It has to do with the parental contribution to one or more school meetings in a calendar year. It can include:
1. Involvement in parent/teacher conferences.
2. The presence at either a PTA meeting, sports event, or any other such meeting.
3. Choosing to voluntarily participate in class events, field trips, school committees, or other school events.
Countless studies have examined the important role of parental involvement in a kid’s education. Some of the conclusions include the following:
· The more intensively parents get involved, the greater the positive effect on their kids’ academic achievement.
· Not only parental involvement helps to improve academic performance, but it also positively impacts students’ attitudes and behavior. A parent’s encouragement and interest in a kid’s education can impact the kid’s classroom conduct, attitude toward school, self-esteem, and motivation.
· Parental involvement can make a significant difference at all age levels. It tends to be the maximum with young kids and tends to taper off as kids get older. However, studies have shown that parental involvement for middle and high school students is equally important. For instance, in high school, a parent’s encouragement can impact whether a student stays in school or drops out. Similarly, a student may consider attending college more seriously when parents demonstrate an interest in the child’s academic achievements and discuss the advantages of college education with the child.
· Parents, who belong to low-income or minority groups, are less likely to get involved in their kids’ education. If they receive proper encouragement and training, these parents can be just as effective as other parents in contributing to their kids’ academic success.
· Parental involvement is most likely to increase when schools actively seek out options to get parents involved and provide training programs to teach parents ways to get involved in their kids’ education.
· Parental involvement benefits schools and teachers because involved parents better appreciate the challenges teachers face in the classrooms. Communication between school and home helps a teacher to understand a student better, which helps the teacher teach the student more effectively.
While parental involvement offers a multitude of benefits, it may also have negative implications. There’re several instances where parents became too much involved, continuously calling the teachers to check their kids’ progress, which consumes a lot of the teacher’s time. There’s also concern on the teachers’ part about the extent to which parents should get involved. curriculum development, book selection, teacher recruitment, etc., are areas where teachers believe that parents shouldn’t be included.
