NMPED News:

SANTA FE — The Public Education Department urges New Mexico parents to participate in a new series of virtual workshops designed to help them prioritize self-care and support their children in remote learning.

The workshop series was funded by PED and created by CNM Ingenuity, an outreach program of Central New Mexico Community College. The sessions, described in more detail here, are open to all New Mexicans at no cost and are available in English and Spanish. 

The series consists of three workshops:

• “Survival 101 for Parents As Virtual School Partners” provides insights into the emotional challenges parents and children may be experiencing and provides simple ideas parents can use to build resiliency and support at-home learning. It was pre-recorded in both English and Spanish to allow the widest access possible and is already available here.
• “Reimagining Parent Engagement Leveraging Virtual Tools” will give parents virtual tools they can use to build communities of parental support. This session will be offered live at 7 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 22, and again at 3:30 p.m. Friday, Oct. 23,  in both English and Spanish. Registration is available here.
• “Survival 102 for Parents as Virtual Partners” will look ahead to what comes after this semester, helping prepare parents for continued online learning or a mix of class types. This will also be a live remote format, with several sessions in both English and Spanish. Registration for this final workshop, which will be offered from mid-November to early December, has not yet opened.

“Caring for oneself and one’s children has never been more complicated or more critical than during the COVID-19 pandemic. We’re navigating new and unfamiliar territory within remote and hybrid learning stances, and we want our families to know they are not alone. We know family engagement is paramount to supporting students’ success, and we are here to help,” said Katherine Avery, interim director of strategic outreach and community engagement for the PED.

CNM Ingenuity previously provided a series of workshops to help K-12 teachers optimize their virtual learning environments.

“We quickly realized that parents could use help navigating all the recent changes and that they would benefit from a place where they could share the strategies and challenges,” said Erica Volkers-Barreiro, CNM’s Future of Work strategist who organized the workshops.