Why Not All Schools Offer Parent-Teacher Conferences

All week, we’ve brought you tips from both sides of the desk to show how mom and dad and school professionals can benefit from parent-teacher conferences.

But what if your district doesn’t officially coordinate these types of meetings?

Some Indiana school corporations require all teachers to hold semi-regular conferences, but some don’t. For example, Fort Wayne Community Schools organizes a district-wide system where all schools close to students for two days in the fall when parents can sign up to drop in and speak with their instructors.

The Monroe County Community School Corporation used to do things this way, but because of a change in state statute they shifted their model.

(Photo Credit: Alex McCall/WFIU News)

Before 2008, schools were allowed to “bank” time – in other words, they gave students two days off in the fall so teachers could spend that time meeting with parents and made up the instructional time by tacking it onto other days in the annual calendar.  When that rule changed, districts like MCCSC moved to offering conferences after school in the evenings.

But Tim Pritchett, MCCSC’s information officer, says that didn’t work so well for teachers’ schedules, so the district has switched to scheduling parent-teacher conferences on a school-by-school basis. All elementary teachers and required to offer conferences sometime in the fall, but it’s up to them to decide on specific dates and times and notify families.

Pritchett says this allows for more flexibility for both parties. If need be, educators can set up a time to meet working parents in the early morning or even on a Saturday.

“It ensures that the parent has that buy-in to show up to the meeting,” Pritchett says. “If it’s open drop-in, you could end up with a teacher sitting there and nobody ever showing up, or you could end up with a bunch of people showing up at the same time, which is not really productive either.”

Pritchett says district officials thought this method might be more helpful for families – but MCCSC parent Allison Rink says in some ways it makes things more difficult.

“As a parent, I would prefer to see them set on the calendar because you can plan ahead,” Rink says. “I feel like it’s an injustice for the teachers as well, with the length of the school day being as long as it is and then asking them to either stay after school and on weekends. Taking a half day is the traditional way to do it, and one that I think works,”

Rink, a former educator, regularly volunteers in her children’s classrooms (fifth grade at Binford Elementary and kindergarten at Rogers Elementary), so she says she feels like she already has a good idea of what’s going on and doesn’t needs the opportunity for additional meeting like other parents might.

“Unless there’s a real issue behaviorally or academically or socially, sometimes parent-teacher conferences are quite frankly kind of a waste of time, with the exception of it’s not a waste of time for those that are having difficulty and really do need face-to-face conferences,” Rink adds.

Whether your district requires face-to-face meetings or not, experts say teachers should feel free to invite parents in on their own if they know of a student who could benefit from the added communication.

Kathy Nimmer, Indiana’s 2015 Teacher of the Year, says an open invitation is a good way to go.

“You can’t force someone into a role of communication if that individual doesn’t want to be there, but you can go fairly far in making it inviting and hopeful and focused on the growth and the help that that particular child needs,” Nimmer advises.