Family-school-professionals partnerships: an action research program to enhance the social, emotional, and academic resilience of children at risk

This paper presents an action research program (note 1) which was designed to support parents and primary school teachers, with the mediation of school professionals in order to enable them facilitate the school inclusion of at risk students or those with special educational needs. The aims, the organization process, and the implementation of the program, as well as its theoretical and practical aspects/components, are presented. Resilience and inclusive education are the key theoretical frameworks informing this paper. These both advocate parent-teacher-professional partnerships to promote a "holding school environment" and support children with difficulties to avoid exclusion. An action research methodology was chosen in order to set up this program with the aim of enabling teachers and parents to be more "resilient" and "inclusive" towards children with special difficulties. The evaluation of the program showed that teachers and parents viewed this model of intervention very positively and gained significant knowledge of practices related to their respective role.