Utah National Family Engagement Fellowship

Jenny is the Director of University Neighborhood Partners (UNP) and Special Assistant to the President for Campus-Community Partnerships at the University of Utah. Previously, she served as the Director of Family-School Collaboration at the Salt Lake City School District (SLCSD) working to build authentic family-school and community partnerships focusing on the varied needs, hopes and dreams of underserved communities in SLC. She was an administrator at Glendale Middle School, Mountain View Elementary and Community Learning Center. She also served as the Alternative Language Services Coordinator and language and culture coach (for teachers) for the SLCSD. Prior to that she was an ESL and Special Education teacher.

When Jenny isn’t working toward social justice in an educational setting, she is doing community advocacy work with the Utah Coalition of La Raza (UCLR), working to increase the number of Latinx teachers and administrators with the Association of Latino Administrators and Superintendents-Utah (ALAS-U) and advising the Utah State Board of Education on the Advisory Committee for Equity of Educational Services for Students.

Connect with Jenny via LinkedIn.

Paul Kuttner is Associate Director at University Neighborhood Partners, University of Utah. In this role, Paul builds university-community partnerships that promote educational equity, access, and justice for young people while producing valuable knowledge to advance scholarship and social change. A native of Boston, Paul earned his masters and doctorate from the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Prior to his doctoral studies, Paul worked as an educator teaching theater, creative writing, and civic engagement in schools and community organizations across Chicago.

Paul is a qualitative researcher, committed to engaged scholarship conducted in partnership with youth, schools, and communities. Paul’s research focuses on the interconnections between educational institutions and communities that have been marginalized by the education system. Specific topics include family engagement, parent and youth organizing, university-community partnerships, and the role of culture in education and social change. Paul is a co-author, with Karen Mapp, of Partners in Education: A Dual Capacity Building Framework for Family-School Partnerships, and a co-editor of Disrupting the School-to-Prison Pipeline (HER, 2012). His work has been published in both academic and popular venues, including Harvard Educational Review, Teachers College Record, and Curriculum Inquiry. He is a board member for Mestizo Institute of Culture and Arts and a Cabinet member for the US Department of Arts and Culture. Paul blogs at culturalorganizing.org

Connect with Paul via LinkedIn.

Sheryl is the Family/Community Engagement Specialist for the Utah State Board of Education (USBE). She graduated from Brigham Young University with a bachelor’s in communications and a minor in sociology in 2007. She later earned her master’s degree in early childhood education from George Mason University as a Teach for America Corps Member. Eventually, Sheryl was hired to be part of the turnaround faculty at Stanton Elementary, which was the lowest performing elementary school in D.C. While teaching there, Stanton went from being the 71st lowest performing to the first school out of priority status. She attributes a lot of the school’s growth to the intensive work done with the families and school community.

In her current role at USBE, Sheryl researches and assembles a repertoire of meaningful parent and family engagement practices and strategies that can be developed into a Parent and Family Engagement Handbook. She also serves as lead facilitator and trainer for evidenced-based family engagement strategies that include relationship-building home visits and Academic Parent Teacher Teams (APTT) meetings.

Connect with Sheryl via LinkedIn.

The Family Engagement Advisory Board is made up of Utah parents, educators, administrators, and other stakeholders. The Advisory Board supported each step of the fellowship process locally, offering much needed expertise, connections, advice, insight, and advocacy.

Family Engagement Advisory Committee

• Adriana Pinto, Assistant Principal, Liberty Elementary School, SLCSD
• Almaida Yanagui, Community Organizer & Assistant Partnership Manager, University Neighborhood Partners
• Amy Fox, Parent & National Standards Specialist, Utah PTA
• Ana Martinez, School Garden Program Coordinator, Wasatch Community Gardens
• Andrea Garavito Martinez, Community School Facilitator, Hillcrest High School, Canyons School District
• Bridgette Barrowes, Director of Special Education, Pacific Heritage Academy
• Deirdre Straight, Parent & SCC Chair, Highland High School, SLCSD
• Fatai Tuifua, Teacher, Mana Academy
• Israel Corrales, TRIO Mentor, University of Utah
• Janessa Crandall, Teacher, Lincoln Elementary School, Granite School District
• Marcus Mailei, Parent, Canyons School District
• Val Murdock, Title 1 Monitoring, Utah State Board of Education
• Kamille Sheikh, Education Specialist, Utah State Board of Education
• Igor Limansky, Senior Director of Grassroots Leadership Development, United Way Salt Lake
• Rebecca Lewis, Special Education Support Staff, Utah State Board of Education
• Jodi Lusty, Parent Engagement Coordinator, Granite School District