LEARN
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2015 Grants Challenge

Parents Education League of LA: Creating Your Go-To School Resource & Parent Network

Imagine a city with informed and confident parents who understand the school landscape, are actively involved and can make the best possible educational choices for their children. To serve the greatest number of families possible, PEL proposes to expand our website to 1) offer comprehensive and robust access to school and educational resources via live streaming, mobile application, webinars, an interactive map; & 2) develop and activate a City-Wide Network of parents and educational leaders

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In what areas of Los Angeles will you be directly working?

Central LA

San Fernando Valley

Westside

County of Los Angeles

City of Los Angeles

LAUSD

How do you plan to use these resources to make change?

Conduct research

Engage residents and stakeholders

Implement a pilot or new project

Expand a pilot or a program

Advocate with policymakers and leaders

How will your proposal improve the following LEARN metrics?​

Percentage of children enrolled in early education programs

District-wide graduation rates

College matriculation rates

Student education pipeline (an integrated network of pre-schools, K-12 institutions, and higher education systems that prepares students for seamless transitions between high school, higher ed

Truancy rates in elementary and middle schools (Dream Metric)

Describe in greater detail how you will make LA the best place to LEARN.

Imagine an LA where discussions of schools and education are met with excitement and possibility rather than anxiety and discord.

Imagine a “one-stop” Website and Mobile App where parents can easily access and learn about the importance of early childhood education, the differences between public and private schools, and enrichment resources. PEL will create a robust Website and Mobile App, hosting videos of our programming & speakers. With the advanced technology, we can replicate our existing programming to reach thousands more parents. PEL frequently hosts speakers on hot topics such as: separation anxiety for new preschoolers, promote vocabulary growth, tech for tots, kindergarten readiness, reading strategies, learning styles & differences, dyslexia, gifted education, progressive education, homeschooling, and arts as enrichment.

Imagine a “go-to” mapped presentation of LA’s schools and educational choices without advertising or bias. PEL will host and feature a more visually engaging and interactive geographical map that outlines all options from a managed database.

Imagine informed parents connected through a City-Wide Parents Network, representing schools from all sectors of the educational landscape so they can virtually connect. PEL will develop and activate a parent portal for access to relevant information.

PEL is positioned to reach the above goals as we currently offer live programming to over 500 families a year in collaboration with over 200 preschools, over 50 independent schools, over 50 educational resource providers, the Office of School Choice of LAUSD, and the California Charter Schools Association.

With new website capabilities of online programming combined with a robust Parent Network, we can geographically reach an almost unlimited number of families throughout LA County. Specifically, we can expand to include the Downtown LA/Los Feliz/South Los Angeles areas.

Our success would be measured by reaching as many families of the approximately 55,000 children entering Preschool or Kindergarten every year in LA. With Google Analytics we can specifically analyze who we are reaching & where. Data collected can also indicate which type of programming parents are most interested in accessing. Email addresses will be collected on the site to request subjective feedback.

Specifically, PEL’s goal is to reach 1,500 new parents during the initial 90 days, 4,000 by the 6th month, & 12,000 by year end & maintain consistently high ratings.

Please explain how you will evaluate your work.

PEL’s proposal is unique in that we can determine how many people we have helped as well as the quality of the programming.

For subjective feedback, PEL will e-survey all recipients of live and streamed programming with a 3-point grading system. Each program will be evaluated by parents for quality and “take-away” merits. Follow-up e-surveys will be scheduled at six month and year intervals to determine parents’ continued satisfaction and/or value-added results. Demographic information will be incorporated into the survey to determine populations most served. A “comment and feedback” button on Website will provide for additional testimonials.

For a more objective evaluation, the PEL Website/Application traffic is tracked with Google Analytics, including number of users, basic demographic info, and most demanded landing pages. With this data, PEL will strategize and respond to the community’s needs. The City-Wide Parent Network can be evaluated by its growth in schools represented.

How can the LA2050 community and other stakeholders help your proposal succeed

Money (financial capital)

Volunteers/staff (human capital)

Publicity/awareness (social capital)

Community outreach

Network/relationship support

Quality improvement research