We are delighted to announce the second annual National PTHV Week is coming, and we want you to be a part of it. Mark your calendars for September 18-23, 2023, to join our shared celebration of the benefits of building trusting relationships between educators and families through a brief, off-campus visit. Watch this page for updates and highlights from the inaugural PTHV Week.

PTHV Week is now an annual event dedicated to fostering stronger relationships between teachers, families, students, and communities. This week-long initiative celebrates teachers and other school staff who visit their students’ homes, creating a unique opportunity for meaningful dialogue, flourishing relationships, and collaboration on students’ academic and social-emotional wellbeing.

We launched PTHV Week in 2022 to kick off the celebration of our 25^th anniversary, and the response was a resounding success, with districts sharing the stories and impact of home visits; encouraging staff and community members to participate; and recognizing the significant shift that happens when an educator crosses the threshold of a family’s home to seek out partnership and trust.

By engaging in home visits, teachers gain valuable insights into a student’s life outside the classroom, enabling them to tailor their teaching methods to suit individual needs. For families, these visits offer a chance to actively participate in their child’s education and establish a strong support system. Through PTHV Week, schools and communities come together to celebrate shared efforts to prioritize education, encourage open dialogue, and lay the foundation for a more inclusive and thriving learning experience for every student.

Participate

This year, there will be many ways to participate in PTHV Week:

1. First, sign up! This is a simple commitment to share the power of Parent Teacher Home Visits and engage with us on your PTHV practice. Already, several schools and districts around the nation have signed up to participate, and this is an opportunity to learn and network with them.
2. Make a plan. Use this six-week countdown checklist to mark major milestones and action steps for a successful PTHV Week.
3. Use our advocacy toolkit. The Parent Teacher Home Visits Advocacy Toolkit is a powerful resource designed to assist and empower you in advocating to start or expand a home visit practice.
4. Leverage your communications to let your whole community know about your home visit practices. This how-to guide shares details on publicizing your PTHV Week celebration for your community and local media. A set of customizable graphics are also available.
5. Learn how others do it. Watch these video presentations describing how school districts planned to observe PTHV Week last year.
6. Get in touch with me, Heather Kilgore,  to ask questions and workshop ideas around celebrating PTHV Week.

Give a High-Five

This year we want to honor and acknowledge the efforts of educators and school staff who do something new and try their first home visit. Some educators overcome resistance, assumptions, and fear when visiting a student off school grounds. There are the normal issues of scheduling and logistics, entering a family’s personal space, and gaining rapport. But it’s also sometimes uncomfortable to navigate differences in language, race, religion, or other forms of difference. PTHV training and practice prepare teachers to encounter diverse family dynamics, cultural norms, and socioeconomic disparities that could impact the learning environment and to work in partnership with families across differences for student success. A PTHV home visit is a simple yet powerful action that has long-term consequences.

We have a quarter-century of evidence that doing this hard work reaps great rewards. Teachers who are on the fence about PTHV visits may not be those who conduct the most visits or are the loudest champions for the practice. They may not be the ones who win awards if that’s how their school district marks PTHV Week. But we want every teacher who completes even one PTHV home visit to know that we see you, and your work matters.

Stay tuned for more details on how we’ll high-five the teachers who are striving to get started and sustain their PTHV practices.