Caregivers play an integral role in a child’s academic development, including their literacy development (Compton-Lilly et al., 2019; Cunningham, 2021; Edwards, 2004; Edwards, 2016; Smith, 2020; Volk, 2021). One way caregivers have supported their children’s literacy development is by assisting them with school activities at home. While some caregivers are willing to assist, schools must recognize that not all caregivers know what specific activities support the development of literacy skills. This partnership between home and school becomes especially important when Michigan schools are in the midst of a state-wide literacy policy aimed at improving students’ achievement levels on the state standardized assessments (Weyer, 2018). This study examined the perspective of the caregiver on this partnership during the implementation of a state-wide literacy policy. Overall, this study sought to understand the degree to which current school outreach to caregivers was aligned to current research on caregiver engagement. The study used the caregivers’ own words (Lumby, 2007), whenever possible. This study further investigated caregivers’ perceptions of the school’s outreach during the 2021-22 school year. Additionally, the study sought to discover caregivers’ desires for future partnerships with schools to continue to support their child in early literacy development. Lastly, this study analyzed the availability of resources, as reported by caregivers and found on school websites, as well as how aligned those resources were to current research on caregiver engagement. To undertake this endeavor, this qualitative study utilized an online survey focused on four distinct areas within a state undergoing a state-wide literacy policy. The four areas were chosen for their diversity in race, ethnicity, location, religions practices, population of immigrants, and population of migrant season farm workers. Following the survey, a subset of the caregivers were interviewed. After the interviews, a review of early literacy materials was conducted using the school’s websites. The review included at least one elementary school from each of the focal areas in the survey and interviews. Additionally, twenty-nine other schools, chosen through random interval sampling, were included in the review. The findings of this study shed light on the partial alignment between the current research and the school outreach to caregivers, specifically in relation to literacy activities focused on student literacy development. Using the frameworks of parental involvement (Epstein et al., 2019), intentionality (Edwards, 2016), and efficacy (Bandura, 1977), this study discovered resources offered to caregivers do not always align with intentionally. Current communication methods do not align with parental involvement framework’s tenet of two-way communication. Lastly, the supports offered to caregivers do not always favor efficacious behavior in caregivers. Implications for this work have wide-reaching opportunities for change in the culture of both policymaking and education. Policymakers can use these findings to understand the importance of including the voice of all policy actors. Teacher educators can view these findings to ensure they teach their teacher candidates how to communicate with caregivers. This includes having difficult conversations. School leadership can support current teachers with stronger engagement with caregivers by using the findings in this study and learning to listen to the caregivers and their concerns. Lastly, caregivers can also learn they are their child’s advocate, and they will have to do their part to work with the child.
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