• Boost motivation and other commitments foundational to learning, achievement, and well-being;
• Cultivate the social and emotional strengths young people will use throughout their lives;
• Protect young people from high-risk behaviors, including substance abuse, violence, and premature sexual activity;
• Foster resilience in  young people who have experienced major challenges or trauma; and
• Help youth and parents navigate transitions, including the transition from childhood into adolescence.

Is Keep Connected evidence based? Search Institute has not yet conducted the kinds of focused effectiveness or impact studies that would generate the level of evidence needed to describe Keep Connected as an evidence-based program, according to standards established by national databases such as the What Works Clearinghouse.

That said, focus groups and brief surveys with youth and parents following participation in Keep Connected offer initial evidence that the program enhances:

• Parent-youth relationships;
• Family communication;
• Youth responsibility;
• Student motivation to learn; and
• Supportive community of families for families.

Search Institute is seeking support to conduct effectiveness studies with partners. We also offer survey tools and resources that allow partners to build their own evidence as well.

• Strengths: Consistent with Search Institute’s history with Developmental Assets and best practices in the field, Keep Connected emphasizes identifying and building on strengths in families and communities. It recognizes that all families from many different backgrounds and circumstances face challenges. Some of those challenges are severe. However, Keep Connected also recognizes that resilience comes through discovering and nurturing strengths, even in the midst of those challenges.
• Culturally responsive: The Keep Connected format and sessions are designed to encourage integration of specific cultural values and practices into sessions, drawing from participating families’ own experiences, cultures, and traditions.

In the pilot testing, families from different cultural backgrounds (particularly African American, Latin American, and European American) all reported being fully engaged in the experience. Parent materials are currently available in English and Spanish, with additional languages being developed in response to expressed need.

• Relationships in families: Keep Connected is not primarily a “parenting program” that teaches skills and techniques. Rather, it offers structure, tools, and a safe environment for exploring and strengthening youth-parent relationships based on Search Institute’s framework. This approach is evident in two emphases throughout the experience:
  • Two generations together. Keep Connected provides experiences that help families practice and become comfortable with shared activities to strengthen relationships.
  • Two-way relationships. Both parents and youth have responsibilities in their relationship. Each influences and responds to the other (though parents have particular responsibilities in the relationship).

Both parenting adult and youth participants in Keep Connected have reported closer relationships based on their participation, and they report new family practices that reflect the Developmental Relationships Framework, such as more shared decision-making and more mutual expression of care and affection.

• Relationships around families: In addition to focusing on relationships within families, Keep Connected also emphasizes openness and trust building between the leaders and participants and among participants. It recognizes (and reinforces) that families have and need supportive networks. This emphasis is expressed through these approaches during the workshops:
  • Interactive learning. Keep Connected parent and youth sessions tap participants’ own experiences, expertise, and questions as integral to learning. (The sessions involve very little presentation of content by facilitators.)
  • Storytelling and sharing. Families learn and connect through sharing and hearing their own stories and the stories of others. Youth and parents talk about their own experiences, traditions, and other stories that matter to them.
• Family rituals and routines: A key to sustaining strong family relationships is for families to integrate shared activities and practices into their everyday lives. Keep Connected includes a shared project in which families create a “Family Pledge to Keep Connected.” This highlights their expectations for routines and practices they will work to maintain and adapt through middle school and high school.

Feedback in pilot sites suggests that families are making ideas and practices that are part of Keep Connected an ongoing part of family life. At the end of the workshop series, families talk about the things they’re doing now that they weren’t doing before (such as using the “highs and lows” activity modeled in the program). Informally, some who participated in the first prototype project report continuing to use the practices and activities they learned up to a year after completing the series.

• Parent leadership: Not only will parents actively shape the content of their shared learning experiences, but some parents may be eager to serve as parenting mentors for other parents in the future. This may include serving as future facilitators.
• Continuous improvement: Keep Connected emphasizes continuous improvement through experimentation, feedback, and adjusting as foundational for effective implementation—for both participating families and facilitators. Search Institute provides tools, training, and technical assistance to help partner organizations make the program work for them.

The Dual Capacity-Building Framework for Family-School Partnerships

In 2013, the U.S. Department of Education and SEDL released Partners in Education: A Dual Capacity-Building Framework for Family-School Partnerships, which now guides family engagement efforts in U.S. public schools. It’s designed to “build capacity among educators and families to partner with one another around student success.” It’s described as a direction-setting “compass” rather than a blueprint for family engagement initiatives.

It articulates several direction-setting priorities that align with Keep Connected, particularly the identified “process conditions” for family-school partnerships. The framework argues that initiatives must be:

• Linked to learning, including an intentional focus on supporting cognitive, emotional, physical, and social development. Developmental relationships are foundational for learning and development.
• Relational: “No meaningful family engagement can be established until relationships of trust and respect are established between home and school. A focus on relationship building is especially important in circumstances where there has been a history of mistrust between families and school or district staff, or where negative past experiences or feelings of intimidation hamper the building of partnerships between staff and parents.” (p. 9)
• Developmental, with a focus on “building the intellectual, social, and human capital of stakeholders engaged in the program.”
• Collective/collaborative, with learning being “conducted in group rather than individual settings and . . . [focusing on building learning communities and networks].”
• Interactive, giving participants “opportunities to test out and apply new skills.” Keep Connected sessions provide opportunities for families to work together to develop new relational practices and family routines. The workshops are learner-centered, not leader-centered.

Epstein’s Family Involvement and Partnership Model

Joyce L. Epstein, director of the National Network of Partnership Schools, pioneered comprehensive, seminal, and widely used approaches to parent involvement. Epstein and her colleagues identified at least six components of parent involvement. These are echoed and amplified in Keep Connected:

*Based on: Epstein, J., et al (2008). School, family and community partnerships: Your handbook for action (3rd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.

1. Prototype project (Spring 2016): Search Institute partnered with five organizations to develop and test an initial version of Keep Connected. The partner organizations were I. J. Holton Intermediate School, Austin, MN; The Georgetown Project, Georgetown, TX; Jubilee Housing, Washington, DC; Communities in Schools of Durham, NC; YWCA Tri-County Area, Pottstown, PA.

Partner sites were selected through an application process. Formative feedback was collected through observation, surveys, and focus groups with youth, parents, and facilitators. The feedback led to revisions in the materials.

1. Pilot project (Fall 2016–Spring 2017): Revised materials were tested with five partners, most of which were also part of the prototype project. The five partners were: I. J. Holton Intermediate School, Austin, MN; Jubilee Housing, Washington, DC; Communities in Schools of Durham, NC; Toberman Neighborhood Center, San Pedro, CA; and YWCA Tri-County Area, Pottstown, PA. Continuity across the two projects gave insight into the opportunities and challenges of moving beyond an initial test of the resources.

Site leaders participated in a pilot training institute to prepare to lead the program. Once again, formative feedback was collected through observation, surveys, and focus groups with youth, parents, and facilitators. The feedback led to revisions in the materials, which resulted in the current, public version of the resources. Additional minor revisions have been made to improve quality, usefulness, and clarity of materials.

Other Search Institute team members who contributed to the testing and refinement of the resource include Lacey Allen, Rachel Chamberlain, Jan DeWall, Tori Johnson, Cheryl Mayberry, Kent Pekel, EdD, Peter C. Scales, PhD, Teresa K. Sullivan, EdD, Amy K. Syvertsen, PhD, and Jenna Sethi, PhD.

All Keep Connected content was developed independently by Search Institute with no review or approval by the funder.