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 James Irvine Foundation to serve as the intermediary between the foundation and five FIE grantees located in California’s San Joaquin Valley. As the technical assistance provider for these agencies, FIS aims to assist grantees in the successful implementation of ther proposed projects by providing access to organizational development opportunities and resources and tools designed to help agencies to 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 recieve the quality of education to which they are entitled, and must have, to achieve life long success.