Aspects Determining School Involvement of Fathers and Mothers

Abstract

The topic of parental involvement has been researched from many aspects in the international literature, and recently, there has been some recent research in Hungary. Parental involvement in school can have a positive impact on the child’s achievements. Despite this, relatively little focus has been placed on the differences between fathers’ and mothers’ involvement. In our paper, we conduct a secondary analysis on the database (N=1002) of the questionnaire survey of parents conducted by the MTA-DE-CSATOKK research group and examine differences between fathers’ and mothers’ school involvement, but another novel aspect of our study is the examination of the role of school as initiator. The dependent variable of regression analysis is the principal component along the school involvement items, and among the explanatory variables the effect of factors indicating the gender of parent and the role of school are highlighted. Results show lower school involvement of fathers after removing the effect of the control variables, and that the initiating role of the school was a significant factor in parental school-based involvement. Parents’ involvement in school is significantly increased if the school provides parents with regular, useful and meaningful information; if it organises informal events in addition to formal events with an emphasis on community building and more informal interaction; if parents can participate in school decision-making; and if the school has an adequate supply of school professionals (e.g. social workers, school psychologists).