The Family Friendly Schools program has been running in the US for almost a decade and Eaglehawk Primary School principal Mary-Anne Rooney and Eaglehawk’s Extended Schools Partnerships pilot program co-ordinator John Jones are looking to bring its success to Bendigo.

They have spent time training with the program’s chief academic officer, Joni Samples, who has travelled to Bendigo from California to help put the program in place.

“We’ve got a two-day workshop to get the school to engage with families and support learning,” Dr Samples said.

“We want to positively engage families to take an active part in the new school so we can work together.”

Dr Samples said the workshop was part of a five step process based on

results from parent surveys.

She said the workshops brought together teams of administration staff, teachers and parents, to design and implement a plan for the future of the new school.

“We coach them for the next six months to help them work to that level,” she said.

“Then we do another data source and find out what areas of the plan have worked and what areas haven’t, so we can put more work into achieving those for the next year.”

Eaglehawk Secondary College is also becoming involved.

Dr Samples said the program had recorded improved overall test scores for students in the US.

Mr Jones said Eaglehawk’s Extended Schools Partnerships was partly based on the Family Friendly Schools Program and he hoped to take the program nationally.

He and Ms Rooney will return to the US for more training in the coming weeks and are hoping to see positive results in the next year.