WCPSS Family Academy provides virtual learning resources for parents

CARY, N.C. (WTVD) -- The Wake County Public School System's Family Academy is providing families tools to help them navigate virtual learning.

While the initiative has been around for nearly 20 years, the focus has shifted during the pandemic.

"For students to see and also for parents to understand the different platforms that teachers will be using to teach their students such as Google Classroom, Canvas," said Dr. MariaRosa Rangel, district Director of Family and Community Engagement. "How do you access your ID portal?"

The district's Family Academy Facebook page features live parent workshops most Tuesday and Thursday evenings and other resources.

Thursday evening's workshop was for parents with children who are about to start kindergarten virtually.

"During those first few weeks of school, be positive and supportive," said teacher Krista Chern in the workshop. "Your child doesn't know any different about what kindergarten should look like because they've never been to kindergarten. This is their first experience. If we're positive and supportive in saying that this is going to be an awesome year, regardless of how the year starts or ends, it's going to be an awesome year."

The workshops are also in Spanish and the district will roll out Arabic videos soon.

"We have over 220 different languages represented and when you desegregate the data, of course, Latinos, Spanish, it's is in the top and then Arabic, it's another language that is also surfacing on the top," Dr. Rangel said. "So, we see that. We see there's a lot of need as far as parents getting the information in their language."

For a calendar, click here.

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