Introduction
Family engagement varies in education literature and includes additional terms such as collaboration, involvement, and partnership. Also, the term family in schools has changed to include extended family members such as grandparents, aunts, uncles, siblings, cousins, and others who interact with the child, such as step-parents, caregivers, and neighbors. So, family engagement is a practice, an interactive process, and a goal-oriented relationship involving professionals and families, allowing families to share their perspectives about their children, their learning, and their customs to improve their children's education (Gerzel-Short et al., 2019; National Center on Parent, Family, and Community Engagement NCPFCE], 2016). Turnbull et al. (2022) argued that when families, educators, and professionals share ideas, thoughts, and perspectives, they build on each to increase educational benefits for students and themselves. Hence, family engagement should be a manageable one-way communication from the professional to the families, involving providing families with a report on their children's strengths and weaknesses and an annual educational plan with goals to address the children's weaknesses.
Families with a child with a disability experience new and unexpected challenges. In special education, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA, P.L. 109-446, 2004) centers on family participation as a core tenet. Additionally, Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA, P.L. 114-95, 2015) goes even further in its requirements for family engagement (expanded from family involvement), requiring engagement activities for all families as a condition of accepting funding. Despite the federal requirements mandating family engagement in certain educational processes, and the wealth of research highlighting the importance of parent engagement (Henderson & Mapp, 2002), systemic barriers make the process inaccessible to a large portion of families served by education systems (Cummings & Hardin, 2017; Gerzel-Short et al., 2019).
The United States population is growing substantially in its cultural, linguistic, and economic diversity. About 85% of the students receiving special education services during the 2020-21 academic year under the IDEA were culturally and linguistically diverse students with disabilities (National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), 2022a). Also, approximately 11.3 million (16%) children under 18 were living in poverty (NCES, 2022b). The diversity in the student population implies diversity in families. The intersection of diversity and disabilities create unique, complex issues creating a dilemma for the majority of professional (76%) who are White and non-Hispanic females (NCES, 2022c).
Furthermore, despite research on diverse families and families with children with disabilities, most resource books focus on engaging diverse families or engaging families with children's books as separate books. There are no resource books that merge disability, diversity, and family engagement that translate research into practice. Also, no resource books focus on how to integrate technology to engage families who experience challenges with distance, time, and language, among other factors. Educators, trainers, researchers, and related service providers in special education programs and training programs need reference books that include ALL families with children with disabilities to ensure equity and social justice in special education.