Crisis and Challenges for Families Facing Global Diversity and Inequality - Can Families Still Function As Educators in Multicultural Societies?

The paper presents a research study on the sociological and educational impact of global cultural diversity on the role of families as educators. Specifically, it presents the field work and findings of qualitative research, involving educational settings in which innovative methods have been developed to include families from diverse cultures as educators in their children's educational process.

The study's outcomes include methods of facilitating an authentic dialogue between families and educators, a creative model for the incorporation of family traditions and narratives as enrichment resources for the school curriculum, developing curricula, developing and conducting educators training sessions.  The study's findings demonstrate that an effective partnership forming between the family and the educational framework, which relates to the child’s cultural world improves the learning process. It is enhancing the children's scholastic achievements, building families' resilience thereby promoting equality among families, helping the family to regain its leadership role and culturally assigning responsibility for strengthening their cultural identity and their self esteem. The study's conclusions show the contribution of families' multiple intelligences to the child's development and to the school's success in achieving its goals and the educational agenda. Therefore, such school-family collaboration has the potential to minimize the risk of crises in the family’s structure which commonly include social changes such as the loss of parental authority, the man/father changing status in a democratic society, children acting as the parents' translators, different social norms, conflicting values with society, adaptation of migrating families to new realities etc.                                                                              

It also encourages acquiring formal education as a vehicle for minimizing inequality and enabling social mobility. The paper will present studies conducted in a widely diverse type of families and schools in Israel along with innovative educational programs developed, tested and implemented during and after the study.