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Family, School, and Community Partnerships

Family-School-Community Partnerships (FSCP) Definition:

Families, early childhood programs, schools, and communities actively partnering to develop, implement, and evaluate effective and equitable practices to improve educational outcomes for children and youth.

Family, School and Community Partnering Standards


The Office of Family, School, and Community Partnerships has released their meetings and events calendar for the 2023-2024 school year. The calendar is updated regularly so check back often for the most up-to-date information.

FSCP Year-at-a Glance

This monthly newsletter is sent to family partnership contacts around the state, and includes updates from the director of family partnerships, promising practices, and current FSCP research. Let us know if you'd like to receive this in your inbox!

Feb/Mar 2024 Key (PDF)


News and Updates

Call for Submissions - Promising Partnership Practices 2024

The State Advisory Council for Parent Involvement in Education (SACPIE), in collaboration with the Colorado Department of Education (CDE), is collecting promising partnership practices from schools, districts, early childhood programs, and institutes of higher education across the state to publish in the 10th annual Promising Partnership Practices—Colorado book.  SACPIE and CDE invite schools, districts, early childhood centers, institutions of higher education, accountability committees, parent-teacher committees, or any other school- or district-based council to submit an application for consideration in the publication.  The purpose of this book is for schools, districts, and other educational organizations in Colorado to share how they partner with families and the community for student success.

Practices may be submitted using this Google form or this Word document.

For more information about Promising Partnership practices, visit the website.

New Resource - Engaging Stakeholders in Planning

A new resource is available to assist districts and schools as they meaningfully engage stakeholders in a variety of family and community engagement planning activities.

See the Engaging Stakeholders in Planning document here.

FSCP Coffee Chat Website

There is a new FSCP Coffee Chat Website available for district-level family engagement staff. Find dates, Zoom links, locations, and presentation slides and resources.

Visit the FSCP Coffee Chat website here.

New High Impact Practices Resource

The Family, School, and Community Partnerships Office has designed a new webpage based on the Flamboyan Foundation's Continuum of Impact on Student Success to help schools and districts implement high impact family engagement strategies. Strategies are linked to specific promising partnership practices, as well as additional resources from the field.

Visit the Continuum of Impact High Impact Strategies here.

CDE's Family, School, and Community Partnerships Online Learning Center

The Family, School, and Community Partnerships Office is excited to share our Online Learning Center. This learning center is a hub of online courses developed by CDE's FSCP Office. Courses are available to all at no charge and are self-paced. Currently, eight courses are offered.

To see which courses are available and the intended audience for each, click here.

2023 Edition of Promising Partnership Practices

The State Advisory Council for Parent Involvement in Education (SACPIE) and the Colorado Department of Education (CDE) are pleased to share this ninth annual collection of Promising Partnership Practices. The purpose of this publication is for schools, districts, and other educational organizations in Colorado to highlight how they partner with families and the community for student success.

Read the 2023 collection of Promising Partnership Practices.

Family-School-Community Partnership Framework Collaborative and User's Guide

New resources are now available to help schools/early childhood programs, districts, and community-based partners to implement the P-12 FSCP Framework. A series of 12 rubrics allows sites to rate their current partnership programs and practices. During the 2021-2022 school year, six districts piloted the P-12 FSCP Framework. Their stories are shared in the accompanying User's Guide, which walks sites through a step-by-step, research-based process to identify starting points and prioritize next steps.

Rubrics are now available for either District Leadership Teams, Early Childhood/School Leadership Teams, or Community-Based Partners:

The Office of Family School and Community Partnerships developed a self-paced course available to anyone who would like to learn more about the P-12 FSCP Framework and rubrics. Individuals who complete the course will receive five hours of professional development credits.

Visit the Colorado's P-12 FSCP Framework: User's Guide Course


About The Office of Family-School-Community Partnerships

The Office of Family-School-Community Partnerships sits within the Accountability and Continuous Improvement Office at CDE, and was created in response to Senate Bill 13-193 Increasing Parent Involvement in Public Schools. Responsibilities of the office include:

  • Supporting to schools and districts implementing Family and Community Engagement practices
  • Incorporating strategies in the Unified Improvement Plan to increase parent engagement in schools, with a specific focus on priority performance and turnaround schools.
  • Ensuring that school district board of education adopt district policy for increasing and supporting parent engagement in the public and charter schools of the district
  • Communicating and providing support to the identified family partnership point of contact within school districts
  • Supporting parent participation on school and district accountability committees (SACs and DACs)
  • Staffing the State Advisory Council for Parent Involvement in Education (SACPIE)

Family and School Partnership in Education Month

Governor Polis has declared November to be Family and School Partnership in Education Month. 

Read the Proclamation here | Spanish

Research indicates that family, school and community partnerships lead to improved students’ attendance, higher graduation rates and a deeper sense of belonging (Mapp et al., 2022). Districts interested in promoting Family and School Partnership in Education Month can use this communications toolkit.

The Family, School, and Community Partnerships Office started November 2022 with a Kickoff at the Denver Zoo. Governor Polis shared a few words and read the Proclamation in English and in Spanish. Schools set up displays of their promising practices and Scholastic was in attendance giving away free books to the kids in attendance. Check out the video to hear the governor's remarks and see a few of the promising practices.

For More Information

Contact the Director of Family School Community Partnerships at CDE, Dr. Darcy Hutchins Hutchins_d@cde.state.co.us