Giving Compass' Take:

• Maria Elena Meraz is a mother and advocate for Latino parents.  She co-founded the nonprofit Parent Engagement Academy in LA to educate Latino parents about their children's school systems. 

• How can schools do more to work with parents and make them feel included in the students' learning process? 

• Read about how advocates are creating accountability in New Orleans schools that have a high Latino student population. 

María Elena Meraz has spent 25 years, as both a mother and an advocate, learning and sharing about how public schools in California can better serve the needs of Latino students by involving parents.

Based on her work in Los Angeles as well as in Mexico, she recently started a new parent empowerment program that is reaching hundreds of Latino and immigrant parents like herself with the message that they “urgently” have to get involved with their schools and their children’s education if they want them to succeed in life.

“Knowing the school system can really transform everything,” Meraz said. But after a quarter-century in the field, she sees that Latino parents still lack knowledge about how schools work. “That has been my lifelong battle!”

Latino students in California have a history of lagging behind their peers in academic achievement. This year, 39 percent of them scored proficient in reading and only 27 percent did so in math on state tests, more than 10 percentage points behind the statewide average.

Meraz started the nonprofit Parent Engagement Academy just over a year ago to help L.A.-area Latino parents take the lead in their children’s education and help them get the support they need. But first, they have to be trained in how to overcome cultural barriers.

After more than two decades working for the Parent Institute for Quality Education (PIQE), Meraz developed her own program that seven school districts in Southern California are using to train parents on the importance of helping their children in their social-emotional development, including learning healthy eating habits and gaining technology skills to support them in school.

Read the full article about advocating for Latino parents by Esmeralda Fabian Romero at The 74