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D.C. schools try to meet students where they live

Sarah Zick swerved through the crowds clogging 14th Street NW in Columbia Heights one recent muggy afternoon, trekking to one of her student’s homes. The first-grade teacher is attempting to meet the families of each of her students at their homes or a place of their choosing — shifting the traditional parent-teacher power dynamic that plays out on school grounds. On this Wednesday, three weeks into the school year, it was student No. 21. She spotted the 6-year-old girl near her public housing complex holding hands with her mother. The girl gave Zick a quick hug. The meeting began. What Zick learned: the girl loves math but is more tepid about reading. She loves dancing and princesses. A friend from school recently died of complications related to asthma, and the 6-year-old often thinks about death. Lockdowns at the school prompted by recent shootings in Columbia Heights exacerbated those anxieties.Zick’s plan after that meeting: she will send the girl home with books about dancing and princesses for mom to read with her at night. And when there is another lockdown or drill, Zick will pay extra attention to make sure the girl is okay.

Over the past five years, the District has sought to reinvent the old-fashioned idea of home visits. It’s no longer about descending on the house of a struggling or truant student. In 2011, the traditional public school system partnered with the Flamboyan Foundation which trained the teachers on how to conduct the visits, paying them $40 each family meeting. Eight years after the program launched, D.C. educators have made more relationship-building home visits than any school system in the country — even more than bigger systems, according to Gina Martinez-Keddy, executive director of Parent Teacher Home Visits, which tracks these interactions.

(Available in:https://www.washingtonpost.com/education. Adapted.)

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