate resources, school leadership, teacher preparation, student learning supports, curricular approaches, and families’ involvement in their own children’s education, among other factors.  While improving educational outcomes for children in public schools requires numerous approaches, advocacy efforts led by nonprofit organizations and community members have impacted changes in policy, practice, and resources in districts and states around the country.  The vast majority of community-based organizations, however, devotes less than two percent of their budgets to advocacy activities and often relies on the least demanding forms of engagement in advocacy.   Significant investments in strengthening the capacity of nonprofit organizations – who have the passion and will, but often lack resources and experience – are necessary to expand the sector’s influence on local and statewide educational policy and practice.

Families Improving Education (FIE), an initiative of the James Irvine Foundation facilitated by Families In Schools, helps to meet this need for improved capacity in the nonprofit sector by supporting organizations engaging underserved families in advocacy and educational decision-making at the state and local levels.  The initiative is designed to foster more responsive and appropriate educational policies and practices that ultimately yield better academic outcomes for children and youth. 
 
Families In Schools (FIS), a non-profit public benefit corporation located in Los Angeles, serves as the Foundation’s intermediary and technical assistance provider to support Initiative grantees in the implementation of their projects and in developing capacity to advocate and to engage families in advocacy.  As technical assistance provider, FIS provides access to organizational development opportunities and resources to strengthen agencies’ capacity to advocate on behalf of families and to provide excellent services that will build parents’ knowledge and confidence to engage in advocacy. 

FIE began in January 2007 by supporting five grantees in California’s Central Valley and has now expanded to include twenty organizations across the Central Valley and Inland Empire regions of the state. 

For more information about the Families Improving Education Initiative, please contact:

Oscar Cruz

Director of Community Engagement and Advocacy
Families In Schools
1545 Wilshire Boulevard, Suite 811
Los Angeles, CA  90017
t: 213.484.2870 x236
f: 213.484.3845
This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it