Schools with involved, informed, and empowered parents provide profound benefits for students, parents, teachers and administrators. Research shows that when parents are integral to student learning, those students generally have higher grades and test scores, better attendance, and more consistently completed homework, according to Joyce Epstein (1997).

Involving all stakeholder groups, including parents, creates a supportive environment for learners. Building successful partnerships is a multifaceted effort focused on increasing awareness and implementation of a quality parent involvement program (Epstein, 1997).

At Third Street Elementary School, although there appear to be numbers of parents who are active, there nevertheless remains a number of parents who constitute untapped resources, especially limited-English speaking parents who are not as involved is they perhaps should be, which may be due to language and cultural barriers. Although 20% of the parents are actively involved and politically savvy, 50% of the parent body are immigrants from Korea who need to become familiar with the American educational system and become more actively involved.

Current challenges faced by me as the on-site principal include the following:

1.How does the principal of Third Street Elementary School reach out to all parents to effect increased involvement in matters that may help to increase student achievement?

2. How does the principal foster equity and equality among parent groups when there are significant disparities in regard to parent involvement?

3. How does the on-site principal utilize actively involved parents to effect more activism on the part of those parents who are less involved?

4. How does the on-site principal evaluate the effectiveness of long-term school reform efforts to involve families in the education of their child(ren)?

According to the LAUSD Ethnic Survey Report (Fall, 2000), at Third Street Elementary School, there is a Korean student population of 54.5%; the remaining 45.5% of the K-5 student body consists of a variety of ethnic groups including white (19.5%), Latino (13.6%), and African-American (9.7%) and others. The parent leadership, in particular, the Parent-Teacher Association (PTA), and the Friends of Third, which is a school booster club that annually raises $70,000.00 in revenues, consist of non-Korean parents.

Korean immigrant parents must learn of programs that will help them and their children to acculturate into the American school system. Korean immigrant students will not achieve their highest potential unless their parents become actively involved in their education by learning parents skills and in playing an integral role in assisting student learning.

Effective July 2, 2001, Suzie K. Oh is the principal of the Wilton Place Elementary School in Los Angeles Koreatown. She can be reached by email at sko1212@aol.com or by FAX at (323)256-1765.