Encouraging family participation in education and healthcare leads to better outcomes.

Professionals often understand the importance of family participation in school or in the healthcare setting, but increasing family engagement can be complex. Madvocator’s school and healthcare programs help professionals and organizations build communication and engagement practices that encourage family participation.

Critical thinking is at the core of Madvocator’s evidenced-based professional seminars and programs, with the goal of helping education and healthcare professionals facilitate trusting relationships that benefit families and communities.

Seminars and Topics

  • Encouraging Family Engagement through Effective Communication
  • Beyond Implicit Bias: Next Steps in Ensuring Equity
  • Helping Families Get Organized for Success
  • Beyond Cultural Competence: Engaging Families to Eliminate Disparities
  • Health Literacy and the Patient Experience
  • Health Literacy and Family Engagement in Complex Care
  • Health Literacy: Advancing Equity and Inclusion

Education Professionals

Thinking Critically to Increase Parent Engagement in the School Setting

State teaching standards include expectations for engaging parents and families. For example, the teaching standards for the State of Ohio require that “teachers share responsibility with parents and caregivers to support student learning, emotional and physical development and mental health.”

In order to foster family engagement in the school setting, education professionals must be able to examine and think critically about their own engagement practices. This training focuses on critical thinking and effective communication, with the needs of families at the center.

Healthcare Professionals

A Day in the Life: Caregiving for the Child with Medical Complexities

This one-hour seminar focuses on the challenges, barriers and rewards of providing safe and effective home care for a medically complex child. This session is appropriate for health care and case management professionals as well as families of medically complex children.

Comments on this training:

“It has given me a perspective that will enable me to be more compassionate to the family’s needs and encourage them to practice self care as well as reach out to other families in similar situations for community support. I feel that I have a better understanding that will enable me to just be present and listen to them share their struggles and to be able to know that these feelings are common.”

“I will definitely share this information with co-workers and stress the fact that, the education that we give to the parents on caring for their child, is not all that these parents are going to need to be successful in the home environment.”

“This [training] has helped me to be mindful of the stress that families of medically complex children face and the importance of establishing a supportive and collaborative relationship with these families.”

Thinking Critically to Engage Patients and Families in the Healthcare Setting

Critical thinking is a core competency for improving patient and family engagement in the health care setting. Participants assess their own practices and examine how they influence health, focusing how to improve communication and collaboration with patients and families.