Leadership is a team sport. We have a wonderful team in Washoe County, and I am one of the newest players. I’ve been here 10 months, and Parent Teacher Home Visits have been a central part of the district’s work for many years. Although I’ve always engaged with families as a superintendent and on committees, but boy, was I missing out on the power of the home visit. It just hits differently than an advisory meeting, a focus group, or even a one-on-one meeting in your office. It’s a very transformative experience.

Our Department of Family-School Partnerships, which includes leaders like D’Lisa Crain and Rochelle Solonia, is a strong team. They were very enthusiastic that I would want to try a home visit. I’ve been a superintendent for going on 13 years; I don’t have a lot of fear. What I found compelling was the data on the results of home visits. I would go on home visits, following teachers who’d known those families for years. The conversations would flow to things like scholarship opportunities and things the teachers knew would help individual students. I knew the impact was there, and the data would bear it out.

I also think it’s invaluable for me to meet with our families—in their home, on their turf, in a place where they feel confident and comfortable. There’s also power in humanizing ourselves as leaders. In this highly political, post-COVID era, superintendents, in particular, have been demonized and dehumanized. For me to go out and genuinely and casually engage with a family on their terms and listen to their experiences and their hopes and dreams—makes a difference in how they see the district and how they see me as a leader. Hopefully, they see me as someone who is approachable, who is on their team, who will advocate for them, and who will respond to them. I want them to know they can reach out to me if they need something. At the end of the day, leadership is founded on relationships, and that’s exactly what Parent Teacher Home Visits does.

Memories & Lessons from Home Visits

All of my home visits have been memorable in the sense that I come away having learned so many things, with such admiration for our staff, and such respect and appreciation for our families and love for our students. One that stands out was in the fall. We went to the home of one of our students whose mother had gone through the district, and the grandmother worked in the district in Nutrition Services. She made a spread of homemade lumpia and all this wonderful food. The student gave us a tour of her bedroom, and I remember there was such a sense of family. One of the lessons I had from that, especially as a new superintendent—new to the community—was how deep the roots that some of our families have within our district.

One of the things that I often say is that school is a child’s second home in many cases, and so to bridge their two homes is powerful. We have lots of areas to improve. We make mistakes, but we have families and students who are really proud to be here, and that makes me proud.

Benefits & Outcomes from Home Visits

In my former district, rather than a mission or vision, we developed a promise that we will likely adopt as our promise here in the Washoe County School District. And that promise is to know every student by name, strength, and need so they graduate prepared for the future they choose. What better way to get to know a child or young person by name, strength, and need than by going into their home, meeting their family, and learning where they come from, who they are, what their culture is, and what their dreams are? This promise is what drives me as an educator and a leader. I think Parent Teacher Home Visits is one of the best ways we can work to deliver on that promise meaningfully, especially in a district like Washoe where the demographics of our student population have shifted over the last decade or more, but the demographics of our staff haven’t necessarily shifted along with them.

I see firsthand the benefits when I watch and listen to staff interact with students and families and create long-term relationships, which often later lead to opportunities for the students. I know there’s national-level and district-level data that show why this matters in terms of educational outcomes and things like graduation rates. But what I would offer coming out of the pandemic is that relationships matter more than ever. Face-to-face, human-to-human relationships—connection—are so incredibly important. These visits allow for that meaningful connection to take place.

I’ve done home visits with elementary, middle, and high school students. I’m sure you know teenagers are sometimes a little standoffish. I remember sitting with one young high school student in her home one day. Having been a high school teacher and having worked around teenagers for a lot of my career, I watched her closely. I could tell, despite some of her teenage exterior—the “I don’t really care” attitude, how much it mattered to her that she mattered to the staff who were sitting in her living room. She knew she was seen. She knew she was loved. She knew she was supported. She knew people were taking the time to come and be with her, to focus on her, to talk about her successes, her opportunities, and her future. She will carry that with her moving forward.

Some of our students and families, just like all of us, have challenges in life, and some have more challenges than others. It’s important to understand the realities that our students are living and that they bring with them when they come into our classrooms. There’s so much conversation now around discipline and student behaviors. Coming out of the pandemic, we are seeing behaviors that are escalated. I don’t think that’s a surprise to anybody. I won’t minimize the issue or say that a Parent Teacher Home Visit will prevent discipline issues and behaviors. I will say from experience that many of the behavioral issues—not all—stem from a lack of relationship between students and adults in the classroom or in the building. So the more we can build these relationships by bridging home and school, I believe the less we’re going to see students act out. That’s because at the end of the day, even if that teenager who is sitting on that couch during that home visit makes a bad choice at school and gets into trouble, that adult who has a relationship with her is going to be able to get through to her in a way that they otherwise wouldn’t be able to.

The Future of Home Visits in Washoe

Now is the time for us to double down on this investment of time and resources in Parent Teacher Home Visits. A day doesn’t go by that I don’t reflect on where we are in these early stages of our recovery from the pandemic. I know the pandemic is over; it’s no longer a world health emergency. Airplanes are full. Restaurants are full. We’re not wearing masks anymore, and that’s all great. But the impact is going to continue to be felt for a long time. I don’t think we yet know what the real impacts will be. I think 10 years from now, we’re going to know really what this did, especially to our children.

I believe that one of the things we learned was the power of human connection, the power of being part of a community. I know the Parent Teacher Home Visit program allows us to continue to strengthen that sense of connection, that sense of community. It also helps at a time when so many of our communities are divided. It’s harder to hate someone when you know them. It’s harder to write someone off after you’ve sat across a coffee table from them and had an honest conversation, when you’ve heard their stories. I think that there is power in learning that while all of our stories are different, we all have a story. And understanding the stories our children bring with them is important. And I would say at a time when we need to find common ground to remember what it means to be part of a respectful community, our home visits are going to help us get there.