CLEVELAND PARENT CONGRESS
OUr CIty.
our POwer. Our Children.
Every parent or caregiver of a school-aged child living in Cleveland belongs at this table, no matter where that child goes to school.
Building a Citywide Family Movement Across Cleveland’s Education Landscape. Just parents, organized.
01 ━━ THE STAKES
The weight behind the call
Most Cleveland parents want a real say in their child's education. Too often, they're asked for their opinions without being given any real influence.
A ten-minute conference. A printout of grades. A handshake. Parents know their children, their schools, their neighborhoods in ways no one else can, but nobody hands them the tools that turn that knowledge into power: how a school measures growth, what support looks like when a child falls behind, how a budget decision shows up in your kid's classroom.
Roughly one in two Cleveland children grows up in poverty. Neighborhoods still carry the weight of decades of policy decisions. And there is no independent, citywide parent organization here, no consistent space where parents are the priority, not an afterthought, not an audience for someone else's agenda. That absence is the point.
The Cleveland Parent Congress is that organization.
We help parents understand how Cleveland's schools are governed, funded, and evaluated, and how to use that knowledge to advocate for their children. What to ask at a conference. How to read a test score. How to build a real, two-way relationship with the educators in your child's life.
District, charter, private, parochial, homeschool, doesn't matter. If you're raising a kid in this city, you've got a seat at the table.
Five Pilot
Town Halls.
02 ━━ THE PLAN
We're starting specific, not abstract. Neighborhood outreach, door by door, and five Town Hall meetings in spring 2027, open to every Cleveland parent and caregiver, built around unbiased, nonpartisan information and real tools for supporting your child. We're not promising results we haven't proven: we're testing whether consistent outreach, useful information, and parent-led relationships can build a stronger citywide parent voice.
Where Ago and Ame come from.
03 ━━ THE ORIGIN
Shout AGO across the city, and answer AME with an invitation that meets parents where they are.
Ago and Ame are Two words carried from West Africa, a call and response that means, roughly,
I need your attention and we're listening.
For many of us, it's an early classroom memory.
For CPC, it's a strategy:
04The Pillars
Built like a congress.
Standing like columns.
Three pillars hold up everything we do. Take one away and the whole structure fails — that's the point of organizing.
Cleveland Parent Congress
I
Truth
Unbiased, nonpartisan information about how Cleveland's schools are governed, funded, and rated — plain-language facts every parent can use.
II
Voice
Town Halls across every kind of school this city has — a dependable, consistent space where parents are the priority, not the audience.
III
Power
An organized, independent parent body with real standing to hold the system accountable to the families it serves.
THE BELIEF
Every child in this city belongs to all of us.
04 ━━ STAY CONNECTED
Stay connected
Get the next Town Hall date, straight answers about Cleveland schools, and updates on where this is headed.
