Why?
Community engagement in schools matters—it takes an engaged community to support the improvement of a school or district. Communities possess important knowledge, understanding, and expertise that can support schools. In Mississippi, state statute requires that any district and any school rated D or F by the Statewide Accountability System create a Community Engagement Council (CEC), formerly known as a P-16 Council. After reports of uneven effectiveness among CECs, the Mississippi Department of Education (MDE) partnered with the Region 7 Comprehensive Center (R7CC) in 2021 to redesign the guidance and supports for CECs.
What?
Efforts began with stakeholder input. R7CC gathered input from 139 community members and district staff in 37 districts through surveys and follow-up focus groups and then shared key themes with MDE. In general, CEC members were highly committed to supporting efforts in their districts, but they were confused about CECs, how they were supposed to function, and how to achieve positive outcomes.
Since then, MDE and R7CC have used the feedback to inform the following activities:
- Releasing new guidance based on stakeholder feedback that aims to provide clearer direction to CECs.
- Creating additional resources to support CEC implementation, including a communications toolkit, a sample information session agenda, a sample interest form, a sample ballot, and a sign-in sheet template.
- Elevating CECs through the creation of two new recognitions, the MS CEC of Promise and MS CEC of Distinction awards.
- Codeveloping and piloting with four districts a learning series for CECs.
MDE will announce its first-ever MS CEC of Promise in April 2024. R7CC continues to support the CEC recognition and pilot work through the creation of process guides and module materials so that MDE can continue to replicate and refine efforts in the coming years.
Impact?
Early implementation has resulted in the following:
- In a post-training survey for districts, 100% of respondents said that MS CEC guidance was somewhat or extremely useful in supporting the creation of CECs, and 97% said the guidance was somewhat or extremely useful in supporting the implementation of CECs.
- MDE has partnered with the MS Campaign for Grade-Level Reading to offer a banner as part of its recognition process.
- MDE has a process guide and set of training materials it can use annually to recognize and support CECs.