Small School Ritual and Parent Involvement

Inner-city and rural schools have the common problem of Increasingly distant (literally and figuratively) populations. Often these same schools desire parents to be involved in their children's education. If their involvement is to improve, parents may need to be socialized about school ways, even while the school transforms itself to address the same issues. School rituals can be vehicles for socializing parents as rituals construct changes of identity. In addition, rituals are useful for imagining how things could be otherwise. This paper presents the ritual socialization of parents into a school community at the annual school potluck of a small, rural elementary school. The ritual is analyzed for how the communication and construction of values and beliefs take place. © 1997 Human Sciences Press, Inc.