Letter-to-Editor of New York Times

To the Editor:

Re: “For Hispanic Parents, Lessons on Helping with the Homework” (November 1, 2006).

Thank you for your article on the involvement of Hispanic parents in their children’s education. This piece truly echoes everything we have learned in the development of our national PSA campaign, developed in partnership with the PTA and aimed at encouraging Hispanic parents to get involved in their children’s education. Acknowledging the real barriers to involvement is the first and most important step in providing meaningful messages and solutions. Our campaign hopes to inspire parents to get more involved in the school and provide real tangible ways that help overcome time constraints and cultural barriers such as language.

As the campaign enters into its fifth year, the Ad Council and National PTA would like to conduct targeted outreach to the Hispanic community. We plan on doing this by working with local groups to create specific messaging that will resonate with parents.

Parent involvement is essential to a child’s development and the more resources we can provide for Hispanic parents the better. Mariela Dabbah’s book, “Help Your Children Succeed in School: A Special Guide for Latino Parents,” is a prime example of one of those tools. The suggestion to encourage parents to enroll their children in a bilingual program if it is available is equally valuable.

The more we can offer to the Hispanic community the more involvement we will begin to see. The article addresses the objectives of the Parent Involvement in Schools campaign and it is our hope that with the continuation of the campaign and the acknowledgement that the Hispanic community could benefit from help in strategizing ways to be involved, that parent involvement will be on the rise and the barriers will begin to move away.

Sincerely,