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School, Family, and Community Partnerships: Preparing Educators and Improving Schools
By Joyce L. Epstein
Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 2001. 620 pages. $35.00
In School, Family, and Community Partnerships: Preparing Educators and Improving Schools, Joyce Epstein apprises readers of the research base that establishes the importance of home-school partnerships, and offers suggestions for the practical application of that research. Throughout the book, Epstein has included numerous readings on partnerships that will appeal to administrators, teachers, and graduate students, while giving the educational researcher sufficient background on the implementation and positive effects of partnerships to design and implement relevant studies. This combination serves not only to inform but also to guide further research in the field of school, family, and community partnerships.
Epstein contends that the research points to one inescapable conclusion: "Families and communities are important in children's lives and, along with schools, influence students' learning" (17). With this research-based tenet in mind, Epstein has divided Partnerships into two parts. Part one includes an introduction to the theory that underlies home-school partnerships and the research base that has established such partnerships as an effective means of improving parent involvement and student achievement. Part two focuses on the practical-partnership policies at the national, state, and local levels; a framework for developing comprehensive partnership programs; and readings on a program that involves families...